Tigist Yoseph Ron
YAYA
January 09 – February 22, 2025
Fridman Gallery is honored to present Tigist Yoseph Ron’s debut solo exhibition in the United States. The exhibition includes new paintings alongside Ron’s signature charcoal-and-eraser drawings. While her work often explores themes of motherhood and femininity, YAYA shifts focus, capturing the complex emotional dissonance between the artist and her late father. Through layering and erasing, Ron reclaims her memory and childlike perspective, observing her father from a distance and tracing their estranged connection.
Tigist Yoseph Ron primarily works with natural charcoal on paper, drawn to its softness and simplicity. Working in black and white allows her to focus on narrative, emotion, and light. Her work centers on themes of femininity and motherhood, often beginning with someone close to her. As the process unfolds, individual identities become abstracted to highlight movement, rhythm, and the interplay of shapes—sometimes guided by how light falls on the figure or by a strong emotional response.
Ron immigrated to Israel in 1984 during Operation Moses, her personal history deeply informs her artistic practice, which often reflects the experiences of the Ethiopian-Jewish community and the complexities of displacement.
A graduate of the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in Jerusalem, Ron further honed her skills in drawing and painting at the Meyerhoff Art Education Center at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art and Hatahana Studio in Tel Aviv.