The Nahum Gutman Museum of Art is celebrating the 120th anniversary of the birth of painter, illustrator, and writer Nahum Gutman with a retrospective exhibition of his work. The show reveals Gutman the “cartographer,” who combined map references, landmarks, and mental maps in his paintings, whereby he rearranged his childhood realms which extended between Jaffa and Tel Aviv.

The exhibition outlines a route which passes from Jaffa, through the Neve Sha’anan neighborhood, to Tel Aviv, following Gutman’s life. It ties his chronicles and body of work with the landscape and topography of the time, illustrating his use of concepts and signs from the doctrine of cartography to assimilate his private memories in the myth about Tel Aviv’s establishment, which he helped create.

Alongside Gutman’s works, the exhibition features still photographs, maps, and aerial photographs which shed light on the area between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, enabling a reconsideration of his…