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Brandstof will start with a screening of the video Detroit (2009) by artist Amir Yatziv. The screening will be followed by a talk between Yatziv and researcher Noa Roei about her recently published paper titled One Map, Multiple Legends (2021) and about the video itself.
Recently, researcher Noa Roei wrote an analytical article titled One Map, Multiple Legends: Detroit as a Case on the work of Amir Yatziv on a militarized interpretation of space. Through a reading for Yatziv’s work ‘Detroit (2009), the paper investigates the blurred borders between civilian and military ways of experiencing and mediating space in the context of Israel's political geography.
The talk will be moderated by curator, researcher, and writer Margarita Osipian.
Program
4 pm. Screening 'Detroit' (2009) by Amir Yatziv
4.30 pm. Talk Amir Yatziv & Noa Roei, moderated by Margarita Osipian
About the video work 'Detroit' (2009)
A map of an Arab Town is presented to urban planners who aren’t aware that it was built as a military training area. They analyze the influence of the city’s structure on its imaginary inhabitants. The title of the video is borrowed from this training area in the country’s southern region. “Detroit” is a 1:1 simulation of a Palestinian city. The simulation generates an alternative reality that conceals the true reality. The training city “Detroit” was intended to prepare soldiers for combat in an urban area. It resembles a Muslim quarter, thus meeting the users’ needs in a simulation that would furnish them with a fantasy of an Arab city. The essence of this city is replaced by its fictive image. “Detroit” is devoid of flowering gardens; the city’s residents are mere extras, and the houses contain no books or any other sign of life.
Amir Yatziv
Amir Yatziv is a filmmaker and visual artist interested in past narratives and their contemporary interpretation. In his works and films, he creates a sense of estrangement, revealing the impossibility of a single coherent historical truth. Yatziv is a graduate of Bezalel Academy of Art and Design - Jerusalem (2008) and Hito Steyerl's class at the UDK Berlin (2010). His works were presented in numerous group and solo exhibitions in several places including Tate Modern (London), KW Institute for Contemporary Art (Berlin), and Van Abbemuseum (Eindhoven) amongst others, and his films were screened at multiple film festivals around the world.
Noa Roei
Noa Roei is assistant professor at the Department of Literary and Cultural Analysis, University of Amsterdam, and a research fellow at the Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis (ASCA). For the academic year 2019–20 she also was a Marie Curie research fellow at the Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies (FRIAS). Her book, Civic Aesthetics: Militarism, Israeli Art, and Visual Culture (Bloomsbury, 2016) addresses the multifaceted representations of militarism in contemporary Israeli art. Current research interests include politics and aesthetics; vision and visuality; performance theory; critical cartography and the (de)construction of national identity.
Margarita Osipian
Margarita Osipian is a curator, researcher, and writer living and working in Amsterdam. Engaging with the intersections and frictions between art, design, technology, and language, she organizes collaborative projects both in formal institutions and in more precarious and fleeting spaces. Holding an MA in Media Studies from the University of Amsterdam and an MA in English Literature from the University of Toronto, her research has focused on visual culture, technology, and the carceral state. Margarita is part of The Hmm, a platform for internet cultures; a member of the Hackers & Designers collective; part of the Sonic Acts curatorial team; and in the artistic core of the W139. She has done programming and curated exhibitions for W139, Salwa Foundation, TodaysArt, Bits of Freedom, Tetem, Hackers & Designers, and Mediamatic, amongst others.
Brandstof is the in-depth program to accompany the exhibition Garden State.
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