Bab al-Dhahabi

The object entitled 182×206×16/Bab al-Dhahabi refers to the Golden Gate in Jerusalem, one of the eight gates in the walls encircling the Old City. This used to be the only gate that led to the Temple Mount, but it has been blocked since the time the fortifications were rebuilt by Suleiman the Magnificent (1520–1566). The Old City reflects the multicultural dimension of Jerusalem, the place where the world’s three greatest religions coexist. This is where the holy sites of Christianity, Judaism and Islam are located: the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the Temple Mount (the Mount Moriah of the Bible) with the Wailing Wall, the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa Mosque. The Golden Gate itself is also the focus of many religious beliefs. In Judaist tradition, this is the gate through which the Messiah would come to Jerusalem, for which reason it was blocked; in the Biblical tradition, in turn, this was the place where Anna and Joachim, the future parents of the Virgin Mary, had met, and through which Christ rode into Jerusalem before His crucifixion; in the Islamic tradition, this is where the history of the world would come to its fulfilment and Allah would reveal Himself to the believers.

Mirosław Bałka refers to the Golden Gate’s ambiguous status. Its multidimensional character is reflected by its names: Bab al-Dhahabi (Arabic: Gate of Repentance) or Shaar Ha-Rahamim (Hebraic: Gate of Mercy). The object in the Arsenał Gallery collection is the left wing of a contemporary sheet metal gate found by the artist, which in no way resembles its sandstone original. Inscribed with the name of the Golden Gate written in Arabic, it was on show in Białystok during the Uwaga! Granica (Attention! Border) exhibition (Białystok–Lublin, 2017). The right wing, which bears the Hebrew name, was on show in Lublin. The Golden Gate symbolically opened to the east, which in the Christian tradition is associated with the resurrection.

The Temple Mount has for many years been the focus of a conflict between the Muslims (it is under Jordanian administration) and Israel, which controls the access to the area. Regular clashes between the Palestinians and the Israelis are but new episodes in the shared Muslim and Jewish history of the Mount, which has been marked by religious fanaticism and a strong sense of distinctiveness. Mirosław Bałka’s work is a voice of protest against history written in this manner. The separated wings of the gate are supposed to “long for each other”, as the artist put it, thereby bringing to mind this coexistence of religions which, in essence, is the determinant of Jerusalem’s identity.

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translated from Polish by Klaudyna Michałowicz