14th Jan 2011 2:00pm-8:00pm
University Gallery
Over Where by Madeleine Strindberg & Judy Price
Friday 14 January 2011
Artists talks:
2.30pm Judy Price
4pm Madeleine Strindberg
Private View 5 – 8pm
(with complimentary first drink)
Free entry, all welcome
University of Brighton Gallery, Faculty of Arts, Grand Parade BN2 0JY
Exhibition open from 1 December 2010 - 20 January 2011
Gallery open Monday - Saturday / 10am-5pm / Free Entry
Over Where brings together visual artists Madeleine Strindberg and Judy Price who both explore representations of Israel and Palestine.
The central part of Strindberg’s work is ‘Over Where’, a triptych representing one land with two rightful owners, Israel and Palestine. Taking the centre stage of the triptych is ‘Bleeding’, a long and thin amorphous golden creature (Israel/Palestine) which is flanked by two large, predominantly bright red paintings that comment on the uncertainty and the unknown aspect of the outcome of the negotiations and the inherent violence of the current situation. ‘The Wall’ is a diagrammatic rendition of the current actual state of affairs. Other paintings include ‘The Flotilla Incident’, and Hebron’, one of the strongholds of the Occupation, while ‘Neharot’ is addressing feelings of separation and suffering due to the political situation in the land.
‘Within this Narrow Strip of Land, 2008’ is a video and sound installation by Judy Price within the ‘Over Where’ exhibition and explores ways in which communities and individuals are framed and incited by the irreversibility of loss in Israel and Palestine.
The video and sound installation consists of different elements. In The Refrain, a double screen video projection, St John’s Eye Hospital is employed as a powerful metaphor for transformation and visibility, the process of healing of damaged sight. Filmed through objects, glass or medical tools The Refrain shows partial visibility of this environment and is accompanied by haunting and minimal sound composition by Norwegian sound artist Maia Urstad.
A number of smaller vignettes, like moving stills, filmed in different locations in Israel and Palestine, are placed around the gallery. In Saffron of Jerusalem a butterfly dances on a Jerusalem rooftop whilst in Light Drinks the Dark a boisterous stag night is observed at the Dead Sea beach. Time Line, filmed from a cable car over Jericho offers both a privileged view of the town at the same time alluding to an ambiguous state of suspension and destabilized vision.
Reel and Assemblage re-appropriate archival material from the British Mandate period. In Reel , Price has selected the unwanted residues of film–the lead-ins and endings of film stock. The scuffing and scratching from handling film material, black cue dots, bleedings, numbering or logging marks reveal all that is not seen in the documentation of history. In Assemblage, the raising of a British Observation kite balloon, conjures up both release from the land and the mapping of it, the establishment of territory through the process of reconnaissance, or surveillance.
