Rook of Heroes

was first presented to the public at the solo exhibition “Heroes and Monsters” in 2021. This work is distinguished by its massiveness and ponderous stillness. It depicts a line of oarsmen, and looking at them the viewer feels the full weight of their condition, in both a literal and a metaphorical sense. The focus of the composition is not on the oarsmen’s faces—their heads are lowered—but on their backs, covered with lash scars. Seeing their muscular bodies and the helmets removed at their feet, one may infer that we are looking at soldiers who were captured and enslaved. “Rook of Heroes” is the sculptor’s meditation on the duality of “good and evil,” “hero and slave,” and on the slipperiness and vulnerability of these notions. While for some, the warriors are heroes, for others they are men under compulsion, carrying out others’ orders. History is not an exact science, and the memory of peoples is malleable. Unfortunately, in some communities what was evil yesterday can be recast today as a heroic deed. And one of humanity’s tasks is not only to draw lessons from the past, but also to prevent that past from being kneaded into putty in the hands of the powerful.