Felix Kris

10/09/78
tel-aviv israel

photographer

My work focuses on what could be called social documentary. I feel that due to my foreignness in Israel I still wish to analyze, through my photos, Israels social mosaic. I believe the need to document stems from my attempts to understand and adopt the new society I was thrown into. My last exhibition though deals with my home-community and it is named Houses. It documents apartments of previous U.S.S.R citizens, currently living in Israel, and their way of expressing both their otherness and wish to be accepted in Israel.

My name is Felix Kris and I am a 29 years old student from Ashkelon, Israel. I was born in Kharson, a small city in Ukraine, and came to Israel with my parents and older brother when I was 11. Since childhood I was encouraged by my mother to express myself through art. She was both a pianist and a director of a puppet theatre in Ukraine, and her dream was that I will succed creating my own art.
Since immigrating to Israel things changed, and my parents were needed to work hard in non-artistic positions. Moreover, I neglected my dreams and started working from the age of sixteen as a dish-washer, waiter and barman. It was not until the age of 24 that I could afford the tuition fees of an Israeli art school. I started studying photography at Camera Obscurer Art School in Tel-Aviv. It was the first time in my life I held a camera and I was thrilled from this experience. Unfortunately, after three years the school I studied in was closed. Nevertheless, I decided to finish my studies and was accepted by the Minshar Art School and Art Center in Tel-Aviv, and graduated in 2007 with merit.

My work focuses on what could be called social documentary. I feel that due to my foreignness in Israel I still wish to analyze, through my p...