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Israel Presents an Agam Artwork as a Gift to the IAEA
	On September 23, 2004 Israel presented to the IAEA a multidimensional image created by the internationally renown Israeli artist and pioneer of Kinetic Art Yaacov Agam. The artwork, a four dimensional kinetic image entitled "From Darkness to Light" represents the power of energy and the aspiration towards peace. The Israeli Ambassador to the IAEA, Dr. Gabriella Gafni, presented the artwork as a gift to the Agency in recognition of the IAEA's important contributions in promoting safe, secure and peaceful nuclear energy. About The Image - From Darkness to Light The artwork is a celebration of colors, shapes and motion. Created by the Israeli artist Yaacov Agam, the image can be viewed from six different angles. Using complex, seemingly scientific combinations of shapes and colors, Agam created a multitude of images and illusions, each meeting the viewer at his particular vantage point also known as "polymorphic painting" (polymorph). The elements appear and disappear; the viewer never sees the entire image at one time. This piece of art enables the viewer to interact, explore and stretch his own view. The viewer has to move constantly and as he shifts his position, the image also transforms and never stays the same. The image represents the power of energy and the aspiration towards peace. The blue and yellow colors in the image symbolize the colors of radiation, transition from Non-Existence to Being and from Darkness to Light. About the Artist - Yaacov Agam Yaacov Agam is an Israeli painter, sculptor and experimental artist born in 1928. He is best known as the pioneer of the Kinetic Art movement. Agam was educated at the Bezalel School of Art in Jerusalem, and at the Atelier d'Art Abstrait in Paris. He has dedicated his creative life to the exploration of the diverse relationships between art and science. Best known for his four-dimensional images and sculptures, Agam is wholly dedicated to art in motion that integrates the fourth dimension of time as a major factor. His works express a concept that breaks away with the established way of viewing reality in a limited or static way. In his work, he strives to demonstrate the principle of reality as a continuous "becoming" rather than a static "graven image." Among the awards he has received are a special prize for art research at the Sao Paulo Bienal in 1963, and first prize at the International Festival of Painting at Cagnes-surmer in 1970. Agam has had one man exhibitions at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, the Mus?e National d'Art Mod?rne in Paris, and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam and at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. His work can be found in the collections of many museums, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the Joseph Hirshhorn Collection in Washington, D.C.	text text text text text text