Portrait by Hadar Mitz
BIO
Joy Bernard is a writer, performer, dancer and multidisciplinary artist living and working between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
She has performed and exhibited her works in various exhibitions, festivals and venues throughout Israel, such as: Machol Shalem Dance House; The Ramat Gan Museum of Art; Hanut Theater; Jerusalem Fringe Festival; Poalot Festival for Dance, Performance and Multidisciplinary Art at the Alfred Institute for Art and Culture; Tel Aviv Artists’ Studios; Beit Kandinof Gallery and more.
Since 2014, Joy has been a journalist and critic, specializing in visual arts, performance and dance. She also writes essays and poetry. Joy’s writing is regularly published in English and in Hebrew by publications such as: literary magazine Granta, Haaretz, The Jerusalem Post, Times of Israel, The Art Newspaper, TimeOut, Flash Art, Collectors Agenda and Erev Rav.
Joy is an art and dance correspondent for Israeli online magazine Portfolio, where she publishes a column titled “Studio Talks.”
ARTIST STATEMENT
I am a movement and body artist. I create in performance, dance, physical and visual theater, writing, video and sound. I enjoy moving between the different artistic mediums or merging them all together. I was born in Tel Aviv in 1996, and raised in Israel, Germany and the United States. The plurality and frequent shift in cultures, countries and languages I have experienced in my upbringing all find their way into my works, in which I explore the philosophy of language and attempt to bridge between spoken language, written language and the language of the body.
My pieces usually begin with a semantic question, which turns into a performative research. The body in motion and the written word are the two axes around which my artistic practice revolves. Inspired by a phrase or triggered by words I read or write, I then attempt to embody, break down, analyze and reconstruct their meanings via choreographic and theatrical scores. Literature, poetry and psychoanalysis are the theoretical foundations that anchor my work. I consider myself a storyteller, and use the three languages at my disposal – Hebrew, English and movement – to tell autobiographical and universal stories about immigration, identity, sexuality, love and an ongoing search for a home.
