State of Matter, 2023
Drill cores from Mount Zion, 100 x 160 cm

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Ella Littwitz explores political, social, and cultural landscapes in her work. Her current project emerges from the intersection of two key questions. The first asks about the role of art: How can one present a creation in a place as charged, layered, and complex as Mount Zion? What can art contribute to such a crowded, bustling space? The second question addresses a practical, material concern: What is the mountain made of? Is it possible to express a place not through the beliefs and stories tied to it, but through what is often overlooked — the very material from which it is composed?

For Littwitz, engaging with these questions demanded purification, precision, and simplicity — an act that both reflects Mount Zion's materiality and brings to the surface its weighty, multi-layered history. Her work embodies a balancing act, connecting the ground as a material with the emotions embedded within it.

In State of Matter, two worlds intersect: matter and spirit, tangibility and emotion, geological drilling on Mount Zion, and a poetic synthesis of two interrelated words: sediment and sentiment. These terms, chosen by Littwitz, sound alike and share structural similarities. They also maintain a semantic relationship: sediment, meaning "residue," is a poetic material counterpart to sentiment, which conveys a deep inner feeling toward a place or object.

Ground drilling and sampling are typically conducted for construction purposes, to profile the land and assess its composition and capacity. In the case of Mount Zion, however, the soil holds profound, invisible historical and cultural layers spanning thousands of years. It is filled with emotions, longings, losses, and victories, and many are drawn to it — emotionally, territorially, and materially.

The depth from which each drill core was extracted is marked with a line drawn in marker, while Littwitz inscribes the cores with words. Her poetic creation underscores the deep connection between what has physically settled into the land and the way Mount Zion is emotionally embedded in the hearts of many believers. The arrangement of the drill cores side by side resembles a wordless poem, composed entirely of subterranean, internal materials, rich with layers of earth, history, and emotion.

Rinat Edelstein for the exhibition catalog Believing in Mount Zion, Manofim Festival, July 2024