STILL MOVED

Video Art and Old Masters
October 13, 2013 to February 23, 2014

The Still Life is an invented image which visualises and reflects both objects of nature as well as objects of everyday life in their seductive beauty. The Still Life bears, at the very instance, a coded message which significantly transcends the objects displayed. The spectrum of its motif ranges from the opulence, joy, and leisure it represents and the reference to the fugacity of all that. Editing a Still Life by the means of video results in an evident evolution of the genre, as a very unique, seemingly paradox tension can be found between the Still Life and the motion picture.

Ori Gersht: Pomegranate, 2006 (Videostill)

The exhibition "Still Moved“ features 9 visual artists who "gave movement“ to the traditional genre in 21 video art works. The videos which have been created over the past 13 years turn out to be a yet unseen compound of stunning density. In the end, all the artists, in their videos, recurred to the initial "pure“ motif of the Old Masters. The exhibition emphasises this direct reference by also presenting a number of 17th century Still Lifes.

This way, the high degree of artistic invention which goes for both the Still Life as for the contemporary video reinterpretation becomes accessible for the first time.

Nothing has changed in the elementary setting of the Still Life. Paintings and videos alike, articulate fundamental statements on the infinity of time and space, and on the condition of men and women being nothing but visitors there. Can we still be moved by the paintings of Old Masters today? And can we come to pause for a moment in front of a contemporary video art work? The exhibition aims at triggering an appetite in viewing exquisite painting as well as immaculate video compositions. And above it hopes to present contemporary relations of meaning and function.

Video Artists

Old Masters (selection)