Art Knowledge News
Kunsthaus Bregenz Presents Candice Breitz's Best Known Video Installations |
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| Written by Melissa Bergen |
| Tuesday, 09 February 2010 01:23 |
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The Kunsthaus Bregenz presents a selection of Breitz’s best known video installations as well as several new works that have never been shown in Europe before: Working Class Hero (A Portrait of John Lennon), 2006; Him + Her, 1968 –2008; and five double por traits from the new series Factum, 2009. The premiere of the video installation New York, New York, 2009, created especially for the exhibition as a co-production between Performa 09 and the KUB, is a special highlight of the exhibition. New York, New York grows out of and includes documentation of Breitz’s first foray into directing live theatrical performance. On 12 and 13 November 2009, Breitz directed two evenings of improvised performance at the Abrons Arts Center in New York. Each evening featured two nearly identical casts composed of four pairs of identical twins, with each pair of twins split between the two casts of four actors. The live performances grew out of intensive character development sessions during which each pair of siblings was invited to create a character between them that both would be willing to play on stage, albeit in a separate cast. New York, New York shifts the probing of sameness and difference that has been central to Breitz’s video-based work into the space of live performance, bringing her interest in what she has called “the scripted life” together with an ongoing reflection on the fragile condition of individuality. For the first time, the work will be presented at the KUB in the form of a two-part video installation. While the first part is comprised of four short films that document each of the four character development sessions, the second part of the installation consists of two projections that are experienced parallel to one another, evoking stereoscopic vision as they document each of the separate casts responding to the improvisational challenge of taking their characters live on stage.
The fourth part in a series portraying pop legends such as Bob Marley, Madonna, and Michael Jackson, Working Class Hero (A Portrait of John Lennon) offered 25 dedicated fans of John Lennon the chance to re-perform Lennon’s first solo album John Lennon/ Plastic Ono Band (1970), on which he explored traumatic childhood memories during a period when he was undergoing primal therapy. Lennon screams out his anger and despair, as do some of the 25 fans singing after him. Collectively, the fans merge to form a 25-headed a cappella choir, each performing his or her own interpretation of the original album. With a duration of nearly forty minutes (matching the duration of the original album by Lennon), Working Class Hero is presented across 25 plasma displays in a continuous loop. Breitz’s portrayal of music fans both confirms and disrupts fixed notions about the figure of the fan in today's society, exploring the extent to which individual expression may or may not be possible´within contemporary mass culture. The artist holds degrees from the University of the Witwatersrand (Johannesburg), the University of Chicago, and Columbia University (New York). She has participated in several biennials and shown her work in numerous group and solo exhibitions all over the world. Breitz lives and works in Berlin and is a tenured professor at the University of Fine Arts in Braunschweig. Visit Kunsthaus Bregenz at : http://www.kunsthaus-bregenz. Click on logo below to add this article to your favorite Social Website ~ |
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