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Hi, I’m Keren.
Every object has its own potential. If I listen carefully, it tells me what it wants to become. I find them on Berlin pavements and at flea markets across Germany and Eastern Europe, take them apart, rewire them and set them in brass. Each lamp is the only one there is.
My little creative safe haven: I share our studio space with four amazing artists, at Frankfurter Allee 6 in Friedrichshain, Berlin.
Trained as a chef in Paris and as a goldsmith in Tel Aviv. Shown at the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition, London, 2011, and the Haifa Museum of Art, 2014. More about my past
How I work
Drawn from the Samovar lamp.
Ever since I can remember, I loved hunting for treasures in flea markets. I always had a talent for fixing things. Since I moved to Berlin, I’ve been exploring the city’s flea markets, and taking my treasure hunts to Germany and Eastern Europe.
Sometimes, if an object is indecisive, I put it in my storage to let it percolate until it becomes clear what it wants to be.
I add or take away parts and play a little bit like Frankenstein with the things I find, to create something that looks completely different. Sometimes it is a new form; sometimes it just adds a function, or life, to an old object.
One of the things I enjoy most in my work is the fact that each object is unique, which makes me invent and seek new technical solutions in the building process. Taking an object that was one thing completely out of its context, and giving it a different language of aesthetics and a different function, always with a dash of humour.
The first lamp
My first lamp in Germany was the MirO, made from a volt meter.
I found the volt meter at a flea market. I built it on the floor of my apartment a week after I moved. There was plenty of space, because I didn’t have any furniture. I went to the Baumarkt, which is basically a hardware store here in Germany, and there I bought cables, switches and two bulb sockets.
The first official lamp I made in my studio was the Green Heater.
Before the lamps
Kitchens first, then jewellery, then lamps.
Read more about my past
Kitchens
I trained as a cook at the École Ferrandi in Paris, worked in the kitchen of Restaurant Hélène Darroze in Paris, then worked as head chef in Tel Aviv. Later I cooked as a private chef for several years.
Jewellery
From 2008 to 2011 I trained as a goldsmith and jewellery designer at the Omanit academy in Tel Aviv-Jaffa. Then I had my own jewellery line, and co-founded Junktion Jewelry, jewellery made from found, ready-made objects. That is where the lamps really begin.
Lamps
In Berlin the two came together: the found object, paired with precision, in brass and wood.
Selected exhibitions
- Group show, Frankfurter Allee 6, Berlin, 2022
- Junktion Jewelry, solo show, Triangle Gallery, Tel Aviv, 2016
- Connector, Vitrina Gallery, Holon, 2016
- Chicago Triangle, Haifa Museum of Art, 2014
- Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 2011
Whenever someone buys a lamp I have mixed emotions. I’m sad to let it go, but happy it found a new home that loves it.