The Ratcatcher
Duo Exhibition: Michael Barak and Mattan Gappell
Curator: Dr. Revital Michali
18.7.2025 - 23.8.2025
“Once upon a time many years ago”... is how most fairy tales begin. But “The Pied Piper of Hamelin”, or “The Rat-Catcher of Hamelin”, is actually derived from an actual historical event. The well-known legend is based on events that took place in 1284 in Hamelin, Germany. The town, plagued by a terrible infestation of rats, accepted the offer of a piper who appeared one day and promised, for a fee, to rid them of the vermin. Although the piper kept his promise and led the rats away, enchanted by the sound of his flute, the townspeople did not uphold the agreement and dismissed him without payment. Betrayed, the piper took his revenge by leading the town’s children away—never to return. Only three children—one lame, one deaf, and one blind—were spared due to their disabilities. The event was so traumatic that the folk tale that emerged seems to have served as a political myth that helped adults process and cope with tragic and controversial events and deal with the loss while easing their conscience by shifting the blame onto the “other”—the vengeful, magical piper.
In their duo exhibition The Rat-Catcher, artists Michael Barak and Mattan Gappell offer a contemporary reading of the political myth, engaging in critique and dialogue with it. They employ both traditional and digital media, blending old and new in a way that reflects the spirit of our time. Barak and Gappell’s interpretation echoes traumatic events of children abducted from their homes, their belongings left behind. It draws attention to children who bear the consequences of the immoral behavior of the adults surrounding them. Reconstructing the legend at this particular moment in time seeks to highlight the blurring boundaries between good and evil, truth and falsehood—in the era we live in: an era of post-truth and lost direction.
The gallery space has a ghostly feel, a place where traces of a past event linger. A hat abandoned on the stage and the absence of human figures intensify the sense of apprehension—yet they also turn us, the gallery visitors, into actors in a staged play. Barak and Gappell invite us into a space that prompts action and choice. The gallery floor is divided into two zones: an area marked “disabled parking” leads from the entrance door to the rear niche, while the rest of the floor is intermittently coated with mice-trap glue, punctuated by holes (reminiscent of swiss cheese), thus restricting the viewer’s movement. The installation layout suggests two optional paths: one safe, the other hazardous. It urges us to choose whether to be active or passive. Should we move into the space as agents, or remain spectators in the disabled parking zone? It compels us to determine what role to play: the abducted children, the disabled ones who remained behind as witnesses to the horror, or perhaps mice caught in a race?
On the face of things, we seem to have freedom of choice—but both options restrict the viewer’s movement within the space. Thus, the artists question the meaning of choice and the roles of the characters in the original tale in relation to ourselves. Unlike the original tale, which was created to ease the conscience of adults by casting the piper as the “other”—the guilty party and scapegoat—the artists revive the tale in order to raise moral questions and reflections in relation to our current condition. In doing so, they challenge and unravel familiar connections between cause and effect.
The works in the treated gallery space reference key elements from the legend: the rat, the flute, and the children.
Gappell’s pieces evoke a traditional, old-worldly sense of material and accumulation.
His sculpture “Rat Monument” features a 3D-printed rat poised atop a tall pedestal shaped like its shadow. The sculpture is coated in liquid bronze (mimicking metallic bronze) and natural corrosion to lend it an antique, monument-like appearance—despite it being merely a copy without an original. Transforming the rat into a monument (reminiscent of the golden calf) also serves to deconstruct the political myth. However, unlike the legend, designed to absolve adults of responsibility for the children’s fate, Gappell emphasizes their greed and its consequences. “Hunter’s Trumpet” is a treated readymade object. Historically, the trumpet was used for communication between hunters and their dogs, and among hunters themselves.
In its shape it evokes the Hamelin piper’s flute. A bronze-cast mouthpiece is fitted onto the original trumpet, stamped with the distress signal “CQD”—the original Morse code for emergency. For Gappell, the trumpet does not symbolize the piper, but rather refers to the parents. It becomes a kind of gramophone playing a reworked version of Miriam Yalan-Shteklis’s children’s song “Michael”, titled “I waited, I waited, I waited.” Thus, “Michael” is transformed from an innocent nursery rhyme into a parent’s cry of longing for their child. Gappell’s sculptures, anchored to the floor, embody the passage of time, guilt, and sorrow—alongside a sense of nostalgic yearning.
Barak’s works represent the new world—a digital realm of social media and emojis. While Gappell creates copies without originals that evoke nostalgia for bygone days, Barak deliberately uses digital raw material devoid of sentimentality. Yet his works act as a bridge between “there and then” and “here and now,” aiming to critique the impoverished and limited modes of communication, the simulacra, and the tendency toward exaggeration that begets the loss of meaning, morality, and value in our times. In “Three Rats”, he enlarges and replicates the rat emoji (an act that exposes the image’s digital origin) in a format reminiscent of a WhatsApp message thread. It is an ironic endeavor to simulate a chat conversation among the town’s horrified residents, but also serves as a critique of today’s shallow and binary communication, which relies on small, duplicated images. In “Glow in the Dark”, he creates a narrative link between the rat emoji and the cheese trap emoji to highlight the danger inherent in the “rat race” that characterizes life in Western society. The brushed aluminum on which both works are printed is a material commonly used for officially designed signboards—such as those commonly used by professionals like lawyers or accountants. It alludes to the greed of Hamelin’s townspeople in particular, and more broadly to humanity, which repeatedly brings disaster upon itself.
The routes inside the space terminate with an inscription on the windows: “I did not see, I did not hear, I did not go.” This ambiguous phrase functions as both a warning and as a guide for the viewer. On one hand, according to the legend, this is the way to be spared. On the other hand, in the age of fake news, the unchecked information people spread puts us all at risk.
R.M
About the artists and the curator:
Michael Barak
An artist and art teacher. Lives and creates in Rosh HaAyin. Works in photography, sculpture, sound, and digital media. His works explore social and cultural structures, examining the personal and the collective, past and present, disruption and order. He holds a B.A. in Fine Art and Education with honors from the Midrasha School of Art at Beit Berl College. He has exhibited in group exhibitions in Israel.
Mattan Gappell
An artist who lives and creates in Tel Aviv. He creates sculptural installations that combine sculpture, sound, and scent. He holds a B.A. in Fine Art and Education with honors from the Midrasha School of Art at Beit Berl College (2024). He is a graduate of the Photography Department at Musrara College (2018). He has exhibited in group exhibitions in Israel.
Dr. Revital Michali is a researcher, independent art curator, dramaturgist and performance artist living and working in Tel Aviv-Jaffa (currently in Amsterdam). Michali holds a Ph.D. in Visual Arts from Tel Aviv University. Her writing and artistic practice focus on female identity, motherhood, and their connection to public spaces. She has curated and produced art exhibitions and events in Tel Aviv, Berlin, and the USA. Michali has been a member of the Alfred Institute for Art and Culture since 2021.