Video work · 2026
Code Muse
Barak Rotem
The Work
Code Muse
The video work moves between worlds of labor and consciousness, translating cycles of nature and work into a visual language that bridges traditions of craftsmanship and artificial intelligence.
Inspired by Hesiod’s Works and Days, Rotem constructs an algorithmic weave of images, transforming allegories from Hesiod’s mythopoetic universe into a contemporary visual meditation centered on the relationship between the handmade object and the digital image.
“Mythological imagery alongside remnants of material culture.”
The eagle and the nightingale, symbols of power and fragility in Hesiod’s fable, dissolve and re-emerge in digital form. Weaving and braiding—circular, ordered, and traditional gestures that recur throughout the work—echo both the cyclical rhythms of agricultural labor and the divine spinning of fate by the Moirai.
Rotem approaches the studio as a sacred field of labor, where he weaves, braids, and layers imagined mythological imagery alongside remnants of material culture drawn from the museum’s collections, reanimating them through a slow and hypnotic ritual of continual transformation.
The Artist
Barak Rotem
Barak Rotem is a multidisciplinary artist working with photography, sound, and artificial intelligence. His practice focuses on the creation of contemporary mythologies, imagined tribes, and invented rituals, presented through a hyper-realistic visual language that blurs the boundary between documentation and fiction.
By combining emerging creative technologies with traditional craftsmanship, he explores mechanisms of memory, identity, belief, and belonging in an era of rapid technological change.
Rotem is a graduate of the Screen-Based Arts Department at Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design. He studied video art at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna and pursued further studies in artificial intelligence at Shenkar College.
His works have been exhibited in museums, biennales, festivals, and galleries in Israel and internationally, including the Eretz Israel Museum Biennale, the UAE Biennale in Ras Al Khaimah, the Museum of Modern Art in Vienna, and the giant screens of Times Square, as well as numerous international platforms and exhibitions across Europe, the Americas, and the Middle East.