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Circle of Life: The Mystical Experience of the Wild Cat (1986)

Zadok Ben-David

metal, resin and pigments

Leamington Spa Art Gallery & Museum

Circle of Life: The Mystical Experience of the Wild Cat (1986)

© Zadok Ben David. Photo credit: Doug Atfield

Details

Classification:

Sculpture

Materials:

Resin, Metal, Pigment

Dimensions:

180 cm

Credit:

Donated by Eric and Jean Cass through the Contemporary Art Society, 2012

Ownership history:

Purchased from Benjamin Rhodes Gallery, London, 19 February 1988 by Eric and Jean Cass; by whom gifted to the Contemporary Art Society; presented to Leamington Spa Art Gallery & Museum, 13 August 2012

Zadok Ben-David spent his early years in Yemen and then Israel, and memories of strong sunlight casting crisp shadows and the fusion of Middle Eastern and Western cultures seep subliminally into his work. In Circle of Life: The Mystical Experience of the Wild Cat (1986) Ben-David has drawn the 'cage' in wire, which he has thickened by an application of resin, which in turn allowed him to create a textured surface. The caged cat was cut from wood and the surface similarly treated. An even larger related sculpture is at Limehouse Link, London, which was commissioned by London Docklands Development Corporation, in 1993. Again, a yellow figure lies behind a network of others. "There is no colour in Ben-David's art as direct and dramatic as the yellow he unleashes in The Mystical Experience of the Wild Cat. Curiously substantial and insubstantial at the same time, it is a colour, which plays tricks with your eyes. If most of Ben-David's recent work reveals a renewed commitment to his origins, nowhere is it more obvious than here that he is the son of a Yemeni goldsmith." (Januszczak, 1987)

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