Common Views: Sourcing Water
Site-Specific Project
As part of the Common Views art initiative, Dan Farberoff and fellow artist David Behar Perahia worked in 2019-20 in the region of the Israeli desert town of Arad and the nearby Bedouin settlements, invited by the Arad Contemporary Art Center.
The communities that inhabit this area of the eastern Negev Desert, west of the Dead Sea, all share a common desert landscape, and yet, there exists between them, in very close geographical proximity, a great disparity and civil inequality and an inequity in the allotment of and access to resources. The artists utilized the theme of Water as a Scarce Resource to reflect on this distributive imbalance in a hyper-arid region, addressing the social and political in the context of a wider discussion on environment and sustainability. In order to address these they incorporated into their vision a grassroots plan to create a Biosphere Reserve in the area, developed in consultation with environmental researchers of the Technion Israel Institute of Technology, Beersheba and Jerusalem’s Hebrew universities, as well with GIS experts Terravision Lab.
An essential part of the project involved public participation in art events to bring together the various communities in the region and encourage local engagement with the project themes. In consultation with representatives of the local Bedouin community, these arts actions revolved around the revival of traditional water harvesting techniques.
Throughout the project’s duration the artists initiated a number of site-specific art interventions exploring the project themes. The concluding exhibition Common Views: Sourcing Water, showed at the Arad Contemporary Arts Center between June and December 2020, consisting of artworks created using material collected during the project, digital mediation of the project themes, documentation of art actions, many hours of interviews with local community members and a “Dreaming Space” consisting of maps and research material presenting the vision for a Biosphere Reserve in the region and inviting visitors to engage with the subject and to contribute their own ideas.
Collected raw materials were transformed by the artists into site-specific, formalistic compositions, spilling into the public space outside the art center. The artworks included sculptures, created in collaboration with local women, Bedouin & Jewish, video and sound installations, drawings and photographic works. These explored the topics of water in the desert, the control and distribution of resources, conservation and the relationship between inhabitants and the landscape. The artworks made use of materials used by the Bedouins, corresponding to the reality of water distribution between the city and its surrounding communities.
