Available via license: CC BY 4.0
Content may be subject to copyright.
Copyright © 2023 e Author(s). Published by Vilnius Gediminas Technical University
is is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.
org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author
and source are credited.
Creativity studies
ISSN 2345-0479 / eISSN 2345-0487
2023 Volume 16 Issue 1: 125–144
https://doi.org/10.3846/cs.2023.15533
*Corresponding author. E-mail: smarnin@gmail.com
CREATIVITY AS AN EXPERIENCE AND AS A COMPLEXITY:
VISUAL-NARRATIVE RESEARCH OF THE ARTWORKS OF
TSIPY AMOS GOLDSTEIN
Shahar MARNIN-DISTELFELD *
Department of Literature, Art and Music, Zefat Academic College, Jerusalem St. 11,
1320611 Zefat, Israel
Received 31 August 2021; accepted 2 November 2021
Abstract. is article focuses on the work Seven Private Skies (initiated in 2009) by the Israeli
artist, Tsipy Amos Goldstein. is is a series of large panels on which the artist has been paint-
ing and embroidering for fourteen years as her main occupation. e aim of the study was to
establish the meanings inherent in the work, which is a kind of multi-layered cryptograph, while
characterizing it in terms of creativity.
e research method combined visual-interpretive analysis with both a narrative-feminist para-
digm and with theories from the eld of creativity studies. e ndings showed that the series
“tells” through artistic means the artist’s personal story in a way that matches two denitions: cre-
ativity as an experience and creativity as a complexity. e article will discuss the characteristics
of the artist and artwork as an experience and then will present the paradoxes distinguishing the
work as complex: 1. Order versus chaos; 2. Love and home in the face of disintegration; 3.Cuts
versus connections and male versus female; 4. Understandable communication in the face of
conicting messages; 5. Star of David versus the Jewish yellow badge.
Keywords: complexity, creativity, experience, visual analysis, visual narrative.
Introduction
is article deals with the artistic series Seven Private Skies by Goldstein, living and working
in Kiryat Tiv’on, Israel.1 e series serves as a case study for exemplifying creativity, which
is dicult to qualify (Norton etal., 2013). It features seven large panels on which the artist
has been painting and embroidering for fourteen years, with the Panel 7 still in progress.
1 I would like to thank the artist for generously and openly sharing her life story letting me delve into her work. Her
thoughts and feelings greatly enlightened me while interpreting her art. All interviews mentioned in this article
were conducted at her home between April and September, 2021.
126 S. Marnin-Distelfeld. Creativity as an experience and as a complexity: visual-narrative research...
Recently the six panels were exhibited in a solo show at the Apter Barrer Arts Center in
Ma’alot-Tarshiha, Israel (curated by Shahar Marnin-Distelfeld) (Figure 1).2
e series serves as a kind of a “studio in action” where the artist works daily. It resembles
a multi-layered cryptograph, whose language is rich and intriguing, deliberately chaotic. e
initial assumption was that the series as a text requires a multidisciplinary research approach,
combining visual analysis with narrative research (Rose, 2016; Mannay, 2016, pp. 13–14). As
the study progressed, theories from the eld of creativity studies seemed compatible with the
investigation. us, the goal of the research was to decipher the meanings inherent in the
series while characterizing it as “creative”.
e research makes the claim that Seven Private Skies meets two main denitions of
the term creativity: creativity as an experience and creativity as complexity. e rst relies
on a general understanding of the artist’s mindset and on the work’s characteristics, while
the second is rooted in the analysis of the work, while cross-referencing data derived from
interviews with the artist. At the beginning of the article, the methodology and theoretical
background will be presented. en, the denition of creativity as an experience in relation
to Goldstein’s work will be introduced. Later, the ndings will be discussed while dening
the artwork in line with the denition of creativity as complexity.
1. A theoretical framework and methodology
In literature dealing with creativity there are dierent denitions of the term, depending on
the approaches and the elds studied (Simonton, 2018; Smith & Smith, 2017; Corazza, 2016;
Runco & Jeager, 2012). is current study focuses on denitions relating to the creator, the
process and the nature of the work itself, ignoring the question of a social denition as irrel-
evant (Brandt, 2021) since the series was only fully exhibited once, and has not been judged
or examined systematically by an audience or by professional critics.
e decision to explore this series using combined methodology, stemmed from the
initial understanding of the intensity of the artwork, which embodies the inner incompre-
hensible world of the creator. It seemed benecial to adopt a narrative paradigm (Spector-
Mersel, 2010, p. 45) involving a feminist approach (Zelermeier, 2010, pp. 106–107) in order
to create an optimal climate in which the story of the artist’s life would be freely recounted.
is paradigm has been combined with a method of visual analysis, based on the model
proposed by Rose (2016).
e series is characterized by thematic and stylistic chaos, a kind of complex and rich
cryptograph. e narrative paradigm that allows for in-depth conversations between re-
searcher and the artist, while tightening trust between them, shed a bright light on the oeu-
vre, in a way visual analysis alone would not suce. e narrative paradigm inquires for a
holistic strategy, examining not only what is being told but also how it is being told (Spector-
Mersel, 2010, p. 60). rough narrative analysis, signicant stages and events in the artist’s
life were explored as well as the cyclical manner of the life-story telling.
2
Two panels of the series were exhibited in e Mother Goddess (2019–2020, Haifa Museum of Art, Israel, curator:
Michal Shachnai Yakobi) within the exhibition cluster “Making History: Feminism in the Age of Trans-National-
ity” (sub-curator: Svetlana Ringold). I thank Shachnai Yakobi for introducing Goldstein to me.
Creativity Studies, 2023, 16(1): 125–144 127
Based on a feminist approach,3 the four characteristics that Zelermeier (2010, p. 108)
suggests for narrative-feminist research were maintained: reference to knowledge and emo-
tions, identity research, aspiration for empowerment and commitment to reection. A re-
spectful and collaborative environment was produced, where knowledge and feelings were
accumulated in a dialogical and transparent manner. Moreover, during the process that lasted
several months, contact between researcher and artist was kept, with the latter being able to
comment on this manuscript.
e study included six phases: 1. e hypothesis phase and the understanding that the
denition of the term creativity should be examined in relation to the series; 2. Visual analysis
of the work; 3. Mapping the visual data; 4. Receiving explanations from the artist; 5. In-depth
open interviews with the artist; 6. Synthesis of the interview data and the visual analysis
data into key themes of the work– a summary of the research ndings and a denition of
Goldstein’s creativity.
In the rst stage, various theories from the eld of creativity were read to decide on
the prism through which this term should be applied in this research. Out of the variety of
theories and denitions, two appeared suitable for the artist and the work: creativity as an
“experience” (Glăveanu & Beghetto, 2021) and creativity as “complexity” (Lambert, 2020).
In the second stage, a visual analysis of the works, which was based on Rose’s (2016) three
sites and modalities was executed. e site related to the production of the image included
an examination of the choice of format, materials and techniques and by the artist , since
they usually shed light on the creator’s inner world (Orbach, 2020, p. 59). In relation to the
production of the works– style, sources of inspiration and motivation were also examined.
Regarding the site of the image itself, its components were scrutinized: the content– what
is being described (Rose, 2016), which of the images are “readable” and which are obscure;
the style is the image realistic, surrealistic, naive, expressive, abstract, etc.; color and its place-
ment on the canvas together with its combination with other materials; the use of three em-
broidery techniques; space design or the illusion of space; whether the composition is open
or closed, the viewing angle given to the viewer; the relationship between visual images and
text and how the various texts are shaped.
In the third stage, the visual data was mapped: naming and interpreting the images,
checking their repetition and versions, cataloging the sources of texts and trying to gure out
the connections of the images to each other. e fourth step was receiving the artist’s explana-
tions regarding the images, the choice of materials and techniques and the organization of
the composition. However, since the works are organized in an unsystematic and deliberately
unclear way, in-depth conversations were necessary to discover some hidden contents.
e h stage was based on the narrative paradigm, including open-ended interviews.
Spector-Mersel (2010, p. 55) argues that “through storytelling we give meaning to our lives
and the world around us, ‘writing’ ourselves we create ourselves an identity and achieve a
sense of individual personality”. Following her, the study shows that Goldstein’s “writing” is
done through the work of art, as narrative-visual studies prove (Mannay, 2016, pp. 12–13).
is study treats the artwork as a narrative expressing signicant aspects of the creator’s
3
Similar studies I conducted using narrative-feminist approach are by Marnin-Distelfeld (2021, 2022).
128 S. Marnin-Distelfeld. Creativity as an experience and as a complexity: visual-narrative research...
personal life, while establishing meanings, transcending the personal to the socio-cultur-
al and even to human-universal realm. e narrative expressed orally provided a detailed
framework for the poetic artwork. is seemed compatible with the denitions of creativity
as a life experience and as a complexity. Glăveanu and Beghetto (2021, p. 75) explain that
“adopting experience as a lens to understand creativity rests in the fact that it necessarily
brings together person, product, process and context and anchors them all within the life of
actual people”.
Conversations with the artist were documented and analyzed to extract prominent
themes and ways of communication. en, the nal stage combined the oral documentation
with the ndings of the visual analysis. ese ndings, focusing on several detailed examples
from the artworks themselves, will be presented below.
2. Findings and discussion
2.1. Creativity as an experience: the uniqueness of the works
Goldstein’s series is exceptional. First, it is enormous in size: each panel is 301 x 206 cm.
Inspired by lectures on women artists in the history of art, Goldstein became motivated
to challenge gender perceptions of large-scaled works as representing the legacy of male
artists, versus art created by women, which has been classied as cra. Her art is, in a way,
a rebellious act. e panels are also exceptional in the richness of techniques, forms, gures
and colors created as a multi-layered work. eir anomaly also stems from the disorganized,
Figure 1. Tsipy Amos Goldstein. Panels 1–6. View from the exhibition Seven Private Skies
(2022, Apter Barrer Arts Center in Ma’alot-Tarshiha, Israel, curator: Shahar Marnin-Distelfeld)
(source: Shahar Marnin-Distelfeld)
Creativity Studies, 2023, 16(1): 125–144 129
deliberately chaotic cluster of images, some readable while others are not. On top of these
images she uses diverse styles of writing, containing quotes of well-known writers, alongside
phrases invented by her. “Creating the images comes from an inner need that is stronger
than me”, explains Goldstein. She believes that even if the viewer does not thoroughly un-
derstand the images, their eectiveness is conveyed at the initial level of absorption, below
the threshold of awareness.
e nature of Seven Private Skies expresses the four characteristics of “creativity” dened
by Glăveanu and Beghetto (2021, p. 77). First, it is open, not carried out according to an or-
derly and pre-tightened plan, subject to change. Second, it is non-linear in its development.
ird, it is multi-perspective, suggesting various interpretations derived from the richness of
detail. Fourth, the series is created without leaning on a specic school or genre.
Nevertheless, the unique style of the works does echo the genre of outsider art, starting
with art of the mentally handicapped and continuing with art made by self-taught artists
(Direktor, 2013). Goldstein states, “All my life I look at things as an outsider” and indeed she
ts the denition of an outsider artist, even if in part; although she studied art at in her youth,
she never graduated and began creating these works many years later, deliberately avoiding
ocial studies in order to “not belong to any teacher or school”. “Aer wandering through
museums and galleries, I realized that in art anything is allowed, and I was given the inner
strength to create. I felt I possessed a treasure, and why should I spoil it?”, she explains. And
indeed, studies show that creativity intensies in early stages of learning when it reaches its
maximum. However, when continuing to learn, creativity fades, probably due to the growing
commitment to established traditional knowledge (Lambert, 2020, p. 444).
e liberty the artist grants herself to create listening to an internal conversation, in which
the intellect, emotion and materials take part, produces a constant process of creativity. e
daily work, in which the artist is in a kind of “reverie”, a state in which she grants herself
with the permission to be and to create fully and freely, is in fact, Goldstein’s private studio.
Orbach (2020, p. 23) denes this situation, where all the conditions exist for the artist to have
dierent ways of expressing herself as a “permission”.
e language of Goldstein’s art can thus be anchored in the theory of Glăveanu and
Beghetto:
“a creative experience can be dened as novel person-world encounters ground-
ed in meaningful actions and interactions, which are marked by the principles of:
open-endedness nonlinearity, pluri-perspectives and future-orientation” (Glăveanu &
Beghetto, 2021, pp. 77–78).
Glăveanu and Beghetto propose to examine creativity by searching for these four markers,
using any compatible methodology. Later in the article, these elements will be discussed in
regards to Goldstein’s creativity.
One of Goldstein’s “person-world encounters” suggests the link of her art to feminist art
of the 1960s–1970s, especially the stream of decorative art, which challenged the dichotomy
between high art as masculine and low art as feminine (Dekel, 2013). is prism is relevant
when observing Goldstein’s work. For many generations, Western hegemony argued for the
superiority of Western artwork over other visual works, in which decorativeness occupied
a prominent place as an artistic value. In their signicant article “Art Hysterical Notions of
130 S. Marnin-Distelfeld. Creativity as an experience and as a complexity: visual-narrative research...
Progress and Culture”, feminist artists Jaudon and Kozlo (1978) have quoted statements by
modernists condemning decorativeness, such as Adolf Loos’ statement that “ornamentation
is a crime” (Dekel, 2013).
Artists of the decoration stream felt that this aesthetics matched the expressions of inner
female rhythms and feminine experiences deriving from the physicality of the woman’s body.
ree feminist thinkers have contributed to the conceptualization of female creation and the
body-related experience: Cixous (1976), Irigaray (1977), and Kristeva (1980). ey called on
women to create through their physical and passionate experiences characterizing their lives,
while formulating a feminine language.
Goldstein was familiar with their heritage: rst, the works are characterized by a multi-
plicity of materials, techniques, colors and shapes, which makes them aesthetically intense.
Second, it is evident that the images are in relation to each other in a kind of non-hierarchical
ow and it is impossible, for example, to separate image from background. e organization
is not dichotomous but integrated and cross-border. ird, Goldstein attests to her aspiration
to “respect” embroidery and elevate it to a high degree of art, to be perceived as supreme art
rather than as inferior to art made by male artists.
e artistic uniqueness, the desire to create alone at home not being inuenced by a spe-
cic artist, the low motivation to integrate into the art world– all echo Goldstein’s biography,
which was explored in the interviews: rstly, she was surprised when asked to talk about her
life, something she had never been asked to do before. She could not believe her life story
would shed light on her work in a way that would enrich her own identity as an artist. Her
narrative started with her telling about her infancy. At the age of three months, she was
transferred from her biological parents, Holocaust survivors who could not raise her, to an
orphanage. From there, she was moved to a foster home, where she grew up until the age
of nine. en, she was transferred with her biological brother, to a boarding school, where
she lived for ten years, until her high school graduation. e most powerful experience that
has accompanied her since her childhood is the loneliness and being forced to getal.ng in
conditions of constant uncertainty, without any parental support or love. is was a sentence,
she constantly repeated.
She later got married and had children, living peacefully with her healthy family. en,
Goldstein’s life trajectory changed again when she lost her husband in a plane crash and was
le to raise their three children alone. is event is highly demonstrated in the work: the
name of the series, Private Seven Skies echoes something of this groundbreaking event, sug-
gesting a blend of a personal meaning with a spiritual-metaphoric one. Seven is a typological
number, signicant in Judaism, science, and dierent cultures. e skies, or heavens– link
to Goldstein’s accident in which he fell from the sky to earth, while also connotes a spiritual
sphere. us, the works embody a world of meanings that is expressed poetically, spiritually,
rather than in a concrete or documentary way.
e experience of loneliness, whose two founding events are her delivery to an orphanage
and the death of her husband, is evident in the choice to create works alone, at home, without
any guidance, with almost no exposure to the world. e way the artist was talking about her
life emphasized the experience of her being unsociable, living a feedback-less life. e rst
Creativity Studies, 2023, 16(1): 125–144 131
title given by the artist to the series was General Disintegration4 suggesting a personal space
where she allowed herself to create in a fragmentary manner, an authentic and prolonged
release of thoughts and feelings put onto the canvas. At the same time, however, these are
not works that constitute a passive platform for adversity, but rather those that subtly and
sensitively involve discursive connections derived from culture and art, Judaism and science.
ese connections add meanings to the works, which join those embedded in her life story
itself (Shlasky & Alpert, 2006, pp. 223–224).
Mapping the main images and themes that emerged from them while cross-referencing
them with the interviews, led to a key principle for understanding the series: ambiguity,
contrast between values, or complexity. is nding was evident in the verbal narration as
well. e artist kept saying: “Reality is built from opposites, I am a woman of edges and my
thinking constantly lies on the edges”. is observation is consistent with Lambert’s diagnosis
that creative people tend to create between two opposing ends by mixing them in such a
way where they occur as a single bend in the work: “Creative people tend to operate either
simultaneously or dynamically at extremes along continua that are generally considered at
odds with one another” (2020, p. 431). Accordingly, I will seek to interpret Goldstein’s works
as creative, by placing ve contrasting elements, which constitute a complexity.
2.2. Creativity as complexity: ve contradictory elements in the artwork
2.2.1. Order versus chaos
Seven Private Skies seems like a spontaneous and unplanned cluster, but actually, the artist
works according to several rules that serve as a strict framework:
1. e format is the same for all panels and the technique used is oil painting and em-
broidery;
2. In all works, the color red appears in varying dose and is the only color that will stand
out compared to others;
3. e artist employs three embroidery types only: the knot style, lined embroidery cov-
ering a space of fabric and dot embroidery. is stems from a desire to maintain
stylistic restraint and “not get carried away with work that may resemble traditional
decorative embroidery”, in Goldstein’s words. Macramé embroidery is considered a
fourth type and appears as the artist’s signature in all panels;
4. Each of the panels was created in a certain period. e artist does not go back “correct-
ing” her work. However, since the works are hung side by side, she does make slight
additions when she feels like it, while previous panels always inspire the new ones,
therefore, back and forth artistic moves occasionally occur.
ese rules are in line with Glăveanu and Beghetto’s (2021, p. 2) denition of creativity.
ey explicitly argue that “lack of linearity” does not necessarily mean lack of advanced
planning of a framework, but rather giving meaning to steps and actions that go beyond
this framework: “<…> strong arguments have been advanced for examining the intrinsic
4 is was a title the artist Goldstein thought of when relating to her works during the years she was working on them.
She did not mention when exactly this title came up and when she decided to change it to Seven Private Skies.
132 S. Marnin-Distelfeld. Creativity as an experience and as a complexity: visual-narrative research...
messiness of creating, including the numerous back and forth movements specic for real-
life creative processes”.
In the works exists a marked contrast between images that represent and symbolize as-
pects of rationality and analytical thinking and those representing emotional sides. A promi-
nent key element demonstrating this contrast is the deceptive brain image (Figure 2). “e
brain is described as Earth, with everything spinning around it. e brain is the important
factor determining the individual’s unique world”, says Goldstein. “It becomes a maze, either
graphic or three-dimensional and illusionary”, she continues.
Inside the brain image, constant motility and ow exist with arrows pointing in and out
symbolizing the two-way absorption from and reaction towards the environment. is cycli-
cal movement, according to Goldstein, reects Amichai’s (2006) poem “Open Closed Open”,
a poem based on contrasting ideas. e arrows leading in all directions create a visual chaos
since arrows are supposed to direct us while in Goldstein’s art, they become rather confus-
ing. e mind as a maze, containing winding paths and movement in dierent directions,
symbolizes paths of life itself.
It is evident that Goldstein seeks to create an integration between the image of the brain,
culturally perceived as masculine, with embroidery work, representing a feminine aspect of
handicras. is integration matches the artist’s sense of identity, combining a search for
Figure 2. Tsipy Amos Goldstein. Panel 5 (detail): a brain image made in turquoise macramé
(source: Tsipy Amos Goldstein)
Creativity Studies, 2023, 16(1): 125–144 133
rationality, while being constantly emotionally turmoiled due to her life trajectory. “As a child
I would always get lost. I experience myself as someone who does not understand where to
go”, a sentence she constantly repeats. Goldstein’s life was characterized by a lack of certainty
and the need to get acquainted with the intricacies of life– both physically and mentally,
mostly by herself. is signi cant experience is uniquely embodied in the brain-maze image.
Another element consisting of the order-chaos contradiction is an embroidered grid em-
bedded in all the panels on top of the oil paintings. In Panel 1 (Figure 4), the grid is arranged
as a set of squares, resembling an arithmetic light blue notebook. “It reminds me of my child-
hood, scribbling instead of learning math <…>. Arithmetic versus creativity, but arithmetic is
above all for those who want to getal.ng in life”, says Goldstein. e grid may feature parallel
squares as in Panels 1 and 6 (Figure 3) or diagonal ones as in Panels 3 and 5. It is clear that
the grid is another attempt by Goldstein to provide order and discipline, a safety net for the
creative process.
e artist further creates a structured encounter between an orderly grid and her turbu-
lent inner world, seeking to burst out with full aesthetic power, thus rendering the series an
expression of a complexity-based essence. Lambert argues that creativity needs to be under-
stood within the framework of complex adaptive systems that exist in our world (such as the
human brain, ant community, capital markets and more): “<…> creativity as an emergent
characteristic of complex adaptive systems” (2020, p. 433).
Figure 3. Tsipy Amos Goldstein. Panel 6 (le ) and its detail (right): grid of embroidery
(source: Tsipy Amos Goldstein)
134 S. Marnin-Distelfeld. Creativity as an experience and as a complexity: visual-narrative research...
Another dominant image reecting the distinction between order and chaos is the chess-
board (Figure 4). e board, featuring a black and white contrast, is described in the series as
distorted, neither in its entirety nor realistically. Chess also presents an encounter of queens
and kings, bringing about a constant battle between masculinity and femininity, an issue
highly important for Goldstein. e queen rules the game, thus undermining the supremacy
of male logic, suggesting a feminine power with which the artist strongly identies. rough
the chess image she presents her “inner rebellion”, a feminist eort to construct her art as
valuable.
2.2.2. Love and home versus separation and collapse
is contrast is woven into the story of Goldstein’s life, especially related to two formative
life events: her giving away as a baby to an orphanage and the death of her husband. In both
cases, she experienced a sudden trauma of disconnection and separation from the people
closest to her. Being torn from her parents’ home cruelly severed her from her natural nest
to a fate of wandering searching for love and safety. Similar to this formative experience,
the accident in which her partner and the father of her children was killed, le her a single
mother as well as having to run the family farm, alone.
Examining the verbal narrative emerging in the interviews, these two events seemed
to stick out as pivotal and key elements to be transformed into the artwork: house images
suggesting disrupted world order, graphic hearts implying love, disintegrating gures
running away, falling down birds and her husband’s name, Goldstein, next to hers, as a kind
of commemoration.
Figure 4. Tsipy Amos Goldstein. Panel 1 (detail): chessboard (source: Tsipy Amos Goldstein)
Creativity Studies, 2023, 16(1): 125–144 135
In the works, one can identify house images placed tilted instably on the ground (Figure 5).
ey are never described in the “right” realistic way but rather on their side or upside down.
is contradicts the simple and childish typical house form, which actually conveys inno-
cence and optimism. e house image undermines its expectation to be our protective shell.
Gaston Bachelard argues “<…> that the image of the house becomes the topography of our
intimate being” and adopts the metaphor of Carl Jung to point out that “<…> it makes sense
to adopt the house as a tool for analyzing the human psyche” (Bachelard, 2020, pp. 32–33).
A row of houses in Panel 5 (Figure 5, right), connected to one another, is shown in a
state of collapse. is re ects a past visual memory of the artist from her boarding school
period. Schematic red gures also appear, falling downwards as if wounded. Next to the row
of houses leaning to the side, the word trauma appears, broken down into parts, whose con-
nection to the house image is clearly evident. e phrase “voluntary blindness” is written (in
Hebrew) next to these images. e trauma, then, is related to leaving the natural home and
the transitions between places, which were not necessarily experienced as homely. It was the
trauma that led the artist to the position of “voluntary blindness”, which is in fact a state of
repression.
Panel 1 (Figure 5, le ) displays a schematic image of a house inside a black maze to which
access is blocked. In addition, small black hearts rise from the chimney like smoke. is im-
age contains a stark contrast between its ideal, naive form, being inaccessibly metaphorical.
e love that prevails in it, if there is one, is associated with the smoke of black hearts– burnt
and dead. e images of the houses and hearts are linked to Goldstein’s traumatic child-
hood events. “ e house is our spot in the world”, claims Bachelard (2020, p. 205), and for
Goldstein it remains a coveted and inconceivable image, certainly not a niche to curl up in.
Figure 5. Tsipy Amos Goldstein. Panels 1 (le ) and 5 (right): houses (source: Tsipy Amos Goldstein)
136 S. Marnin-Distelfeld. Creativity as an experience and as a complexity: visual-narrative research...
e images of the shells in Panel 5 (Figure 2) are also perceived by the artist as homes.
Bachelard (2020, pp. 167–202) believes that shells represent both ultimate homes for mol-
lusks and a dialectic movement of in-out for the creatures living in them. A shell symbolizes
an eternal, protective haven, one that has been formed for thousands of years, a house whose
existence is unquestionable and most importantly, one formed to suit the needs and dimen-
sions of its living creature. e shell image contradicts the undisturbed man-made house,
which sometimes fails to protect its residents. Contrary to the descriptions of the house, the
shells are colorfully depicted in great size, indicating positive feelings attached to them by
the artist, consistent with Bachelard’s (2020, p. 186) explanations that shells are a source of
dreaming and the embodiment of natural beauty complexity.
A colorful heart-like image of a plant is seen above the shells in Panel 5 (Figure 6). is
image combines embroidery with oil painting in such a way that only when approaching the
canvas closely would one notice it. e artist states that in Panel 5, she reached the level of
harmonious combination of oil and embroidery, a kind of “synthesis of the masculine and
the feminine”, which distills the aesthetic qualities of the work. e images of the house and
the shell appear to be fundamentally opposite in Goldstein’s works.
In contrast to the houses and shells representing stationary objects, Goldstein’s birds rep-
resent movement and mobility, always falling down, implying her husband’s plane crash. In
Panel 3, black birds appear in oil colors, while in Panel 4 (Figure 7, right), they y around the
maze, consisting of letters breaking down into geometrical forms. ey appear near children’s
gures depicted within red road signs in this work (Figure 7, right). ese may symbolize
Goldstein’s children, whose life ordeal went awry following their father’s death. Perhaps these
images serve as a metaphor for her attempt to protect them from the world’s hardships.
Figure 6. Tsipy Amos Goldstein. Panel 5 (detail): integration of oil painting and embroidery
(source: Tsipy Amos Goldstein)
Creativity Studies, 2023, 16(1): 125–144 137
2.2.3. Cutting versus connecting, masculine versus feminine
e most dominant element in the series, the artist’s signature, is the macramé embroidery,
which appears in straight or rounded lines in light blue-turquoise (Figure 7, le and Fig-
ure 8). It consists of a thick line crossed by thinner lines vertically. e macramé in Gold-
stein’s work connects two pieces of fabric, which were cut by her as a preliminary action.
Figure 7. Tsipy Amos Goldstein. Panel 6 (detail): falling down birds painted in black on a black
background (le ). Panel 4 (detail): falling down birds (right) (source: Tsipy Amos Goldstein)
Figure 8. Tsipy Amos Goldstein. Panel 5 (details): female gures (source: Tsipy Amos Goldstein)
138 S. Marnin-Distelfeld. Creativity as an experience and as a complexity: visual-narrative research...
ese two opposing, pre-planned actions symbolize masculine elements versus feminine
ones; cutting is the physical act of using force to create a rupture, injuring the whole– the
fabric or the body– while knotting (in the macramé technique) involves the obligation to
connect and heal what is torn.
Using macramé sharpens the works’ expressive aspect as if the giant fabrics were battle
sites or wounded skin parts of a living body. Macramé knots always appear on top of the oil
painting and sometimes also surpass other embroidery textures. It is the upper layer, which
creates a material emphasis to the “injured lines”, as the artist calls them.
e artist states that macramé was perceived as an inferior cra, yet she aspired to give it
a dominant place in her works in order to raise it to the status of “high art”. e contradiction
between cutting and connecting symbolizing the dialectics between male and female, also
resonates in the distinction between oil-painting technique, perceived as masculine, versus
embroidery and macramé, perceived as feminine.
e female gure featuring in Panel 3 (Figure 8) embodies the inherent contrast between
whole and cut, and between feminine and non-feminine (not necessarily masculine). e
gure’s limbs are unrealistically connected to each other, her head and chest twisted, her face
distorted and her many hands bony. is woman clearly lacks beauty and tenderness– dis-
tinctive feminine qualities. e highlighted chest and abdomen are lled with light macramé
knots, which grants the body an injured look. Out of her head blue macramé lines emerge,
as a kind of hair-replacing rays, which actually follow an outline of broken glass the artist
used. If the lines were to continue, they would have cut the woman’s head, and even without
that happening, the gure looks somewhat monstrous.
Next to the woman’s right shoulder a smiling queen gure is depicted, made of embroi-
dery in the French point technique, a kind of small balls of thread forming a rough surface.
e image of the queen, which is based on an old photograph of the artist in a queen Esther
costume, is rendered realistically, beaming with joy, as opposed to the twisted woman gure.
e artist remembers not feeling like a queen at all, albeit dressed like one, but rather odd.
It is possible that the contrast between the costume and her inner thoughts is conveyed by
portraying two opposing features of a woman gure: one (queen Esther) representing dignity
and femininity, while the other (a monstrous woman) representing abnormality.
2.2.4. Communication versus paradoxical messages
is contrast is reected in the depiction of three recurring images that usually exemplify
means of communication: verbal texts, musical notes and clocks. While these usually convey
various messages, in Goldstein’s works, they contain an internal contradiction, rendering the
entire series a eld of paradoxes: the writing appearing each time in a dierent font, size and
color contains contrasts, undermining something perceived as an objective truth; the notes
do not communicate any melody, instead they are scattered around, while echoing the art-
ist’s music lessons in her youth; the clocks look displaced and detached from any time zone.
More than any other image, these images raise a paradoxical complexity (Lambert, 2020,
p. 433) suggesting the third characteristic in Glăveanu and Beghetto’s theory (2021, p. 79),
“multiple perspectives”, allowing for broad interpretations. In Panel 3, the artist writes no
innity (ein ein sof, in Hebrew) suggesting mankind’s stubborn desire to stop time, albeit its
Creativity Studies, 2023, 16(1): 125–144 139
innite progress. Words and sentences feature dominantly in this series. Sometimes it is a
short sentence extending the main idea that appears in the visual description, while at other
times it is a narrative, bearing enigmatic, uncertain content. e lyrics are sometimes taken
from familiar Israeli poems or hymns (for example, by poets Amichai or Ehud Manor), while
in other cases these are terms in both Hebrew and English. e word kesher (connection, in
Hebrew) is highly signicant for the artist who fails to create normal relationships, as she
herself testies. us, this word stands for an ideal concept, a non-achievable one to her. It is
worth mentioning in this context that there are no signicant gurative scenes in the series
other than a few schematic ones.
e text embodies a contrast since instead of being an understandable communication
tool, it becomes a deliberately incomprehensive one. e letters are sometimes hidden within
color spots, oating or even becoming abstract forms. e artist admits she likes to play
with these texts, creating “quizzes”. In doing so, she expresses the constant tension she feels
between the need to be communicative on the one hand, while remaining “under-cover”
keeping her personal world to herself, on the other. e texts enrich the work, reecting
Goldstein’s ambition “to eliminate dullness and to expand the prospects of understanding not
only for myself but also for the viewer”. ese texts also include right-to-le English writing,
in order to deliberately disrupt the viewers’ decoding ability.
In Panel 1 (Figure 9, right), the artist wrote an anecdote based on the well-known phrase
“which came rst: the egg or the chicken?” in terms of cause and result. In using this fable,
the artist poses the question of what is better: the outside lit world of the chicken, where
reason dictates the rules or the inner one, a protected egg, where the chick can curl into a
plunge of delightful music provided with love. e text deals with the opposing forces exist-
ing in the world: whole versus cracked, ability versus failure and emotion versus reason.
In Panel 2 (Figure 9, le), the text begins with, “It is a double scribble about pain, be-
ing alone and time”. e addition of the word alone underlies the content of the panel. It
continues,
“I am wounded, save me, the soul cries out and only the silence/solitude is witness
to a person’s dying. And now nothing has an end or a beginning. ere is no one to
wait for as he will never return. is is a story about an illusion/wish with a denite
ending ”.
is entails the pain of the artist’s separation from her husband, and its emotional con-
sequences for her life. It was gured out through Goldstein’s personal narrative, while telling
of her husband’s plane crash, when he was badly injured waiting for rescue uttering his last
words, “It hurts, save me”. Without the artist’s mediation, it would not be possible to extract
the meaning of this text. e connection between the œuvre and the event underlying it, can
be understood by Glăveanu and Beghetto’s (2021, p. 80) denition of creativity as an experi-
ence open to owing moves, inuenced by unexpected encounters between the creator and
the world.
e musical note images (Figure 10) treasure the ultimate connection between the ab-
stract world of the intellect and the world of emotion and nostalgia. e artist reiterates
the importance of music in her life, either as a child attending music classes, or as an adult,
working while listening to music. e notes, even more than the letters, lose their original
140 S. Marnin-Distelfeld. Creativity as an experience and as a complexity: visual-narrative research...
function, becoming abstract signs only. Sometimes they are related to words, as if accom-
panying the lyrics, while at other times, only a note-less sta is depicted. e notes might
represent a liminal position where the artist dwells– that of logic and structure of language
on the one hand and potential abstract emotions on the other.
Figure 9. Tsipy Amos Goldstein. Panel 2 (detail): verbal text (le ) and Panel 1 (right)
(source: Tsipy Amos Goldstein)
Figure 10. Tsipy Amos Goldstein. Panel 6 (detail) and Panel 5 (detail): notes
(source: Tsipy Amos Goldstein)
Creativity Studies, 2023, 16(1): 125–144 141
Clock images are found in the series in several forms: round Roman numeral clocks,
hourglasses and digital clocks. In addition, the word time appears in several places linking
the viewer to the concept of time, as well. e time motif is also represented through various
quotations of songs, poems or biblical phrases, which express the inability of humans to stop
time or turn it back. e artist is intensely preoccupied with time due to those signicant
life events interrupted in an abrupt manner: her moving to an orphanage and the sudden
death of her husband.
2.2.5. A star of David versus a Jewish yellow badge
e contrasting symbols– the star of David and a yellow badge (Figure 11) are perceived
by the artist as one image. She does not separate them when describing them verbally and
in some of the panels they are even visually incorporated into each other. is echoes some
visual proposals for the Israeli ag which included yellow gold stars next to the star of David
(Mishory, 2000, p. 132). e star of David as a visual image was born in the early modern
period as being associated with Jewish printing and became a symbol of Jewish communities
in Europe, engraved on Jewish gravestones (Mishory, 2000, p. 125). It later became a Zionist
symbol and nally has dominated the ag of the State of Israel.
Over the years, the star of David has become both a religious emblem and a national one.
e yellow badge was born in Nazi Germany and became a symbol of evil and racism against
the Jews who were forced to wear it during World War II. While the star of David symbolizes
a resurrection of the Jewish people, the yellow badge symbolizes its lowest condition.
Goldstein was born to the Holocaust survivors who could not raise her. Up until now,
she has not reviewed documents related to her parents. Only now, when she herself is a
Figure 11. Tsipy Amos Goldstein. Panel 3 (detail): a yellow badge (le) and Panel 2 (detail): star of
David and a yellow badge (right) (source: Tsipy Amos Goldstein)
142 S. Marnin-Distelfeld. Creativity as an experience and as a complexity: visual-narrative research...
grandmother, is she considering discovering some fragments of her identity. Her artistic
creation explores her preoccupation with her past, that of her biological family and the Jew-
ish people as a whole. e yellow badge appears in each panel in a dierent way: visible (as
in Panels 1 and 2), or disguised (as in Panel 3). In addition to the yellow badge symbolizing
the Holocaust, a map of the Łódź Ghetto (in Panel 6, Figure 7, le) serves as another the
Holocaust symbol. It is not inconceivable that other chaotic descriptions are also born out
of unconscious associations to the Holocaust.
e artist’s interest in the star of David was aroused following Dan Shechtman’s scientic
discovery of the quasi-crystal, which features a star shape. is is another example of the
intertextuality in Goldstein’s work, which testies to her openness of thought and her rich
and diverse knowledge, integrated into her art in a surprising and unusual way. Glăveanu
and Beghetto dene the rst characteristic of creativity as openness to ideas and encounters
(real or imaginary) as signicant in creative processes:
“Allowing open-endedness to ourish thereby involves becoming aware of dierent
ways of thinking, of doing things, and of being <…> and inviting them into our day
to day experience in order to unsettle old and stale routines, habits, and assumptions”
(2021, p. 78).
Conclusions
is article presented Seven Private Skies by artist Goldstein, aimed at establishing the mean-
ings inherent in the work, while characterizing it in terms of creativity.
e research method combined visual-interpretive analysis with both a narrative-feminist
paradigm and with theories from the eld of creativity studies.
e ndings showed that the series “tells” through artistic means the artist’s life story in a
way that matches two denitions: creativity as an experience (Glăveanu & Beghetto, p. 2021)
and creativity as complexity (Lambert, 2020). e four characteristics of creativity as an ex-
perience found compatible with Goldstein’s work are: 1. It is open and subject to change, not
carried out according to an orderly and pre-tightened plan; 2. It is non-linear in its develop-
ment; 3. It is multi-perspective, suggesting various interpretations derived from the richness
of detail; 4. It is created without leaning on a specic school or genre.
e second denition of creativity by Lambert (2020) was also found to be in line with
Goldstein’s work, being based on pairs of opposites exemplifying a complex essence of the
series. Five contrasts were detected as prevalent: 1. Order versus chaos. Despite the initial
impression of the series as chaotic and indecipherable, systematic mapping showed that there
were recurring elements as well as rules and regulations which shaped the artist’s practice.
is contrast is especially evident in the images of the brain, the chess board and the grid;
2. Love and home versus separation and collapse, which is woven into Goldstein’s narrative,
and is especially related to two formative events: being given away to an orphanage and the
death of her husband. Both events are reected in house images that hint at disrupting world
order, graphic hearts alongside disintegrating bodies, gures running away and birds falling
down; 3. Cuts versus connections, which also echoes a conict between the perceptions of
masculine versus feminine. is contrast is embodied in the macramé embroidery, which
Creativity Studies, 2023, 16(1): 125–144 143
connects two pieces of fabric. e knotting, or macramé, are actions involving the obligation
to connect and heal what had been torn. e woman gure resonates the encounter between
what is torn or healed; 4. Understandable communication in the face of conicting messages.
is contrast is conveyed through the use of verbal phrases, musical notes and clocks which
instead of functioning as expected they all mislead the viewer, failing one’s expectations;
5. e star of David versus a yellow badge juxtaposing power versus humiliation, while the
star of David is associated with modern Judaism and science, the yellow badge bears the
memory of the Holocaust. ey also represent the contrast between rationality and sentimen-
tality, between the outside world and the inner one, which characterizes the way Goldstein
experiences her life and work.
In addition to these ndings, the research process itself enhanced the artist’s sense of
personal and professional identity by enabling an external professional view of her work for
the rst time. During the study, the artist admitted she has gained a better understanding of
moves and decisions taken regarding her art and has even acknowledged the research process
as somewhat therapeutic. Her solo exhibition, displaying six of the seven panels, explored the
series to the public, which was a signicant opportunity for the artist to get feedback from a
wide variety of people. e exhibition contributed to her self-esteem as an artist, while also
boosted her to go on completing the Panel 7 on which she is still working.
References
Amichai, Y. (2006). Open closed open: Poems. A Harvest Book/Harcourt, Inc.
Bachelard, G. (2020). Hapoetika Shel Hachalal. Bavel.
Brandt, A.(2021).Dening creativity: A view from the arts.Creativity Research Journal, 33(2), 81–95.
https://doi.org/10.1080/10400419.2020.1855905
Cixous, H. (1976). e laugh of the Medusa. Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 1(4), 875–893.
https://doi.org/10.1086/493306
Corazza,G.E. (2016). Potential originality and eectiveness: e dynamic denition of creativity. Cre-
ativity Research Journal, 28(3), 258–267. https://doi.org/10.1080/10400419.2016.1195627
Dekel, T. (2013). Gendered: Art and feminist theory. Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
Direktor, R. (2013). Be Ma’agalim Acherim: Outsiderim, autodidactim ve naivim. Haifa Museum of Art.
Glăveanu,V. P., & Beghetto,R.A.(2021).Creative experience: A non-standard denition of creativ-
it y. Creativity Research Journal,33(2),75–80. https://doi.org/10.1080/10400419.2020.1827606
Irigaray, L. (1977). Ce sexe qui n’en est pas un. Les Éditions de Minuit.
Jaudon, V., & Kozlo, J. (1978). Art hysterical notions of progress and culture. Heresies, 4, 38–42.
Kristeva, J. (1980). Desire in language: A semiotic approach to literature and art. L.S.Roudiez (Ed.).
Columbia University Press.
Lambert, Ph. A. (2020).e order–chaos dynamic of creativity.Creativity Research Journal,32(4),431–
446. https://doi.org/10.1080/10400419.2020.1821562
Mannay, D. (2016). Visual, narrative and creative research methods: Application, reection and ethics.
Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315775760
Marnin-Distelfeld, Sh. (2021). Embroidered memory: e artwork of Miri Abramson, a second-gener-
ation holocaust survivor. Woman’s Art Journal, 42(2), 33–42.
144 S. Marnin-Distelfeld. Creativity as an experience and as a complexity: visual-narrative research...
Marnin-Distelfeld, Sh. (2022). “In the liveliest place, my mother’s bosom, there was death” – Mother–
daughter relationships in the work of Rachel Nemesh, Second-generation Holocaust survivor. Ho-
locaust Studies: A Journal of Culture and History, 28(1), 20–47.
https://doi.org/10.1080/17504902.2021.1882770
Mishory, A. (2000). Shuru Habitu Ureu: Ikonot Usmalim Chazutim Zionim Batarbut Haysraelit. Am
Oved.
Norton, D., Heath, D., & Ventura, D. (2013). Finding creativity in an articial artist. Journal of Creative
Be hav i or, 47(2), 106–124. https://doi.org/10.1002/jocb.27
Orbach, N. (2020). e Good Enough Studio: Art erapy through the Prism of Space, Matter and Action.
Self-Publication of Nona Orbach.
Rose, G. (2016). Visual methodologies: An introduction to researching with visual materials. SAGE.
Runco,M. A., & Jaeger,G. J. (2012). e standard denition of creativity. Creativity Research Jour-
nal,24(1), 92–96. https://doi.org/10.1080/10400419.2012.650092
Shlasky, S., & Alpert, B. (2006). Drachim Bektivat Mechkar Narrativi Meperuk Hametziut Lehavnayata
Ketext. Mofet.
Simonton,D.K. (2018). Dening creativity: Don’t we also need to dene what is Not creative? Journal
of Creative Behavior, 52(1), 80–90. https://doi.org/10.1002/jocb.137
Smith,J.K., & Smith,L.F. (2017). e 1.5 criterion model of creativity: Where less is more, more or
less. Journal of Creative Behavior, 51(4), 281–284. https://doi.org/10.1002/jocb.191
Spector-Mersel, G. (2010). Megisha Narrativit Leparadigma Narrativit. In R. Tuval-Mashiach &
G. Spector-Mersel (Eds.), Mechkar Narrativi: Teoriya, Yetzira Veparshanut (pp. 45–80). Mofet/
Magnes.
Zelermeier, M. (2010). Al Mechkar Narrativi, Al Feminism Vealma Shebeynehem. In Tuval- R. Mashiach
& G. Spector-Mersel (Eds.), Mechkar Narrativi: Teoriya, Yetzira Veparshanut (pp. 106–132). Mofet/
Magnes.