Haran Kislev

Painter, Kibbutz Be’eri, Israel

See his work on his website and Instagram

For years, I have been an artist who paints the essence of fear. My canvases are a reflection of the landscape which embodies the region we refer to as Otef Gaza, the surroundings of Gaza.

Within my brush strokes, I've captured the terrain surrounding me – Gaza, a mere few hundred meters away, and my beloved Kibbutz, Be’eri, where I and my two children first drew breath. The roads between them and us have been imbued with the ever-present anxiety that shadows our lives.

These surroundings have haunted my psyche for years, offering me little solace. Yet, there's an unusual alchemy when you choose to paint fear; a momentary surrender, a release of the darkness that resides within one's thoughts and imagination. It's as if, by giving voice to this fear, a small sliver of light is allowed to permeate.
But this respite is fleeting and tightly controlled. Once the canvas fully expresses my profound unease, the episode concludes. I return to my family, my children, my wife, and my daily reality. Everything, it seems, is well, secure, and whole, and I am granted a moment of relief.

Then, one fateful Saturday, everything unraveled. In an instant, I realized how feeble my imagination truly was. Even as an artist who prides himself on his ability to conjure images, I had not ventured far enough into the depths of the unimaginable. Reality served as a stern teacher, revealing my innocence and lack of creativity. Who could anticipate the need to implore one's children for silence, for stillness, as shots echoed all around us? Every moment held the weight of life or death, hinging on the slightest sound or movement. My imagination had been strikingly naive.

Terrorists pounded on my door, and I, in desperation, pushed a heavy cabinet against it and turned off the lights. I felt as though I had stumbled into a scene from a macabre horror film. Each minute felt impossibly long, each moment teetering on the edge. For my children, my wife, and myself, it was a matter of survival. Hours dragged on, endless hours, every minute felt like an eternity, accompanied by the cacophony of screams, suffering, and death right outside our doorstep. Miraculously, we endured. My brother, a beacon of hope, encountered soldiers en route to our kibbutz and rescued me, Sivan, my son Carmi (10 years old), and my daughter Bari (7 years old), as well as my sister and grandmother.

The stories continue to unfold, each one more harrowing than the last. I prefer to keep them locked away in the recesses of my mind, buried in the expanding darkness. I cannot find the words to chronicle the aftermath, for I fear that it might unleash the reality lurking in the shadows, and will no longer have the strength to grasp the door handle as it swings open.
 
Haran