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11/4/2013

Dissidents

Stattbad Wedding, Berlin

The ongoing economic crisis and the rise of all kinds of populism in Europe demonstrate a dangerous backlash in 21st century history; meanwhile extreme industrialization, mass production & over consumption has led global warming to break all records. Quarrels over diminishing but vital natural resources and shrinking living space may well be the cause of future conflicts. However fucked up the situation our world is facing right now, there is still hope. To keep faith, we need to remember people’s abilities to protest and to resist. Protest is when I say this does not please me. Resistance is when I ensure what does not please me occurs no more. From the Arab Spring to the Occupy movement, the eastern and western worlds have both lately shown the capability to fight against establishment. Protest always starts in the streets, and so often does art. The street is a mixture of languages and a hotchpotch of voices, where the pictograms of road signs and the surreal messages written by street artists live side by side, and where the simple commercial communication runs up against the political. To the careful observer the street makes visible the underlying noise of our society.

By acknowledging the social and political unrest of our time, OPEN WALLS Gallery cordially invites you as we debut DISSIDENTS, a group show. A dissident, broadly defined, is a person who actively challenges an established doctrine, policy, or institution. Using the urban landscape as a playground, seeking truth and raising awareness, the artists that we have chosen for this show strive for non-conformity and create work representative of both political and social opposition, making them pioneers of dissident activity.

Join us on Friday April 12th in Stattbad Berlin as we contribute to the social strife of 2013 with works by:

BR1 - By ripping off advertisements from billboards or giving a new face to Muslim women BR1 is fighting the hegemonic policing of sense imposed by late capitalism . The point is to fight hegemonic ideas and to give back the public space to the public. His aim is to give social and cultural functions to billboards which, while lacking those, are imposed to society. Portraying veiled woman in their daily life, BR1 challenges the ideological isolation of the veil.

JUST – Just’s photographic work is a journey. He studied photography in Scotland where he also worked as a picture framer while taking photos of the punk- and squatter scenes that he was part of. One scene led to another, and Just then went on to focus on the graffiti and street art cultures. American photojournalist, Martha Cooper has it: “Just’s breathtaking photos are dramatic documents of daring graffiti artists in action. Through them you can vicariously experience the danger and thrills of rooftop writing.”

ALIAS - Rather than directly dealing with war or politics, Alias is focusing on how individuals are personally affected by their environment. It is like zooming on individuals and seeing things on their scale; zooming in on children in particular and observing how they experience that world and context they live in. There is a lot of compassion in Alias’ work as he delicately infiltrates the urban environment to reveal the existence of loneliness and personal crisis behind a larger catastrophe.

EMESS - Confronting the viewer with issues that would rather be swept under the rug, Emess’ work is most often motivated by political questions, for which there are perhaps no clear answers or solutions but that need to be addressed. The use of humor and his sense of aesthetics catch the viewer off guard for a moment allowing attention to be drawn to the subject. Emess sees no difference between the street or the gallery space, his work is designed to reach an audience and adapts itself to the situation.

VERMIBUS – Berlin based artist Vermibus regularly collects advertising posters from the streets, using them in his studio as the base material for his work. There, a process of transformation begins. Using solvent, he brushes away the faces and flesh of the models appearing in the posters as well as brand logos. Once the transformation is complete, he then reintroduces the adverts back into their original context, hijacking the publicity, and its purpose.

GIACOMO SPAZIO - Pioneer of the Italian Street Art movement, Spazio’s iconography is borrowed from fanzines of the 1970s and 1980s, from punk graphics and the album covers of those years, from documents of the underground scene and artistic-musical performances, from photos taken from publications, magazines, and daily newspapers. The mind immediately races to the silk screens of Andy Warhol and Pop Art, but it is only a superficial evocation because Spazio goes well beyond, making his own the practice of incursion and theft typical of the punk who uses information and images from the media and propose them with an ironic and desecrating, cynical and subversive intention.

NEGATIVE VIBES – Self made, street taught, Negative Vibes delivers a great deal of gravity through his existentialist and symbolic imagery.

Press & Private View: by invitation only, Friday April 12th

Vernissage: Friday April 12th from 20:00 onwards

OPEN WALLS Gallery
C/O Stattbad Berlin
Gerichtstr. 65 - 13347 Berlin
Opening hours: Thursdays to Saturdays, from 15:00 to 20:00
Admission: €5 Free for Gallery members & clients

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