Since 7th October, Israel has lived through an almost continuous sequence of war, alongside an almost continuous sequence of documentation. Thousands of images reached the public every day from the front, the home front, public squares, families and streets. Within this constant flow, images that do not resemble conventional photojournalism - blurred, hurried, and often captured on mobile phones from inside the events themselves - can become particularly powerful documents because their primary function is to bear witness.
Journalist Bar Peleg (Ha’aretz) approached the protest movement and the war not as a professional photographer but as a journalist present in the field. Over recent months he has consistently documented public struggles, the families of hostages, demonstrations and the small moments between major headlines. The resulting archive brings together moments that may not be technically “perfect” photographs, but that capture the period directly and from within it.
No Change in the Instructions presents a selection of Peleg’s photography, video and still-image works created during the three turbulent years since 7th October 2023. Curated by Photojournalist Tomer Applebaum (Ha’aretz), the exhibition brings together works in different techniques and formats documenting key moments from the fighting, the home front, the struggle of hostage families, public protest, and social and political events that have shaped Israeli reality since 2023.
Alongside the visual works, the exhibition includes texts written by Peleg during this period, including journalistic passages, field notes and thoughts written in real time. Together, these materials form a mosaic of the period as experienced from within, rather than through an official narrative.
Some of the works have previously appeared on social media, in articles and on other platforms as part of ongoing reporting, while others are shown for the first time. Bringing them together in one physical space shifts them from transient news images into a body of work that asks visitors to stop, slow down and reconsider the people, moments and struggles that have shaped their lives in recent years.
As part of the exhibition, on October 5th, Heinrich Boell Stiftung Tel Aviv’s Head of Office, Dr. Ofer Waldman, will host a conversation with Bar Peleg and the German author Sara Levy, now residing in Israel. The conversation will focus on journalistic work and how it plays a role in surfacing stories that are out of the public eye, the difference between inside and outside journalistic work and the concept of bravery in journalism.
