Venus Gathering Onions

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We are looking at a sculpture entitled Venus Collects Onions, by the artist Eli Shamir, a third-generation resident of Kfar Yehoshua. The sculpture was created in 2020 and cast in bronze. During the first stage of work, the artist made the sculpture out of clay, and looking closely, one can see his handprints impressed in the material. 

The sculpture shows a young female figure bending toward the ground and collecting onions from the earth with her hands. Growing onions was a common branch of agriculture at Kfar Yehoshua for many years. Harvesting the onions involved strenuous physical labor during the hot summer days, and all of the family members went to work.

Eli Shamir’s sculpture is in honor of the female agricultural workers, and is dedicated to the first generation of female pioneers in the valley. With their hard work, the women played an important role in the history of the labor-based settlements, and their role was not adequately presented in the annals of history. The figure’s sitting position is reminiscent of the marble sculpture, The Crouching Venus, from the ancient Greek period.

About the sculpture and the process of its creation, artist Eli Shamir shares:

“This piece is in honor of the female pioneers of the Jezreel Valley, who were forgotten on the way, and in honor of today’s female agricultural workers, and agricultural work in general. The model for the sculpture is Noy Perach, who is the granddaughter of a female pioneer from the Jezreel Valley as well as the daughter of a Thai woman who married a resident of Kfar Yehoshua.

Another thing that the sculpture expresses, from my perspective, is an expansion of the definition of an Israeli - to include the Thai aspect, but also as a critique of the masculinity aspect, as expressed in the Nimrod sculpture. This is a different way of looking at the world and at nature. Nimrod is a man, a ruler, with a bird of prey, conquering the world. A hunter. He has a bird that has descended from above, from the heavens, a force controlling the ground from above, if you will. But she crouches on the soil, this is the feminine option, removing the onions from the earth and knowing that an onion has many layers. When you peel it, you shed tears.

The sculpture is made of clay and was made primarily from photographs. I photographed the model 12 times from all angles, 360 degrees, as well as one enlarged image of her profile. Using these photos, I crafted the sculpture. After it was sculpted in clay, a process that took about six months, a bronze casting was made of the sculpture, more or less natural-sized.

I collected onions, first of all as a child, and then as a teenager on the farm. It is very hard work, done at the end of summer, at the hottest time. I used this imagery, this subject as early as the eighties, in order to express a type of connection to the soil. This specific sculpture was preceded by two paintings of the same Noy Perach collecting onions, and then I decided to make it into a sculpture as well. This is the first sculpture that I ever created.”