Mummery + Schnelle is very pleased to present a limited edition
collector set of Artist Book: Ori Gersht. Conceived
by the artist as a piece of work in its own right, the set
is composed of three volumes, each taking a separate Gersht
film work as its subject; Evaders, Will You Dance For
Me and Offering.
All three film works disguise dark and complex themes beneath
seductive or hypnotic imagery. Will You Dance For Me depicts
an 85-year-old dancer swaying back and forth in a rocking
chair, slowly recounting her experiences as a young woman
in Auschwitz. Evaders explores Walter Bernjamin's
ill fated escape from Nazi occupied France along the mountainous
Lister Route. Offering presents a contemporary matador
preparing for a bullfight and an expectant audience.
These small and intimate books reflect on the creative thought
process behind the making of each film. Together they create
a seamless visual narrative and an insight into the mind of
the artist. Each volume combines sources that have influenced
Gersht including film stills, screen grabs, music videos and
art historical paintings. From page to page they combine with
Gersht’s own drawings, sketches, photographs and works
from his wider portfolio that he considers relevant to these
final film works.
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All of the images, original, found and sourced are treated
equally and have been edited into sequences by the artist.
The relationships between the images are not intended to be
didactic but attempt to create a new experience from Gersht’s
ideas and to contextualize his working process.
Robert Rowland Smith, author of the Kindle number one bestseller
Breakfast with Socrates, has written the accompanying
softback text Gersht's Ghosts. The essay explores
the themes of all three works and makes connections between
the sourced, found and comparative images.
This publication accompanies the exhibition This Storm
is What We Call Progress, co-curated with Photoworks,
showing at Imperial War Museum, London 25 January - 29 April
2012.
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