YAEL IZRAI

With movement and dappled curiosity, Yael Izrai’s art practice is both confrontational and feminine. Her rhapsodic prints and sculptures show the work of a musically attuned visual artist: hands in position to play piano chords dance across many of her pieces posing a recurrent theme of musicality and song. Using her multimedia talents to depict her musings and reflections on the earth and its people, Izrai plays with different mediums, textures and modalities to find what matches her mood and that of which she intends to portray.

Reverberations of Klimt, Picasso, and Magritte become apparent in her works: arching figures, living sculptures, apples, and pomegranates are recurring themes across her pieces. Beginning as a means to express difficult emotions, Izrai’s art practice has evolved into one that inquires the big questions in life, which are the focus of her most recent series. Izrai immigrated from Russia to the United States—her influences reflect a global perspective spanning across cultures and time periods, which range from spiritual to artistic to cultural. By reflecting these foundational episodes of humanity, Izrai’s work asks the viewer to consider where we come from and why we are here. Izrai lives and works on Long Island, New York.

My paintings are often allegorical depictions of my feelings and reactions to the world. The initial impulse must be elaborated into a clear idea, and from that idea an image can be born. This process can be almost instantaneous, or take several months or years.

There are mediums that are especially dear to me, namely ceramics, but the desire to explore has led me to study printmaking, painting, and mixed media. I am currently very attracted to mixed media, because it gives me a multidimensional palette.

The subjects of my paintings vary greatly, but there are overarching questions connecting them all: Why are we humans on Earth? How can we achieve harmony of soul, body, thoughts, and actions? I believe that art should tell what it can of an ideal truth. Though this truth cannot be seen, some of its beauty can. Whether my work is born from joy or pain, my goal is to make that beauty seen. I seek to create artworks which are tuning forks for the soul, to help the onlooker find harmony amid chaos, and discover something essential in themselves.

ORIGINAL YAEL IZRAI

ARTWORKS ON

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