Yael Bartana

The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them.
– Isaiah (Chapter 11, Verse 6)

"The Wolf Shall Dwell with the Lamb" is a contemporary adaptation of the prophecy of Isaiah (Chapter 11, Verse 6), a public sculpture commission, situated at the entrance of the Helena Rubinstein Pavilion for Contemporary Art in Tel Aviv since 2023. At first glance, the figures of the wolf and lamb rest together, enveloped in cloth, as if frozen in a moment just before the public unveiling of the sculpture. Yet upon closer inspection, the fabric is revealed as separable from the work itself, enshrouding it forever. The sculpture’s form simultaneously embodies a yearning for an idyllic future peace and the impossibility of ever attaining this vision. The dream persists, forever unfulfilled. The veiled image alludes to a utopian destiny even as it questions the very nature of what is to come, contemplating an imagined possibility of the end of history and the triumph of the spirit.

Isaiah 11:6

The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them.