Class 2007

In the summer of 2007, Gil finished his studies at Alon High School in Ramat Hasharon, and like all his classmates enlisted in the IDF. His mother, photographer Vardi Kahana, then a resident of Ramat Hasharon, chose to document in careful studio photographs the moments of transition between his youth and the army, his and all his classmates.

From then until today, they pose in front of her camera lens in the studio, giving her serious looks, one by one. The result is a large-scale project with hundreds of beautiful portrait photographs, both neutral and poignant, that follow the stages of puberty of the members of one class in Ramat Hasharon but represent the stages of puberty of most of those born and raised in Israel.

The time that has passed since the beginning of the project and the events that brought with it paint the collection of photographs in new shades; Shades of memory and mourning that may not have been in him at the beginning. Not only 30 girls and boys growing up in seventeen years in front of the camera but also a monument to normality, and possibility. A promise.

--Ravit Harari