sebaceous gland

duo exhibition by Liat Danieli and Tal Rosen-Eliezer

HaHanut Gallery-Theater, Tel Aviv.

Curator: Tali Kayam.

2017

For the exhibition, Danieli and Rosen-Eliezer transformed the gallery into a hybrid environment in which plants appeared to produce and release milk. The installation explored the relationship between nourishment, secretion, the body, and the living systems of plants, questioning the assumption that milk is necessarily a source of nourishment.

The gallery’s structural support column was transformed into a dripping milk gland inspired by rubber trees and their milky latex. The artists carved into the column and placed a bowl beneath it to collect the continuous drip. Across the right-hand storefront, a dense network of aerial roots covered the window, from which figs and sycamore fruits emerged. These fruits appeared to secrete a milky substance of their own, turning the gallery into an uncanny botanical organism.

The exhibition opened with a performance conceived as a ritual of ingestion. Visitors were given figs containing small test tubes filled with goat’s milk. A bacterial-cellulose mask was placed over each participant’s nose, altering their sense of smell and introducing the scent of honey. Participants were instructed to drink the goat’s milk, hold it in their mouths, and then eat the fig.