This work is of a golden-copperish hue, and it consists of five slabs, which create a festive atmosphere. We see five worshipping figures standing around the Menora, which is made up of stylized Hebrew letters. The branches of the Menora are in the form of a bulb and a flower, according to Biblical specifications. The figures are dressed in robes, and seem to grow right out of the letters below them, this growth suggesting the ascent from the earthly sphere into the realm of the spiritual through the worship of the Menora, which was housed in the Temple’s ‘Holy of Holies’. This may be the Menora from the Arch of Titus, which has seven branches and a foundation evoking the steps that the High Priest would climb to place the candles.
The figures are arranged like two mirrored couples, with a fifth individual to their left. Are these the priests who were permitted to enter the Holy place, since the Holy of Holies was reserved for the High Priest? The figures are human ones, of ambiguous gender, and this makes them universal. The transition from the earthly to the spiritual reaches its zenith in the whole golden balls. Castel, with his unparalleled technical mastery, used copper oxide, which he spread over the black, moist basalt to achieve the silvery and golden hue that he sought. Turquoise stones from Timnah were used to imbue the artwork with flashes of oxidized copper, creating the look and feel of an ancient, aged thing.
This masterpiece was preceded by another work, given by Moshe Castel to his wife Bilha on her fiftieth birthday in 1972 (this piece, too, is part of the Museum collection and permanent exhibition). These two works, in turn, are connected to a third masterwork, The Golden Scroll, created by Castel for the Israeli President’s House. All three pieces feature figures made up of metal wires, with a long-limbed, airy design, recalling the sculptures of Alberto Giacometti (with whom Castel had shared a studio in Paris for some twelve years).
Literature:
Moshe Castel. Retrospective Exhibition, 1928–1973 (The Tel Aviv Museum of Art, 1974), cat. 131.
Castel. Works from the Collection (Maale-Adummim: The Moshe Castel Museum of Art, 2018), p. 33.
