Improv@halas.am Track

Experimental
Israel Ohad Fishof Not Having to
Decide who I amExperimental Israel continues its journey on its 23rd
installation with an artist that, through his work, manages to perfectly embody
the ethos of experimentation. Ohad Fishof is perhaps still best known in the Israeli
music scene as the front man of the mythical 90s rock group – Nosei Hamigbaat.
In its own accord, Nosei Hamigbaat presented an experimental twist within the
pop genre, and indeed with its disbandment some of its members turned towards
more esoteric artistic realms. This is especially true for Fishof, who, since,
has been affiliated with multidisciplinary work seeming to dwell comfortably
between the avant-garde and pop. To those acquainted with Fishof this comes as
no surprise, as his career includes training as dancer alongside his musical
output. And indeed, a meeting with a sample piece by Fishof, whether
installation, dance performance, or pure music, seems always to present a work veering
towards a meeting point between different mediums and forms of expression. Another aspect of Fishof’s work is a trademark at “world making”. I
compare this tendency to a similar one to be found in the work of David Lynch,
claiming that there, too, is to be found an abundance of detail leading one
towards a feeling of meaning, yet a tendency to keep this meaning opaque.
Fishof’s reaction is in claiming that he, as an artist, tends to listen to
different types of reason, and attempts to shape these supposed meanings into
forms. Meaning, continues Fishof, is a consequence of interaction, yet one that
the artist can formulate without fully understanding. He relates this practice
to his love of exoticism and science fiction, both of which present us a
reflection of ideas and potential meanings that are very hard to explain
vis-à-vis one’s own culture. This same train of thought finds itself entering
frequently into Fishof’s works, where, according to him, he attempts to imagine
different realities or a different “me”, as he terms it. For Fishof, Experimentation and self
are two interconnected ideas creating a whole. One’s own research of self
requires experimentation with one’s “peaks” – a term borrowed from the world of
audio. A peak value is the highest voltage a waveform will ever reach.
Transferable to audio, the peak represents the utmost amplitude an audio device
can produce. The RMS value (i.e. root-mean-square) is the effective value of
the total waveform, or its mean in terms of audio. Using this analogy, Fishof
identifies experimentation with one’s own artistic “peaks” as a means to
enhance the RMS. This idea sends us into a discussion of Fishof’s creation
practices and unfolds his current work on a new album, which attempts to
encompass an array from pop songs to abstract forms. We also discover in him a
fascination and firm belief in processes – a space in which a sometimes mundane
idea can become a wonderful piece, and this only due to the rigour to which the
idea was subjected. On one hand, Fishof immediately seems like a critical artist,
aware of his artistic surroundings with which he is in an ongoing discourse.
The other side presents us with Fishof the teacher, who realises the importance
of a non-critical practice for art students, as well as his students of Gaga  - the movement language and pedagogy
developed by the Israeli choreographer, Ohad Naharin. The latter presents a
practice that does not seek to be validated by the culmination in artistic
expression. However, Fishof also recognizes a personal attraction with another
dance practice, namely the dance language invented by Noa Eshkol that, to him, represents a
meeting point between life practice and artistic expression.






























At the conclusion of our interview I
enter with Fishof into a direct discussion regarding experimentalism, and why
he personally believes his art tends, more often than not, to choose that
direction: As a teenager in Jerusalem of the 80s, Fishof was confronted with
more than a few examples of multidisciplinary art (Fishof mentions Laurie
Anderson, Meredith Monk, The Residents, etc.) that didn’t proclaim themselves
as avant-garde, rather maintained or even paraded their pop status. Fishof
claims that the times were probably ripe for the underlying understanding
claiming that the avant-garde, too, can become traditional. Hence, Fishof, as a
product of his time, grew up thinking that music is an experimental art, and
more so, allows one to not have to decide exactly who s/he is or where s/he
stands. It was a pop art that didn’t seek to adhere to a setting or framework,
as well as resounded a loud no to definition.