Esther Shalev-Gerz

Esther Shalev-Gerz (born Gilinsky) is a contemporary artist. She lives and works in Paris, London and New York.

Biography

Esther Shalev-Gerz was born in Vilnius, Lithuania. In 1957, she moved with her family to Jerusalem, Israel.

From 1975 to 1979 she studied Fine arts at the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design where she got her Bachelor of Fine Arts. She then lived in New York City for one year (1980/81).

From 1981 she participated in collective exhibitions in institutions such as the Israel Museum in Jerusalem and the Tel Aviv Museum of Art.

In 1983 she produced her first work in public space: Oil on Stone, a permanent installation in Tel Hai, Israel, for the Tel Hai Contemporary Art Meeting.

In 1984 the artist moved to Paris and started working through Europe and Canada.

In 1990 she got an artistic residency from the German Academic Exchange Service and moved to Berlin for one year.

In 2002 she stayed at the IASPIS residency in Stockholm, Sweden.

From 2003 to 2014 she taught the Master of Fine Arts students in Valand Academy, University of Gothenburg, Sweden.[1]

Her latest major exhibitions were Ton Image me Regarde?!, 2010, in the Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris, in which ten of her installations were displayed[2][3][4][5] and her retrospective entitled Between Telling and Listening, 2012, in the Cantonal Museum of Fine Arts in Lausanne, Switzerland where she presented 15 of her installations. Besides, her work was the subject of an itinerary personal exhibition in Canada between 2012 and 2014, firstly in the Kamloops Art Gallery,[6] then in the Belkin Art Gallery,[7] UBC, Vancouver and finally in the Galerie de l'UQAM, Montreal.[8]

In 2010 she received a three-year grant from the Swedish Research Council for her Artistic Research project Trust and the Unfolding Dialogue.[9]

In 2013 was released the illustrated anthology Esther Shalev-Gerz, The Contemporary Art of Trusting Uncertainties and Unfolding Dialogues[10] edited by Jason E. Bowman that gathers new texts around Shalev-Gerz's work and the notion of Trust as well as formerly published texts on her art. Among the authors are Jacques Rancière, Georges Didi-Huberman, Jacqueline Rose, James E. Young, Lisa Le Feuvre.

In 2014 her team is one of the six finalists of the competition for the design of the Canadian National Holocaust Monument in Ottawa, with the teams of Yael Bartana, Daniel Libeskind, Krzysztof Wodiczko, David Adjaye or Gilles Saucier.[11]

In 2015 the Fonds municipal d'art contemporain of the city of Geneva acquired the artwork Les Inséparables, 2000-2010, a monumental double-clock installed as a permanent work in public space.

Work overview

Esther Shalev-Gerz questions the perpetual construction of the relationship between an experience and the telling one gives of it. She analyses portraiture, which she understands as the reflection of a person, place or event. Her work invites the spectator to an opening to the ambiguities and multiplicities acting in the collective memory. Her installations, photography, video and public sculpture are developed through dialogue, consultation and negotiation with people whose participation provides an emphasis to their individual and collective memories, accounts, opinions and experiences. Constantly inquiring into transitional qualities of time and space and the correlative transformation of identities, locales and (hi)stories Esther Shalev-Gerz has produced a body of work that simultaneously records, critiques, and contributes to the understandings of the societal roles and value of artistic practice.[12]

In her text entitled The Perpetual Movement of Memory, Shalev-Gerz describes her practice: “In my works in the public realm, a space is constructed for memories activated by participation, that is to say, the moment when the supposed spectator becomes a participant by writing his name, using his voice or sending in his photo. Thanks to the traces left during this acts, these participants keep the memory of their own participation in the work’s procedure, which also bears witness to their responsibility to their own times.”[13]

In an interview with Marta Gili, director of the Jeu de Paume, Shalev-Gerz adds: “I try to enter the space that opens between listening and telling in order to get away from the logic of discourse, that is to say, to accede to another kind of space and consider it artistically. It’s a kind of “reveal” of the intelligibility of the sensible/sensitive or of a memory that differs from the one constructed by words, akin to concepts that traverse the body, able to be picked up by the gaze.”[14]

And also: “As an artist, it is very important for me to trust the participants – whom I approach (right away) as equals, and whose contributions are an element of the project. I think that this is what makes it possible to produce the work: trust in the other person’s intelligence.”[15]

In his text entitled The Image of the Other, in the catalogue of the exhibition Does Your Image Reflect Me? Ulrich Krempel provides his understanding of Shalev-Gerz’ work: “One thing is certain: only by talking and listening, passing on first-hand experience, images, emotional glances and moments, can we bring ourselves to the point where remembrance is converted into action”.[16]

Jacques Rancière in his text The Work of the Image, for the catalogue of MenschenDinge/The Human Aspect of Objects, republished in the catalogue of the Jeu de Paume show, described the artist’s work in these words: “Esther Shalev-Gerz does not give voice to the witnesses of the past or of elsewhere, but to researchers that are at work in the here and now. She makes the ones who come from elsewhere speak of the present as they do of the past, of here as of there. She makes them speak about the way they have thought and arrange the relationship between one place and another, one time and another. But also the dispositifs that she constructs are themselves dispositifs that distend their words, and subject them to representation of the conditions governing their listening and uttering.”[17]

Some projects and exhibitions

“We invite the citizens of Harburg, and visitors to the town, to add their names here to ours. In doing so we commit ourselves to remain vigilant. As more and more names cover this 12 metre-high lead column, it will gradually be lowered into the ground. One day it will have disappeared completely and the site of the Harburg monument against fascism will be empty. In the long run, it is only we ourselves who can stand up against injustice."

The column was sunk into the ground seven times from 1986 to 1993. All that remains visible are a lead plaque on the ground, the text panel and photos of the different stages.[18][19][20][21]

Permanent installations in public space

“We invite the citizens of Harburg, and visitors to the town, to add their names here to ours. In doing so we commit ourselves to remain vigilant. As more and more names cover this 12 metre-high lead column, it will gradually be lowered into the ground. One day it will have disappeared completely and the site of the Harburg monument against fascism will be empty. In the long run, it is only we ourselves who can stand up against injustice."

The column was sunk into the ground seven times from 1986 to 1993. All that remains visible are a lead plaque on the ground, the text panel and photos of the different stages.[69][70][71]

Books, catalogues and monographs

Works in public collections

References

  1. Shalev-Gerz's biography on her website
  2. Esther Shalev-Gerz, catalogue of the exhibition Ton image me regarde?!, Jeu de Paume and Fage Editions, ISBN 978-2-84975-187-9
  3. Jeu de Paume website
  4. Ronald Jones, I Saw It, frieze, UK, March, 2010
  5. Elizabeth Matheson, “Esther Shalev-Gerz Ton image me regarde!?”, Ciel Variable n°86, Canada, September, 2010
  6. Valand website, Artistic Research page
  7. Esther Shalev-Gerz, Listening Voices: On Actualizing Memories in Cultures and Globalization: Heritage, Memory and Identity by Helmut Anheir and Raj Isar, SAGE publications Ltd, London, United Kingdom, 2011
  8. in Geht dein Bild mich an?/Does Your Image Reflect Me?, Sprengel-Museum, Hannover, Germany, 2002, p.87
  9. in Esther Shalev-Gerz, catalogue of the exhibition Ton image me regarde?!, Jeu de Paume and Fage Editions, p.155
  10. in Esther Shalev-Gerz, catalogue of the exhibition Ton image me regarde?!, Jeu de Paume and Fage Editions, p.157
  11. in Geht dein Bild mich an?/Does Your Image Reflect Me?, Sprengel-Museum, Hannover, Germany, 2002, p.85
  12. in Esther Shalev-Gerz, catalogue of the exhibition Ton image me regarde?!, Jeu de Paume and Fage Editions, p.139
  13. James E. Young, The Counter-Monument: Memory against Itself in Germany Today, in Critical Inquiry, Vol. 18, No. 2. (Winter, 1992), pp. 267-296
  14. Justin Branch, The Historiography of the Harburg Monument, University Thesis, Eton College, Windsor, United Kingdom, 1996
  15. Publication by Esther Shalev-Gerz and Jochen Gerz: Mahnmal gegen Faschismus, Cantz/Hatje Verlag Stuttgart, Germany, 1993
  16. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of the Monument Against Fascism
  17. Catalogue: Erase the Past, DAAD editions, Berlin, Germany, 1991
  18. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of Erase The Past
  19. Catalogue by Esther Shalev-Gerz: Irréparable, Musée de la Roche-sur-Yon, France, 1996
  20. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of Irreparable
  21. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of Just One Sky
  22. Publication by Esther Shalev-Gerz and Jochen Gerz: Die Berliner Ermittlung, Hebbel-Theater, Berlin, Germany, 1998
  23. Die Berliner Ermittlung von Jochen Gerz und Esther Shalev-Gerz in Theater als Öffentlicher Raum, Christel Weiler, Spielen in Auschwitz, in Theater der Zeit, Germany, 2005
  24. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of the Berlin Inquiry
  25. Publication by Esther Shalev-Gerz: Les Portraits des Histoires – Aubervilliers, Editions ENSBA, France, 2000
  26. Publication by Esther Shalev-Gerz: Les Portraits des Histoires – Belsunce, Editions Images en Manoeuvres, Marseille, France, 2000
  27. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of the Portraits of Stories, Aubervilliers
  28. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of the Portraits of Stories, Marseille
  29. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of the Portraits of Stories, Skoghall
  30. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of the Portraits of Stories, Sandwell
  31. Catalogue: Två installationer/Two Installations, History Museum, Stockholm, Sweden, 2002
  32. Stefanie Heckmann, Spurensuche mit Engel, in Berliner Zeitung, Germany n¡44, February 21st, 2001
  33. Katrin Bettina Müller, Engel im Gepäck, in Der Tagesspiegel, Germany, n°17, February 24th, 2001
  34. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of Inseparable Angels
  35. Catalogue: Två installationer/Two Installations, History Museum, Stockholm, Sweden, 2002
  36. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of White Out
  37. Catalogue: Geht dein Bild mich an? / Does Your Image Reflect Me?, Sprengel-Museum, Hannover, Germany, 2002
  38. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of Does Your Image Reflect Me?
  39. Catalogue: First Generation, Multiculturel Center, Fitja, Sweden, 2006
  40. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of First Generation
  41. Carole Boulbès, Entre l’écoute et la parole, derniers témoins, in Art Press, France, n°312, May, 2005
  42. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of Between Listening and Telling
  43. Publication: The Thread, Aje Aje, in collaboration with CCA, Glasgow, U.K., 2008
  44. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of the Thread
  45. Catalogue: MenschenDinge, (The Human Aspect of Objects), Gedenkstätte Buchenwald, Germany, 2006
  46. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of Menschendinge
  47. Wall to wall and off the beaten track, in The Irish Times, Wednesday, p. 14, Ireland, February 8th, 2006
  48. Catalogue: Daedal(us), Fire Station Artists’ Studios, Dublin, Ireland, 2005
  49. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of Daedal(us)
  50. Catalogue: The Place of Art, Art monitor, Göteborg University, Sweden, 2008
  51. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of the Place of Art
  52. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of Echoes in Memory
  53. Jessica Kempe, Hurl lät Norrköping?, in Dagens Nyheter, Sweden, May 17th, 2008
  54. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of Sound Machine
  55. Catalogue: Still/Film, Vilnius Academy of Art, Lithuania, 2009
  56. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of Still/Film
  57. Robin Laurence, Esther Shalev-Gerz: Rare Books, and Rarer Insights, Canadienart, Canada, September 17th, 2009
  58. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of the Open Book
  59. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of On Two
  60. A description of the project Last Click in Valand website
  61. Shalev-Gerz's Website, page of the Last Click
  62. A description of the project Last Click in the Museum für Photographie website
  63. James E. Young, The Counter-Monument: Memory against Itself in Germany Today, in Critical Inquiry, Vol. 18, No. 2. (Winter, 1992), pp. 267-296
  64. Justin Branch, The Historiography of the Harburg Monument, University Thesis, Eton College, Windsor, United Kingdom, 1996
  65. Publication by Esther Shalev-Gerz and Jochen Gerz: Mahnmal gegen Faschismus, Cantz/Hatje Verlag Stuttgart, Germany, 1993
  66. Catalogue: First Generation, Multiculturel Center, Fitja, Sweden, 2006
  67. Publication: The Thread, Aje Aje, in collaboration with CCA, Glasgow, U.K., 2008

External links

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