Museum Brot und Kunst Forum Welternährung Salzstadelgasse 10, 89073 Ulm

What Values Are We Defending?
What day-to-day and ritualistic rites do we perform and why? In which actions do culture, nation, and religion manifest themselves? The work of the Israeli artist Shahar Marcus revolves around these and similar questions. He always uses his own body as the primary artistic medium in his instalations, videos, and performances. Dough and  bread are also key ingredients of his work. Dough and bread have a substantial physical presence. They are at once both formless and malleable, sticky and chewy, shaped and sensuous. They have taste and smell and shifting textures. They can be handled as objects external to the human body, or they can be consumed and incorporated into the body. Moreover, dough and bread contain many layers of symbolism. As a product that is thousands of years old, bread is deeply imbued with religious, ritual, and cultural connotations. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, Enkidu must
eat bread to become human, and in the Christian Lord‘s Supper, bread represents the body of God and is eaten as a symbol of resurrection. Shahar Marcus plays with such associations and invites his audience to reflect on culture and everyday life. Although dealing with heavy, existential themes, Shahar Marcus negotiates the subject matter in a humorous and ironic way that is uniquely his own.