Catalog of a Collection of Photographs by Gérard Allon in the Judaica Collection of the Harvard library

tography. As conceived and expressed by Allon, holography is in a
sense a two-dimensional rendition of a four-dimensional world and
reality, as it also includes the element of time. Not only is the perspective
not dependent on the camera’s position, it varies according to the
viewer’s placement: two viewers looking at the same picture will each
perceive a different image, just as if looking through a window.
Figure 11: Hologram from an installation for Paradoks ha-Halom
ha-Homri (The Paradox of the Materialistic Dream), Tel Aviv Museum
of Art, 1993.
created in his state-of-the art studio laboratory touch upon a variety
of subjects—from Biblical symbolism to fashion and portraiture (Figure
11). However successful, his efforts did not meet with the response
he expected. It seems that his experiments and the images he created
were somewhat premature, with their intellectual and philosophical
basis not understood.
In Allon’s view, holography and synthetic imagery questioned the traditional
concept of photography and linear perspective as applied
through the lens and the camera obscura. The new technologies, especially
holography with its simultaneous multiple points of view of
the subject, is an antithesis of the time-frozen, “cyclopic” vision of pho-
Having traveled to the United States and Canada for his exhibitions
in 1983 and 1985, Allon realized that the technology of holography
had evolved to the point of allowing a wider range of creative possibilities.
In addition, he also met potential investors wanting to create
a research and development company in the field, and they offered
him a partnership and the direction of a laboratory in Montreal,
Canada, the center of new imaging technologies. In view of the
limited possibilities Israel could offer for holography and his need
for wider horizons, he decided to move to Canada in 1986. There, besides
his regular photographic work, he experimented extensively
with the magic beams. He registered a U.S. patent for a “Photograph
Booth with Automatic Holographic Camera” on April 5, 1988; see
http://www.patentstorm.us/patents-by-date/1988/0405-1.html. This
unique device was capable of creating a hologram of a human subject
positioned inside it and facing a holographic sheet film on which the
hologram of the subject was to be recorded. Although the booth had all
the necessary safety devices to prevent the laser beam from damaging the
sitter’s eyes, its high cost probably prevented its commercial realization.
Allon’s stay in Canada, although longer than intended, was also a period
of reflection on the very essence of images, and it naturally influenced
his future work. Upon his return to Israel in 1991, he continued
experimenting with the notion of multiple points of view, turning his
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