Cecilia Vicuña, ¿Qué es para Usted la Poesía?, 1980, 23’20’’
Salim Bayri and Ghita Skali, Semiotics of the Hammam, 2023, 8’
Shadi Harouni, The Lightest of Stones, 2015, 15’55’’
video loop
13 September 2024, 4 pm – 1.30 am, auditorium
#Sonata #Supplement
Cecilia Vicuña, ¿Qué es para Usted la Poesía?, 1980, 23’20’’
Courtesy the artist and Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI), New York
Vicuña asks passersby on the streets of Bogotá—including fellow artists and poets, sex workers, children, a police officer, and a scientist—the question: “What is poetry to you?” The surprising answers she elicits reveal the richness of oral culture in Colombia.
Salim Bayri e Ghita Skali, Semiotics of the Hammam, 2023, 8’
Courtesy Electronic Arts Intermix, NY
Semiotics of the Hammam—a direct response to Martha Rosler’s Semiotics of the Kitchen—shows a character trapped in a dry hammam presenting, with irritation, hygiene tools that gradually start to feel like weapons. This remake of the canonic video is actualized through the figure of a migrant in the West, frustrated in its orientalized space.
Shadi Harouni, The Lightest of Stones, 2015, 15’55’’
Courtesy the artists
Set in an isolated pumice quarry in the mountainous region of Kurdistan, The Lightest of Stones is the first in a multi-chapter project made in collaboration with displaced individuals who, during the peak of operations by the so-called “Islamic State” and imposed economic sanctions, find themselves working in harsh spaces of labor and extraction on the Iran/Iraq border. In the film, a group of men watch as the artist removes stones from the mountainside by hand. They speak of labor and their precarious working conditions, of their image and its possible perceptions, of ancient mythology, dragons, and Jennifer Lopez, as they participate in and critique the film itself.
CECILIA VICUÑA (Santiago de Chile, 1948) is a poet, performer, sound and visual artist, who coined the concept of arte precario (precarious art) in the 1960s in response to pressing concerns of the modern world, including ecological destruction, human rights, and cultural homogenization. Born and raised in Santiago, she was exiled during the early 1970s after the violent military coup against President Salvador Allende. This sense of impermanence, and a desire to preserve and pay tribute to the indigenous history and culture of Chile, especially the Quipu (an Andean writing system or “knot-record” fashioned from string), have characterized her work throughout her career. Vicuña lives and works in New York City and Santiago de Chile.
SALIM BAYRI (Casablanca, 1992) lives and works in Amsterdam. He is visual artist and polyglot whose practice spans sculpture, performance, drawing, coding, tech, and the virtual realm. Bayri holds a BA in Arts and Design from the Escola Massana and a MA in Media, Art, Design and Technology from the Frank Mohr Institute. In 2019-21 he was a resident at the Rijksakademie van beeldende kunst, and in 2022 was awarded the Volkskrant Visual Arts Prize and the Charlotte Köhler Prize. His work has been shown in art spaces and institutions such as W139 (Amsterdam), CODA Museum (Apeldoorn), Alyssa Davis Gallery (New York), ADN Gallery (Barcelona), Azkuna Zentroa (Bilbao), GVCC (Casablanca), Hot Wheels (Athens), and La Capella (Barcelona), among others. Bayri is half of the music duo BAZOGA.
GHITA SKALI (Casablanca, 1992) is an artist based in Amsterdam. She has a multidisciplinary practice which encompasses installations, videos and interventions. She uses odd news, rumors and historical facts to disrupt institutional power structures. Her work blends humor and critics with outcomes that penetrate channels which go beyond the exhibition space, as alternative trade of goods, (il)legal documents, and things you take home.
SHADI HAROUNI (Hamedan, Iran) is a visual artist based in New York City. Harouni’s research and material investigations are rooted in disavowed histories of erasure and resistance that span from everyday acts of dissent to global mass movements, from modern revolutions in the Middle East to ancient transgressions in thought and poetry. Harouni’s practice weaves together modes and media—film and photography, sculpture and site-specific interventions with text and folklore. Harouni’s projects have been exhibited at the Queens Museum (NY), Kunstmuseum Bonn (DE), Prague City Museum (CZ), Museo d’Arte Orientale (IT). She has been awarded prizes and residencies from the Gattuso Foundation, Civitella Ranieri Foundation, Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. Harouni is a 2024-25 Guggenheim Fellow in Film-Video. Shadi Harouni is an educator, Professor and Head of Video and Photography at New York University Steinhardt Department of Art.
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Via Nizza 138
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