Videoland

In our developing global reality, more and more geographies are being born. It would seem, then, that the boundaries of the gaze is a question that itself acquires a new meaning. This exhibition seeks to explore the connection between belonging and finding one's place. It does so by means of diverting the gaze away from the local. This is the connection between the "familiar" and the "foreign," or the "other".

A series of related issues arise: Is geography visible? Does it have a place? What roles do knowledge and memory fill in defining a place?

The exhibition reveals interrelationships between different types of spaces, between a space that needs no actual manifestation in order to exist in contrast to a physical space. We will ask "Where are we situated?" rather than "Where do we belong?"

Does turning the gaze toward an "other" place necessarily mean a place where I am not to be found?

The other space, or the spatial otherness, is an imaginary space that is born of the transition between two other kinds of spaces: a knowledge space and a physical space. The gaze that is directed towards the imagined space in which identities are tested is a gaze of consciousness, one that creates the possibility of returning the gaze, that is, there is the gaze towards "there," and there is "there" returning our gaze.

The exhibition is based on a trialogue between gazes that deals with the physical space, textual space, sound space, or the space of the human body itself. The participating artists are from various places. They represent the horizon of a foreign place destabilizing their sense of belonging. By so doing, they stabilize a sense of their own place.

Works:

Hannan Abu Hussein and Haim Odri | A Small Country with 2 Big Mustaches |

The work deals with both, the home country and the own body as territories constructing identity. The artist herself describes all the time balancing on plates her feeling towards a physical and mental occupation by two different kinds of society: nyje Israeli government and the Palestinian patriarchy. Hannan Abu Hussein | born 1972 | lives and works in Jerusalem Haim Adri | born 1968 | lives and works in Paris

Wilfried Agricola de Cologne | Message from behind a Wall | 2005 | 10:00 min.

In February 2005 Agricola de Cologne visited several places where the Israeli government erected the segregation wall. The part of the wall filmed in Message from behind a Wall is situated in opposite of the AIDA refugee camp and was at the time a temporary playground for children. Agricola de Cologne | born 1950 | lives and works in Cologne

Yossi Breger | Carsten Speaks of the View Seen from Kollhoff-Tower in Potsdamer Platz, Berlin | 2004 | 6:38 min.

We see a view to a central place in a city. A person we cannot see explains us the view by heart. Famous buildings such as the Bundestag are in this explanation from memory related to subjective experience.

The work was part of the solo exhibition Twenty Shekels Cup of Coffee, exhibiting 12 video works with stories from daily life. Yossi Breger | born 1960 | lives and works in Tel Aviv

Birgit Glatzel & Benjamin Seide | Going to Jerusalem (Reise nach Jerusalem) | 2005 | 3:29 min.

The video refers to a play called going to Jerusalem. An imaginary journey from your home to a place far away. Like in a dream the holy land appears as a souvenir in a snow dome and becomes a symbol of travelling in thought. Birgit Glatzel | born 1970 | lives and works in Berlin & Tel Aviv Benjamin Seide | born 1968 | lives and works in Berlin

Uschi Huber | Yalla Playback | 2002 | 8:00 min.

A discarded music cassette tape rolled out and scattered in the street is followed by a camera. She recovers the tape very slowly and restores the 'Eastern' style music on it, combines it with the video sequence into a complex relationship of sight and sound. Uschi Huber | born 1966 | lives and works in Cologne

Cheb M. Kammerer & Sharon Horodi | Simply a Love Song (Pashut Shir Ahava) | 2006, 3min

"Simply A Love Song" is one sequence of a series of self-contained short films and fragments entitled "Stray Docs Tel Aviv ", combining video art with documentary and video activism. Despite our seemingly documentary working method this videos display portraits of places, or people from a subjective point of view, that does not intend to be objective.

"Simply A Love Song" was made in August 2006 when the recent war against Lebanon hit its peak. During a demonstration against it some passerby started to lose temper... Cheb M. Kammerer | born 1963 | lives and works in Tel Aviv Sharon Horodi | born 1970 | lives and works in Tel Aviv

Hadas Kedar & Alex Shady | Fall in Berlin | 2004, 1.5 min

The mere name "Universal Theory of Gravity" or "Theory of Universal Gravity" (the secularists like to use confusing language) has a distinctly socialist ring to it. The core idea of "to each according to his weight, from each according to his mass" is communist. There is no reason that gravity should apply to the just and the unjust equally, and the saved should have relief from such "universalism." And, if we have Universal Gravity now, then Universal health care will be sure to follow. It is this kind of universalism that saps a nation's moral fiber. Hadas Kedar | born 1963 | lives and works in Tel Aviv Alex Shady | born 1974 | lives and works in London

Dana Levy | Disengagement | 2005, 3:20 min & Dreamers | 2004, 19:10 min

Disengagement was made during Isrealis disengagement from Gaza in August 2005. It deals with the temporariness and fragility of home and the pain of being uprooted. The work was made during an artist residency at Hotel Pupik in the Austrian countryside.

For the Dreamers Dana Levy filmed Israelis and Palestinians describing their dreams highlighting through collective subconscious the essence of societies in a constant state of conflict. Dana Levy | born 1973 | lives and works in Tel Aviv

Waheeda Malullah | Play | 2005, 2:41 min.

Play is a short magic trick about how we react to each other and what our roles in society are. In a light way using the speed and rythm of people's movement it is shown that every behavior is constructed and instead of following the rules we could decide to play: We don't have to catch the ball, instead believing it exists! Waheeda Malullah | born 1978 | lives and works in Bahrain

Heike Mutter | Continuing along a Line | 2004, 11:00 min.

The work shows two sequences filmed on the crowded beach of Tel Aviv. Both were taken without any break, the length of each sequence corresponds with the length of a 16 mm film reel.

In sequence 1 the camera was directed to the West. The view of the spectator is drawn along the horizon, passing a countless number of Matkot-players.

In sequence 2 the camera was directed to the East. The crowded beach is filmed together with the the city's skyline. Heike Mutter | born 1969 | lives and works in Cologne

Uriel Orlow | Descent | 2006, 6:00 min.

In Descent a pregnant Israeli woman talks about her experience of moving to Switzerland. Descent is the literal translation of the Hebrew word for emigration: Yerida. It is the most recent in a series of films made since 1998 in which Uriel Orlow explores the political and historical situation of Israel through personal testimonies. Uriel Orlow | born 1973 | lives and works in London

Youssef Rabbaoui | Homezone | 2005, 14:30 min.

Homezone is a film about and with teenagers in Wedding, one of the Berlin's poorest districts. Acted by locals from an ethnically mixed working class area in the heart of Berlin, just a few blocks away from the central government buildings. Ordinary youth living their lives of quiet desperation, bored and trapped in the only environment they know. A short and poignant story about young people without a history. Youssef Rabbaoui | born 1954 | lives and works in Berlin

Maya Zack & Stanislav Levor | Meme 2. The Units | 2003, 11:00 min.

Meme 2. the Units is part of a video trilogy examining the validity of cultural and folkloristic information binding one with a place, with a group, with a tradition and is being transferred onwards as a Meme (see Memetics).

An orientalist tourist, exhausted by the heat and flies is trying to find his way to "The Units" with a map - but alas; the surrounding looks just like the map. When he bumps into an Arabic looking local and there starts a strange dialogue between the two: The tourist, frightened communicates with neurotic body movements.The local talks to him in English with a heavy theatrical Arabic accent; giving him poetic information about the "The Units".

In the second part, a folkloristic dancer is being watched. He has just deserted his dance group during a dance tour abroad and is now in a grey globalist office, trying to address the office room by physical gestures and dancing. Maya Zack | born 1976 | lives and works in Tel Aviv Stanislav Levor | born 1976 | lives and works in Jerusalem

Videoland
A Trialogue of video Artworks

mit Agricola de Cologne, Yossi Breger, Birgit Glatzel & Benjamin Seide,
Uschi Huber, Hannan Abu Hussein & Haim Adri, Cheb Kammerer & Sharon Horodi, Hadas Kedar & Alex Schady, Dana Levy, Waheeda Malullah, Heike Mutter, Uriel Orlow, Youssef Rabbaoui, Barak Reiser, Maya Zack, Stanislav Levor