MAYA ZACK, MADE TO MEASURE, GALLERIA MARIE-LAURE FLEISCH – ROME

Still from the video Mother Economy, 2007, one channel HD, duration:19:45 min.

MAYA ZACK
Made to Measure
Videos and drawings
from the project About Paper. Israeli Contemporary Art| curated by Giorgia Calò
Maya Attoun, Hilla Ben Ari, Yifat Bezalel, Maya Zack, Etti Abergel, Yael Balaban, Ofri Cnaani

Exhibition Opening: Monday, September 24th| 6 p.m.
Galleria Marie-Laure Fleisch | Vicolo Sforza Cesarini 3A | Rome
September 24th | November 17th 2012

On Monday, September 24th at 6 p.m., Galleria Marie-Laure Fleisch will open the third chapter of the project About Paper. Israeli Contemporary Art with a solo exhibition by Maya Zack entitled Made to Measure / videos and drawings.

The gallery hosts an installation looking like a sort of office that has been filled with paperwork, metal shelves and cardboard boxes, in order to partly recreate the setting that appears in the video Black and White Rule (2011), screened inside the installation itself. Maya Zack explores the relationship between video and drawing, which are often used in her works, giving her visual language a twofold function: in the video, the drawings are the practical tools used by the characters to measure things, and take the form of equations, archive images and diagrams. At the same time, the drawings on paper of various sizes exhibited in the gallery are meant to complete and extend the plot of the video, which therefore becomes both the signified and the signifier.

The perceptual distortion that blurs reality and representation is also emphasized by the exhibition of works on paper, which depict full-scale characters while they are measuring and examining the things that surround them. Their way of mapping and redefining space, in an almost obsessive fashion, causes a feeling of suspense in the spectator – an atmosphere that also pervades the video itself, which plays on the idea of a narrative pause that coincides with a moment of tension, in which characters once again perform very definite gestures.

The whole exhibition therefore focuses on the constant dialogue between the inside and the outside, between sense and nonsense, by creating real and fictitious environments that appear like cold, sterilized places filled with the presence/absence of humans.

In creating these works, Maya Zack started from the term “Tatort”, a German word that literally translates as “crime scene”. Here the word is interpreted in a wider sense, referring to a specific place in which something has happened. Thus the characters that people the drawings in the gallery, although in a state of “apparent death”, are actually investigators meditating on the ambiguous relationship between reality and its representation.

The gallery’s Project Room hosts Mother Economy (2007), a video where the artist stages her own personal strategy for developing an alternative kind of memory, which does not passively reproduce the past, but rather reworks and reinterprets it. Mother Economy, presented in 2008 at New York’s Jewish Museum, again looks into the solitary, compulsive gestures of a woman as she tries to measure several objects with almost scientific precision, in a home setting. The other family members, although absent, are evoked by the objects that people the home, while the diegetic audio of the radio helps evoke the historical context, in which a dramatically real chaos clashes with the apparently orderly, controlled space of the house.

Born in 1976, Maya Zack lives and works in Tel Aviv. She has exhibited in the most important museums of Israel (Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Museum of Art, Tel Aviv). Outside Israel, she presented her works at New York’s Jewish Museum and at the Jewish Museum in Berlin, and is represented in the permanent collection of the latter. She has won several awards, including Berlin’s Celeste Kunstpreis, with Mother Economy (2008); the Adi Prize for Jewish Expression in Art and Design of Jerusalem, with Living Room (2010); the 13th International Film Festival in Patras City, Greece, with Black and White Rule (2011). In 2011 she won the Idud Hayetzira Award, granted by the Israeli Ministry of Culture, as well as the Tel Aviv Museum of Art Prize. Her works are represented in many private collections in England, France, Belgium, the US, and Israel.

Still from the video Black and White Rule, 2011 one channel HD video, duration:17:45 min

MAYA ZACK
Made to Measure
videos and drawings
dal progetto About Paper. Israeli Contemporary Art| a cura di Giorgia Calò
Maya Attoun, Hilla Ben Ari, Yifat Bezalel, Maya Zack, Etti Abergel, Yael Balaban, Ofri Cnaani

Inaugurazione mostra: lunedì 24 settembre| ore 18.00
Galleria Marie-Laure Fleisch | Vicolo Sforza Cesarini 3A | Roma
24 settembre |17 novembre 2012

Lunedì 24 settembre alle ore 18.00, la Galleria Marie-Laure Fleisch inaugura la terza tappa del progetto About Paper. Israeli Contemporary Art, con la mostra personale di Maya Zack intitolata Made to Measure / videos and drawings.

La galleria ospita un’installazione che si presenta come una sorta di ufficio pieno di scartoffie, scaffalature metalliche e scatole di cartone, atte a ricreare parte dell’ambientazione che appare nel video Black and White Rule (2011), proiettato all’interno dell’installazione stessa. Maya Zack esplora il rapporto tra video e disegno, mezzi ricorrenti del suo linguaggio, conferendo a quest’ultimo una duplice funzione: nel video, i disegni sono lo strumento pratico utilizzato dai personaggi per misurare le cose apparendo sotto forma di equazioni, immagini di archivio e diagrammi. Al contempo i disegni su carta di varie dimensioni, accompagnano e proseguono lungo la galleria la trama del video che si fa così significato e significante.

La distorsione percettiva tra realtà e rappresentazione è enfatizzata anche dall’esposizione di carte raffiguranti personaggi disegnati in scala reale nell’atto di misurare ed esaminare ciò che li circonda. Il loro modo di mappare e ridefinire lo spazio in maniera quasi ossessiva, provoca nello spettatore uno stato di suspense che ritroviamo come elemento dominante anche nel video stesso, tutto giocato sul concetto di pausa narrativa in corrispondenza di un momento di tensione, in cui i personaggi compiono ancora una volta gesti precisi.

L’intera mostra verte quindi sul dialogo continuo tra dentro e fuori, senso e non senso, mediante la realizzazione di ambienti reali e fittizi che si mostrano come luoghi algidi e asettici, saturi della presenza/assenza dell’uomo.

Nella realizzazione di questi lavori, Maya Zack è partita dal termine “Tatort”, parola tedesca che letteralmente viene tradotta come “scena del crimine”, riletta però attraverso un senso più ampio che si riferisce ad un luogo specifico in cui è accaduto qualcosa. Così, i disegni dei personaggi che animano la galleria, in uno stato di “morte apparente”, sono in realtà gli investigatori che si interrogano sul rapporto ambiguo tra la realtà e la sua rappresentazione.

La Project Room della galleria ospita Mother Economy (2007), video in cui l’artista mette in scena la sua personale strategia di elaborazione di una memoria alternativa che non tende a ricalcare passivamente il passato, piuttosto lo elabora ed interpreta. Mother Economy, presentato nel 2008 al Jewish Museum di New York, indaga ancora una volta le azioni solitarie e compulsive di una donna intenta a misurare vari oggetti con una precisione quasi scientifica, all’interno di uno spazio domestico. Gli altri membri della famiglia, seppur assenti, sono evocati dagli oggetti che abitano la casa, mentre l’audio diegetico della radio contestualizza il momento storico, il caos drammaticamente reale che si contrappone allo spazio apparentemente ordinato e controllato dell’abitazione.

Maya Zack, nata nel 1976, vive e lavora a Tel Aviv. Ha esposto nei più importanti musei d’Israele (Israel Museum di Gerusalemme e Museum of Art di Tel Aviv). All’estero ha presentato i suoi lavori al Jewish Museum di New York e al Jewish Museum di Berlino, entrando nella collezione di quest’ultimo. Ha vinto numerosi premi tra cui: il Celeste Kunstpreis di Berlino con Mother Economy (2008); l’Adi Prize for Jewish Expression in Art and Design di Gerusalemme con Living Room (2010); il 13th International Film Festival di Patras City, Grecia, con Black and White Rule (2011). Nel 2011 ha vinto l’Idud Hayetzira Award del Ministero israeliano della cultura e il Tel Aviv Museum of Art Prize.

È presente in numerose collezioni private in Inghilterra, Francia, Belgio, America, Israele.

MAYA ZACK
nata nel 1976, vive e lavora a Tel Aviv.

Selected Group Exhibitions / Mostre personali:
2012 (Upcoming) Maya Zack solo show, Alon Segev Gallery, Tel Aviv
2011 Living Room, The Jewish Museum, New York, U.S.A
2011 Camera Obscura, Galerie Natalie Seroussi, Paris
2010 Mother Economy – video and drawings, CUC Gallery, Berlin
2010 Living Room, Alon Segev Gallery, Tel Aviv
2010 Black and White Rule – Open Set, Yaffo 23, Bezalel Gallery Jerusalem
2009 Reading Room. Bialik House Museum, Tel Aviv
2008 Mother Economy, The Jewish Museum, Media Center Gallery, New York
2008 Nalbishech Salmat Beton Vamelet, Be’eri gallery, Kibutz be’eri
2005 Videos + drawings, Alon Gallery, Ramat Hasharon
2004 Concrete and Cement, Noga Gallery, Tel Aviv (with Raya Bruckenthal)
2004 Mockument, Alon Gallery, Ramat Hasharon
2002 The Baron E.T. von Home, Artists Studios Gallery, Tel Aviv (with Raya Bruckenthal)
2001 Hier seid Ihr zusammen, Kav 16 Gallery, Tel Aviv.

.-.-.-.

Solo Exhibitions / Mostre collettive:
2012 3rd Moscow International Biennale for Young Art
2012 Recipients of ‘Idud Hayetzira’ Award by the Israeli Ministry of Culture. Petach Tikva Museum
2011   Magic Lantern: Recent Acquisitions in Contemporary Art. Israel Museum, Jerusalem
2011   Heimatkunde (How German is it? 30 Artists’ Notion of Home) Jewish Museum, Berlin Germany.
2010   Neo-Barbarism, Rothschild 69, Tel Aviv
2010   Rupture & Repair, Adi Prize for Jewish Expression in Art and Design. Artists House Jerusalem
2010   Ark, Mani House, Leumi Gellery, Israel
2010   Suspended Spaces #1. Maison de la culture, Amiens, France
2009 Childhood Stories, whiteBOX e.V., Kultfabrik Gallery, Munihc
2009 Art TLV, The Tel Aviv Art Biannale
2009 Drama of Identities, Beth Hatefutsoth Museum, Tel Aviv
2009 Seafaring-route. Tel Aviv. Berlin. Beirut. Artneuland Berlin
2009 Paper Works, The Israel Museum, Anna Ticho House, Jerusalem
2009 Reel Mothers, California Center for the Arts Museum, Escondido
2009 Tel Aviv Mon Amour, The Office Gallery, TLV
2009 Shirat Ha’beton, Eretz Israel Museum, Tel Aviv
2008 Invideo, International Exhibition of Video Art and Cinema Beyond. Milan, Italy.
2008 From Punk To Pink, Moti Hasson Gellry, NY, USA.
2008 Figge von Rosen Galerie – Cologne, Germany
2008 Merma(i)d, Inga Gallery, Tel Aviv, Israel. (with Raya Bruckenthal)
2008 Rishon Le’zion Biannale, Rishon Le’zion, Israel.
2008 Celeste Kunstpreis Finalists, At the former Patzenhofer Brauerei-Friedrichshöhe, Berlin.
2008 Dead End, Rosenfeld Gallery, Tel Aviv
2008 Goyim, The new Gallery, Teddy Stadium, Jerusalem.
2007 Guilt & Gelt, Artneuland Gallery Berlin
2006 Videoland, Artneuland Gallery Berlin
2006 The Israel Museum, Jerusalem. Culture ministry Award winners
2005 Not Alone, The Haifa University Gallery
2005 The Drawing Biennale, The Jerusalem Artists House
2004 A Homage to Hanoch Levin, The Haifa Museum of Art
2003 Something Local, the Digital Art Lab, Holon
2002 Positive Discrimination, The Tel Aviv Museum of Art
2002 Guanacju Biennale, Korea
2001   The Armory Show, The Tel Aviv Museum of Art

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