The Orange as an expression for the tattered Israeli-Palestinian society appears in new contexts in Nadia Perlov's (* 1990, Tel Aviv) video Lost PARDESS - Maybe Paradise, thus dealing in an abstract way with the recent history of the Israeli-Palestinian region. The use of fragments from historical cultural productions creates a visual and musical collage that questions cultural realities by experimenting with the underlying concepts.

The orange is a symbol of Israeli national pride, but at the same time stands for destruction, pain, and suffering, resulting from the Israeli-Palestinian history. The artist touts the special qualities of the citrus fruit, in doing so she appears to be the protagonist of an absurd advertising show. Nadia Perlov uses quotations from Israeli advertising slogans, children's books, pop songs and theater shows which address the topic of the Israeli orange.

Already the title Lost PARDESS- Maybe Paradise refers to the ambivalence of the oranges symbolism. In Persian, Arabic, and Hebrew “Pardess† means orange gardens - but the lost orange garden of the title also bears the simultaneous possibility of a paradise. The image of the "Golden Apple" of Israel began in the early 20th century in the British colony of Palestine, where Arab and Jewish people lived and worked together as neighbors and business partners. Both communities cooperated in the orange fields of the port city of Jaffa, today Tel-Aviv-Jaffa. Presumably, this was a result of the British vision that there would be a communal life under their administration. The idea of the colonial rulers of a social cooperation found its symbolic expression in the orange, which should be brought to Europe as a sign of modernity and quality.

After the proclamation of the State of Israel in 1948, this collective memory of community and equality was forgotten. The new Israeli state took over the orange fields to redefine the production of the Jaffa oranges and developed it as an Israeli brand.

About the artist /
After her training as a dancer in Tel Aviv and Rotterdam Nadia Perlov (*1990, Tel Aviv) studied until 2015 at the Bezalel Academy for Arts and Design in Jerusalem and until 2017 at the Städelschule Frankfurt am Main in the class of Judith Hopf.