NOA GUR
(B. 1980 HOLON, ISRAEL) LIVES AND WORKS IN BERLIN AND TEL AVIV-> FELD 2018
-> BODY VS SUPERSTRUCTURE 2016
-> CV
THE FIRST MOMENT OF MARWA EL SHERBINI, 2019-2020, PERFORMANCE, 10 MIN
Above, a reversed documentation of the performance near the german chancellery, Berlin, Camera: Avi Levi.
Almost 10 years ago, Marwa el Sherbini, a young woman of Egyptian origin, residing in Dresden, was brutally murdered inside the city's courtroom by the right wing extremist against whom she testified. This incident raised fierce questions towards the state's authorities & their representatives (Judges, officials and the police who shot Marwa's husband instead of her attacker). Nevertheless, a responsibility has not been taken and her family's lawsuit against the german court was rejected three times so far. Through assembling legal records & further information the case is reenacted, the performers (trained as dancers) are talking and moving in reverse, while reversing the timeline from her death back to life & reality that preceded to sequence of events, through using backward movement & speech.
FIELDS, 2020, INTERACTIVE INSTALLATION
The video installation uses a green screen located on the street in south Tel Aviv, opposite the 1:1 Center for Art and Politics. A live camera films the street and the green background that is simultaneously replaced by images of an exhibition space in Israel’s Museum, and the result is streamed in real- time and projected in the 1:1 exhibition space. Passersby that walk by the green screen will see themselves “inside” parts the spaces if they look into the 1:1 centre through the front window that separates the exhibition space from its neglected surroundings. The real-time photographic action is characteristic of the surveillance and monitoring strategies of both museum spaces and and crime ridden public spaces. This intervention seeks to challenge the separation between art spaces and the streets, and to confront participants with the experience of observing themselves and being observed in these two different spaces.
FELD, 2018, INSTALLATION VIEW - NIR ALTMAN
LOOPHOLE, 2017, A ONE CHANNEL VIDEO INSTALLTION, FLOOR PROJECTION, 00:06 Min (LOOP), COLOR, SOUND
"Loophole extends between darkness and light, between the anonymity of the silhouette and a recognizable outline. Here, the artist has produced a self-portrait that is constantly moving, spinning on its axis like a mechanical mannequin. It may also be regarded as an ethnographic visual object that proclaims its otherness and its distinctiveness; an object one would like to regard as imploring us to categorize it in a way that may fix its meaning, to analyze and reduce it to the limitations of our knowledge. At the same time, it is a portrait devoid of excessive information, presenting the viewer only with an engulfing two dimensional silhouette that tries to breach its designated bounds. An aperture or patch in the artists portrait turns into two gaping holes that may stand for her absent eyes, looking at us without looking." Text by Rothem Rozenthal
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LOGISTICS OF INTEGRATIONS, 2017, PHOTO (PROCESSED), INJEKT ON ALU DIBOND, 80 X 54 CM
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SUD, ZUID, SUR, 2016, A ONE CHANNEL VIDEO INSTALLATION, FLOOR PROJECTION, 01:40 MIN, COLOR, SOUND
Three words I write on the ground- Sud, Sur, Zuid, are of the same meaning in languages of nations that expended southwards in the colonial era. As the lightbulb circles, my shadow oscillates between the hand written words until it slows down while pointing in one direction.
"Loophole extends between darkness and light, between the anonymity of the silhouette and a recognizable outline. Here, the artist has produced a self-portrait that is constantly moving, spinning on its axis like a mechanical mannequin. It may also be regarded as an ethnographic visual object that proclaims its otherness and its distinctiveness; an object one would like to regard as imploring us to categorize it in a way that may fix its meaning, to analyze and reduce it to the limitations of our knowledge. At the same time, it is a portrait devoid of excessive information, presenting the viewer only with an engulfing two dimensional silhouette that tries to breach its designated bounds. An aperture or patch in the artists portrait turns into two gaping holes that may stand for her absent eyes, looking at us without looking." Text by Rothem Rozenthal
LOGISTICS OF INTEGRATIONS, 2017, PHOTO (PROCESSED), INJEKT ON ALU DIBOND, 80 X 54 CM
SUD, ZUID, SUR, 2016, A ONE CHANNEL VIDEO INSTALLATION, FLOOR PROJECTION, 01:40 MIN, COLOR, SOUND
Three words I write on the ground- Sud, Sur, Zuid, are of the same meaning in languages of nations that expended southwards in the colonial era. As the lightbulb circles, my shadow oscillates between the hand written words until it slows down while pointing in one direction.
WAYS OF MAKING VISIBLE, 2016, A TWO CHANNEL VIDEO
INSTALLATION, 02:29 MIN., COLOUR, SOUND - THE VIDEO CHANNELS ARE PRESENTED AS OPPOSIT PROJECTIONS
The Video shooting took place outside of the museum's opening hours and involves pupils operating flashlights in the darkened space, posing behind sculptures in showcases. Their faces are visible and alternately blinded by the flash, while hindering and in turn enabling the spectators' gaze with the audible click of the torches button. A simulation of the flashlight's reflection of the object is projected on to the opposite wall, and casts the outlines of the shadow of the sculptural object that is seen in the video involving the pupils and the sculpture from which it supposedly originates, which is not entirely visible to the viewers eyes.
ARTDUBAI, 2014, A ONE CHANNEL VIDEO INSTALLATION, 02:29 MIN., COLOUR, SOUND
In the video work Art Dubai, Gurs Berlin galerist recounts an anecdote that he experienced in the art fair, when the fairs directors interfered with one of the exhibits, a globe-shaped sculpture, and asked to make changes in the world map it displays. The demand followed a nocturnal visit to the fair. There, when the lights are turned off and visibility is ostensibly limited, the conditions and restrictions are shaped into the visibility of daylight. Participaction: Henning Weidemann.
BURNING BUSH, 2012, VIDEO INSTALLATION, 28 MINUTES LOOP
"shows the artist's face painted black with soot. The mouth inhales and exhales smoke. The face, which at first appears to be a flat, black surface, is partly lit and reveals its contours. The chest is covered with black spots and presented in the classic posture of the self-portrait and in an androgynous way, thereby pointing towards the problematic status of the female body as a represented object. Soot and smoke refer to industrial means of production, as well as to capitalism as a way of 'melting all that is solid into the air'. Wearing soot as a mask recalls the fact that somewhere physical work still takes place, and that it is performed predominantly by those who are not part of the glorious regime of creative and cognitive labor. Like the artist's face, it is invisible labor: invisible because of its remoteness (it is outsourced to parts of the world we do not observe closely) or because it does not count as gainful employment (like female carework). One could also have the impression that the face is consuming itself by inhaling and exhaling: A self-sufficient circle of production and indulgence in a post-apocalyptic atmosphere. Everything has already been burned".
WHITE NOISE, 2012, A ONE CHANNEL VIDEO INSTALLATION, SOUND, HD, 02:29 MIN , 15:00 MIN LOOP
"In White Noise (2012) Gur continues the exploration of her self-perception, refracted through a prism of Otherness, into the realm of contemporary art practice as it relates to art historical production Gur makes imprints of her black, charcoal colored face on paper towels, photographs them, and then creates a video showing one printed portrait per frame. In a 25-second loop, she exposes the evolution of the image, from its status as religious iconography to its mechanical reproduction, its pairing with movement, and its more recent digitalization and distribution, while still reinforcing the individuality of each print." Text by Hili Perlsohn, taken from the article Ways of making visible.