15.10.2021—30.01.2022

Do you hear us?

Art, Group exhibition, Roma

WED/FRI: 14:00-18:00
THU: 14:00-20:00
SAT/SUN: 11:00-18:00
Entrance: Via Ludovisi 48

Dates
15.10.2021
30.01.2022
Location
Roma
Category
Art, Group exhibition
Information

WED/FRI: 14:00-18:00
THU: 14:00-20:00
SAT/SUN: 11:00-18:00
Entrance: Via Ludovisi 48

Istituto Svizzero
Via Ludovisi 48, Rome

Opening hours:

Wednesday / Friday: 14:00-18:00
Thursday: 14:00-20:00
Saturday / Sunday: 11:00-18:00

Do you hear us?

An exhibition on silence, noise, and listening with:

Mohamed Almusibli (b. 1990, lives and works in Geneva/CH)
Pauline Boudry / Renate Lorenz (work together in Berlin since 2007)
Miriam Cahn (b. 1949, lives and works in Stampa/CH)
Nina Emge (b. 1995, lives and works in Berlin/DE and Zurich/CH)
Nastasia Meyrat (b. 1991, lives and works in Lausanne/CH)
Dorian Sari (b. 1989, lives and works in Basel/CH)
Hannah Weinberger (b. 1988, lives and works in Basel/CH)

The experience of the pandemic changed our perception of the world. Thinking back over the lockdown weeks here in Rome, I remember in particular the shift in soundscape. The city became silent and, in the silence, I suddenly heard other things: the screeching of hungry seagulls (which, I read, feed on the leftovers from restaurants in cities) and the drone of police helicopters over rooftops.
Silence, noise and listening always have a social if not political dimension. The sounds, yes, the noise, that surround us always create a certain social space. Silencing someone is an act of violence; at the same time, staying silent can be a resistant gesture, and listening can be claimed as an active political act that gives space to unheard, neglected voices. «Hearing,» the composer Pauline Oliveros writes, «happens involuntarily, listening, on the other hand, is a voluntary process that produces culture through training and experience». In Italian, the verb ‘sentire’ means not only to listen, but also to feel.
The group exhibition Do you hear us? at the Istituto Svizzero in Rome aims to trace these things. In doing so, the artistic works, some of which were conceived especially for the exhibition, and some of which pre-existed, explore a multi-layered theme. The invited artists address the listening of migrant voices and memories and the meaning of music and singing in this context, show us how silence can be a powerful performative act of resistance, invoke the roots of listening as an active political strategy in the feminist movements of the 1960s and 1970s, or remind us how quickly we overhear certain voices in the constant noise of social media.

Gioia Dal Molin, August 2021

Please download the curatorial text and the floorplan here.

Press inquires: press@istitutosvizzero.it

 

Access is allowed only to those who obtained the Reinforced Green Pass health certificate, which proves vaccination or recovery. It is mandatory to wear a Ffp2 face mask within our spaces.

Biographies:

Mohamed Almusibli (b. 1990, lives and works in Geneva/CH) is an artist and curator based in Geneva where he runs the project space Cherish. His work is distinctly interdisciplinary, using his own or found texts for installation, sound and video-works as well as performance. His own writing is often the result of personal poetic anecdotes that find their way into a common space through questioning and depicting our shared human emotions, beliefs and values. Mohamed Almusibli’s work could therefore be seen as political, albeit on a personal level.

Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenz have been working together in Berlin since 2007. They produce installations that choreograph the tension between visibility and opacity. Their films capture performances in front of the camera, often starting with a song, a picture, a film or a score from the near past. They upset normative historical narratives and conventions of spectatorship, as figures and actions across time are staged, layered and re-imagined. Their performers are choreographers, artists and musicians, with whom they are having a long-term conversation about the conditions of performance, the violent history of visibility, the pathologization of bodies, but also about companionship, glamour and resistance. Their recent work, Moving Backwards, featuring choreographers/performers Latifa Laâbissi, Werner Hirsch, Julie Cunningham, Marbles Jumbo Radio and Nach premiered at the Swiss Pavillon of the 58th Venice Biennale. Their works have been shown in Europe and abroad.

Miriam Cahn (b. 1949, lives and works in Stampa/CH) exposed her works internationally, significant solo exhibitions include Palazzo Castelmur (Stampa, 2021); Sifang Art Museum, Nanjing (2020); the exhibition I AS HUMAN at Kunstmuseum Bern (2019) which travelled to Haus der Kunst, Munich (2019) and Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw (2019); Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid (2019); Kunsthaus Bregenz (2019), among others. Miriam Cahn has participated in numerous group exhibitions in Tokyo, Dallas, Washington D.C., Tel Aviv, Dublin, Berlin, Bonn, and elsewhere. She has been the recipient of notable awards, including the Oberrheinischer Kunstpreis Offenburg, Basler Kunstpreis, Käthe-Kollwitz-Preis Berlin, Ströher Preis Frankfurt/Main and the DAAD grant in 1985. In 2022 Cahn will be awarded the 14th Rubens Prize from the city of Siegen. Her works are included in renowned collections such us the Museum of Modern Art (New York), Tate Modern (London), Museo Reina Sofia (Madrid), Kunstmuseum Basel and Museum for Modern Art (Warszaw), Rubell Collection (Miami) and Pinault Collection (Paris). She has recently exhibited at Kunsthal Charlottenborg in Copenhagen. The exhibition titled ME AS HAPPENING will be shown in a new iteration at the Power Plant in Toronto this upcoming Fall. Additionally, Palais de Tokyo (Paris); ICA Milan and MAN (Nuoro -Italy) will be presenting solo exhibitions in 2022. She was born in Basel in 1949.

Nina Emge (b. 1995, lives and works in Berlin/DE and Zurich/CH) often examines organic forms, sound and its effect in her practice. In addition, questions around the concept of listening play a central role. This is evident in her research and archival work, her installations and drawings, and in the often collaborative working and creation processes of her works, among others. Nina Emge is an active member of the Transnational Sound Initiative, DAAD Fellow. Her works have been shown at Les Complices* Zurich, Les Urbaines Lausanne, Shedhalle Zurich, Kunsthalle Zurich and other national and international project spaces.

Nastasia Meyrat (b. 1991, lives and works in Lausanne/CH) received an MA with honours from HEAD Geneva University of Art and Design in 2015. In 2021, among several exhibitions, she showed her work at the Musée Cantonal des Beaux-Arts of Lausanne, during the show Jardin d’Hiver #1 curated by Jill Gasparina and she exhibited at ICA Milano. In 2020 she was invited to exhibit in Marseille for Manifesta 13. She was a fellow resident from 2019-2020 at the Istituto Svizzero in Rome. From 2018-2019 she co-directed a project-space based in Lausanne, Tunnel Tunnel. Meyrat was selected in 2018 for the Kiefer Hablitzel prize and her work was exhibited at the Swiss Art Awards the same year. She was in residency with the Davidoff Art Initiative in 2017, in the Dominican Republic. In 2015, she exhibited her work in Port-au-Prince (Haiti), after she attended the residency Ghetto Biennale. In 2015, she exhibited at the Musée Cantonal des Beaux-Arts of Lausanne and was selected for the New HEADS – BNP Paribas Foundation Art Awards prize in 2015, concurrent with the group exhibition GET OUT, curated by Latifa Echakhch.

Dorian Özhan Sari (b. 1989, lives and works in Basel/CH) obtained an MA in Visual Arts at the Institut Kunst Basel in 2018, after studying at HEAD Geneva University of Art and Design and at Paris Sorbonne University. He was awarded with the Manor Kunstpreis in 2020, the Kunstkredit Basel and the Swiss Art Award in 2019 and several other prices and scholarships. He was a resident at the Akademie der Künste in 2020 and at The BAR Project and La Fondazione Lac O Lemon in 2017. He exposed his work in the framework of many group and solo shows in France, Turkey, Spain, Germany, Brazil and Switzerland. He was born in Izmir (Turkey), and he is represented by Gallery Wilde (CH), Gallery Öktem&Aykut (TR).

Hannah Weinberger (b. 1988, lives and works in Basel/CH) graduated from the Zürcher Hochschule der Künste in 2013 with an MA in Fine Arts. Collaboration and participation are hallmarks of Hannah Weinberger’s practice. Her work draws on the potential of sound and the properties of spaces to facilitate collective encounters or to assign a performative role to the audience. From 2011 to 2013 she co-directed the space Elaine in the courtyard of Museum Gegenwart/ Kunstmuseum Basel. She presented solo exhibitions at Centre d’Art Contemporain Geneva; Kunstverein Braunschweig; Badischer Kunstverein, Karlsruhe; Schinkel Pavillon; Kunstverein Harburger Bahnhof; Kunsthaus Bregenz; MIT List Center for Visual Arts, FriArt, Freiburg; Swiss Institute New York; Kunsthalle Basel. Her work has also been exhibited internationally: Vleeshal Middleburg; Copenhagen Contemporary; Okayama Art Summit; Manifesta 11; Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo; Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Zurich; the Lyon Biennale; Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam; the Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia; Kunsthal Charlottenborg; Kunstverein München; Kunsthaus Glarus. Since 2016 he has been a lecturer at the Institute of Art at the Basel School of Art and Design, and since 2013 he has been on the board of Kunsthalle Basel.