This trail starts here

Yaël Artsi was born in Morocco and immigrated to Israel aged 21. She studied at the Avni Institute of Art and Design in Tel Aviv, and in Paris with the famous sculptor Etienne Martin and at Cola Marini’s studio. She graduated the Academy des Beaux-Arts, Paris, in 1975. Yaël creates both huge monumental objects as well as smaller, intimate pieces. Childhood influences from her native Morocco often infiltrate her sculptures.

Artsi uses materials such as stone, basalt (e.g. Yitzhak Rabin memorial in city hall, Tel Aviv), granite, metal, and wood. She curates and organizes the International Sculpture Peace Garden in Israel and Denmark. Her outdoor monumental sculptures can be found throughout Israel, and internationally in The Netherlands, Poland, Geneva, Osaka, Spain and Buenos Aires. Artsi lives on Kibbutz Sdot-Yam.

Vision comprises two elements: A metal bird soaring from a 12-ton mass of natural basalt rock. As the sculpture is built from latticed stainless steel bars, it does not obscure the view and merges with the environment. The basalt stone symbolizes the ancient, a starting point, and flight symbolizes the first condition for the evolution of science.

The sculpture was commissioned in tribute to Dr Irwin and Joan Jacobs on the naming of the Graduate School.