04/05/10

VideoStudio at Studio Museum Harlem - Spring 2010

Contemporary Art Exhibition > Video Art > Yto Barrada - Djamel Kokene - Bouchra Khalili
Contemporary Art Exhibition > United States > New York > Harlem > SMH

 

VidéoStudio: New Work from France

Yto Barrada - Bouchra Khalili - Djamel Kokene

Studio Museum, Harlem - SMH

Avril 1 - June 27, 2010

 

In a trio of month-long programs, the Studio Museum presents the work of three North African artists—Yto Barrada, Bouchra Khalili and Djamel Kokene—who were born or currently live in France. While these artists emerge from a specific Afro-European context, the exhibition brings together work that considers “France”—and the very idea of the nation—as a concept rather than a stable category. Together their work encourages us to consider the relationship between individuals and the state; culture and the law; and identity and modes of representation. VidéoStudio: New Work from France is the second installment of VideoStudio, an ongoing series of video art.

Yto Barrada, Bouchra Khalili and Djamel Kokene use the immediacy and transience of film and video to question conceptions of cinematic form, national identity and statelessness. Each artist reinterprets techniques drawn from artistic genres including guerilla theater, documentary film and narrative storytelling.

 

Yto Barrada, The Smuggler, 2006 

  © Yto Barrada, The Smuggler, 2006.   Courtesy the artist

 

Yto BARRADA (b. 1971) recounts narratives of individuals—botanists, smugglers and magicians—and specific places, such as gardens and vacant lots. She addresses issues of postcolonial power in Morocco, where she lives and works.

 

Bouchra Khalili, Straight Stories - Part 2: Anya, 2008

© Bouchra Khalili, Straight Stories--Part 2: Anya, 2008.  Courtesy the artist

 

Bouchra KHALILI (b. 1975) follows the stories of contemporary migrants as they navigate geographic and psychological landscapes. Her subjects are made discernible only through overheard conversations, maps and urban panoramas.

 

Djamel Kokene, 4’33” (20 ans de nationalité française), 2006

  © Djamel Kokene, 4’33” (20 ans de nationalité française), 2006.
      Courtesy the artist and Galerie Anne de Villepoix, Paris

 

Djamel KOKENE (b. 1968) stages site-specific interventions in spaces such as museums and workshops, and records these performances on video. For the artist, the performances and videos of them each function as individual works, a move that tests the boundaries of media specificity and the limits of the artist’s role in contemporary society.

 

VideoStudio was inaugurated in fall 2008 to foster critical engagement with video, digital and new media practices.

 

VIDEOSTUDIO: NEW WORK FROM FRANCE

VIDEOS BY DJAMEL KOKENE, BOUCHRA KHALILI, DJAMEL KOKENE

April 1 - June 27, 2010

STUDIO MUSEUM HARLEM - SMH

144 West 125th Street
New York, NY 10027

Other Studio Museum's spring 2010 exhibitions and projects

On view April 1 - June 27, 2010

Collected. Reflections on the Permanent Collection
Harlem Postcards: Xenobia Bailey, Yara El-Sherbini, Brendan Fernandes, Monique Schubert
StudioSound: DJ /rupture

 

Previous Exhibitions at SMH

Wardell Milan: Drawings of Harlem, November 12, 2009 – March 14, 2010