DELUGE
Gallery Director:
Endo Kazuo
Inquiries about works: LOKO GALLERY
Shown first at:
LOKO Gallery: 11/4- 10/5 Tokyo, Japan, 2025.
Solo Exhibition
Year:
2025
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Eyal Segal / “DELUGE” To exhibit is to create a moment - a space where time slows, where images and ideas resonate beyond their physical forms. An exhibition is not merely a collection of works but a temporary constellation, a dialogue between what is presented, the space that contains it, and the individuals who experience it.
In today’s rapidly shifting world, both internally and externally, we are confronted with instability, uncertainty, and a heightened awareness of our collective vulnerability. The global landscape has undergone a profound transformation, retreating from openness toward a more enclosed, nationalistic stance. Wars and prolonged conflicts have become normalized, and unsettling events remind us of the precarious state of global security. In Israel, a country historically accustomed to upheaval, these challenges feel particularly acute. Against this backdrop, the act of exhibiting takes on new significance - not as a direct political statement but as a reflection on the role of time, space, and perception in moments of uncertainty.
The works in this exhibition revolve around cycles - of movement, of water, of time.
'All men and women are prophets', 2021, Ready-made LED Sign, running text, 59×12 cm
ONCE THERE WAS A GRAVE HERE, 2021
HD Video-Performance, 8'00"
Sound by: Nir Jacob Younessi
(Filmed in Jaffa, Israel)
“Once There Was a Grave Here” is the trace of a poetic action, filmed in 2012 on Eliezer Ben Yossi Street in Jaffa.
A man and a woman, dressed in festive Hasidic clothing, enter the stripped, wounded street and lie down upon the exposed earth.
At some point, the woman rises and walks away. The man remains, still.
The performance took place atop an archaeological excavation—an open wound in the city, where graves may have once been, and where construction was soon to bury the past beneath concrete.
In this fragile moment, the figures awaken what lies beneath the sand, the matter, the memory of soil.
The central video piece LEVIATHAN unfolds in an underground water reservoir in Japan (Kasukabe Underground Flood Protection Tank, Saitama) used for the collection of flood water. The video is divided into three chapters and three days, which parallel states of escape, survival, and prophecy. Running through the depths, the artist’s figure appears to have been swallowed by its loneliness deep within the unconscious, repeating the same actions in an endless loop. The tragic figure of the Prophet Jonah inspired this work and serves as its main axis. The architectural labyrinth serves as a “tomb” or “womb,” a primeval sphere that enables flight yet does not provide a respite.
The video piece, DELUGE, captures a figure in continuous rotation, a motion both infinite and constrained. The sound, composed by Yitzhak Shushan, reinforces this sense of suspended rhythm, where time is both measured and elusive. The circle - a recurring motif - evokes clocks, rituals, and the unspoken rules that govern change, return, and expectation.
Alongside the video, large and small-scale paintings depict the sea - frames of shifting waves, half-abstract and half-real, devoid of human presence. These images do not document reality but rather suggest possibilities, inviting contemplation on presence and absence, on the uncertainty of what lies ahead.
LEVIATHAN, 2020
HD-Video Performance, 25’00”
(Filmed in Kasukabe Underground Flood Protection Tank, Saitama, Japan)
In the video performance “Leviathan,” the place is a subterranean water reservoir in Japan, which serves to collect floodwater. The tragic figure of the Prophet Jonah serves Segal as a source of inspiration. the artist’s figure is revealed crying out loud as he runs through a labyrinth of endless rooms, past vast pillars and puddles of murky water. Running about in the depths appears to be swallowed into the unconscious, repeating itself in an endless loop. A powerful echo answers his cries, confirming the artist’s solitude and his isolation from human society.
The architectural labyrinth serves as a “tomb/womb,” a primeval space that allows for escape yet does not provide a respite. The whale is an ancient cultural symbol surrounded by numerous myths, stories, and beliefs. The video work Leviathan unfolds over three days, which parallel the stages of flight, survival and prophecy. The three days obviously call to mind the death of Jesus and the three days spent in the tomb prior to his resurrection, as well as the last chapters of Herman Melville’s masterpiece Moby Dick, published in 1851, whose subtitle is The Whale: “The Chase – First Day,” “The Chase – Second Day,” and “The Chase – Third Day.” The figure of Captain Ahab, the novel’s protagonist, who is chasing the whale, parallels that of the artist running to and from in the whale’s entrails. Like Jesus and Jonah, these figures represent an existential state of human restlessness.
Lighthouse
HD video, 14:20 min
Music performed by: Roy Amotz
Toru Takemitsu – Air
Joji Yuasa – Mai-Bataraki II (for alto flute)
A new video performance premiered in 2018, filmed in Inubōsaki, Chiba. The video poetically depicts the sea and water, with long shots of ships passing by the famous lighthouse. The work focuses on the movement of the water, connected to the music of two Japanese composers, performed by Israeli flutist Roy Amotz (living and working in Berlin). The visual language of the video draws from the sensation of a waking dream, where time seems suspended, and the water takes on an almost surreal quality. The movements of the waves and the ships are mirrored in the fluid, cyclical rhythm of the music, creating a dreamlike atmosphere that blurs the boundaries between the conscious and the unconscious.
Toru Takemitsu – Air (1994): Composed during the final year of Takemitsu's life, Air embodies the Japanese aesthetic concept of Ma—the space between sounds and movements. The work expresses a sense of serenity, peace, and acceptance, with pauses and rests that are as integral to the music as the movement itself.
Joji Yuasa – Mai-Bataraki II (for alto flute) (1987): Mai refers to a slow, circular dance originating from Shinto rituals and agricultural festivals. Yuasa's piece mimics the fluid gestures of a dancer, and the music is choreographed to evoke an ethereal, almost ritualistic atmosphere. The piece was composed with the idea of creating a deep connection between human and divine realms, accompanied by traditional instruments.
DELUGE, 2023
4k Video-performance, 72 min
(Filmed in Israel, 2023)
Original music and sound by: Issac Shushan
Cinematographer: Ira Prohorova
Sound mix: Andrey Orenstein
A new video performance unfolds on a freshly painted school football field, where the artist engages with systems of symbols and familiar rules drawn from the field’s own language: tracing its painted lines, circling the center circle, playing with a ball, and donning attire that suggests ritual or festivity.
The movement is whimsical, circular, and repetitive. Gradually, the figure seems to dissolve into the blue-and-white surface.
The action echoes ancient gestures—drawing a circle like Honi HaMe’agel, waiting for a sign from the heavens, and conjuring the story of Noah’s Ark, adrift in the great flood. This reference not only imbues the video with themes of isolation, prophecy, and survival, but also bridges it to the accompanying painting series, all bearing the shared title Deluge.
The work lingers in the space between expectation and hope, protest and prophecy—its atmosphere shaped by a unique rhythm and soundscape composed by Issac Shushan.
In the Japanese concept of 間 (MA), emptiness is not merely a void but a profound, meaningful interval - a pause between moments, a space where perception shifts, and transformation unfolds. In many ways, an exhibition embodies MA - the silent gaps between the artworks, between the viewer and the work, between the past, the present, and what has yet to come. It is not just about the content but also about what lies in between: the quiet rhythm of stillness, the unsaid, and the anticipation of revelation.
To exhibit is to acknowledge the impermanence of existence. The installation arises briefly, then fades, leaving only echoes. Yet, in that fleeting moment, a new space is created - a space where viewers step away from the relentless flow of everyday life and enter a different rhythm. It is a moment to reflect, to immerse, to pause between past and future, and to consider the meaning of what remains.
