Artist Yael Bartana Taps Into the Zeitgeist of the Jewish Diaspora

8 Tuesday, February 10, 2015 | Haaretz weighty issues such as geno- ludicrous than what she dis- Marisa Fox-Bevilacqua cide, in between the cack- covered as she was having a erhaps the boldest im- les and the folkloric kitsch. fictional map of Jerusalem age in Yael Bartana’s Bartana was commissioned drawn to accompany “In- P bracing new exhibit to create a work exploring ferno” at the gallery. The at the Friedrich Petzel Finnish national identity. map is a playful sendup of Gallery in New York (also She created an experiment the classic map of Jerusalem showing concurrently in in communal living with by Heinrich Bunting, a 16th- Berlin) is a self-portrait of eight ethnically diverse par- century cartographer and the artist as Nazi propagan- ticipants, examining whether pastor from Hannover, Ger- dist Leni Riefenstahl. It’s a sublimating their identities many – not far from where startling picture, and not was a prerequisite to forging Bartana resides. because it’s sweeping and a national one. “He had never been to Je- grand, like her cinematic For “Inferno,” she de- rusalem and based the map videos or neon sculpture camped to Sao Paolo to film of the Old City on a flower of beaming, “Black stars shed a facsimile of the Temple Hannover, a clover, with three no light” as you enter. of Solomon being built by petals that symbolize the holy This subdued self-portrait, the Universal Church of the Trinity,” she explains. monochromatic save for a Kingdom of Christ. Like shock of hot-red lipstick, most of her work, Bartana makes a statement mostly used a real-life occurrence because it is dark and seduc- as a springboard for her mus- Bartana: ‘We tend tive – and displayed at a time ings. In this case, she cast like this, after the killings Brazilian actors to play the to disregard other in Paris, International Holo- sect’s high priests and wor- narratives to justify caust Day, and heated debate shippers, writing a script that over the line between politi- examines the consequences our own actions cal correctness and freedom of exporting sacred ground and our own set of expression, satire and cen- and religious artifact to a sorship. place, people and time that of beliefs. But we Bartana didn’t know this are a total departure from must look at other was going to happen when the original. Can you retro- she began to create this work, fit the Bible for one’s own narratives. If much as she didn’t know the purposes? Spoiler alert: This media would be declaring a temple gets destroyed a third there’s one message Polish Jewish renaissance af- Yael Bartana poses as Leni Riefenstahl in her self-portrait, “ Stalag.” Yael Bartana / Petzel Gallery, N.Y. Yael Bartana, Untitled, 2014. Courtesy of the artist / Petzel time. behind all my ter the recent opening of War- It’s easy to see the parallel saw’s Museum of the History between this Sao Paolo cult anti-propaganda, of the Polish Jews; just when and Israel’s far-right zealots. it is: Don’t take that museum was breaking But Bartana does not push ground, she embarked on her Artist Yael Bartana taps into the any agenda other than her anything as fact.’ video trilogy “And Europe desire to examine the conse- Will Be Stunned.” quences of taking religious But that’s what makes Bar- fervor out of context. Bunting’s map is no more tana one of the most profound zeitgeist of the Jewish Diaspora “We tend to disregard valid a representation of Je- Jewish artists of her day: She other narratives to justify rusalem than the fake temple has an uncanny ability to tap our own actions and our own in Sao Paolo. Bartana’s map into the zeitgeist, exploring The Israeli-born video artist, now showing in New York and Berlin, set of beliefs,” Bartana says. riffs on his, but also fea- and manipulating pictures, “But we must look at other tures a fishing vessel used words and symbols to ques- manipulates words and images while asking questions about identity narratives. If there’s one to illegally transport Jewish tion issues that are funda- message behind all my anti- refugees to Palestine after mental to these troubling propaganda, it is: Don’t take the Holocaust, World War II times and to her — an Israeli As a result of her endeav- guilt over it,” says Bartana, soldier.” Does the Zionist confounding reality of being in her video works on show anything as fact.” fighter jets and other images artist living in the Diaspora, ors, Bartana is frequently 44, who’s raising a son in Ber- symbol negate the impact of an Israeli living in Germany, in New York and Berlin. Tellingly, she ends “Infer- borrowed from her film. dealing with issues of Jewish misunderstood and often lin with her German partner, the Nazi uniform, or are they where the brutal past is ever- no” with a scene in front of a “It’s the most Jewish work identity versus assimilation, hailed by the very people of and has no direct connection deadlocked into an absurdist present, but where unspoken ‘Who is a Finn?’ replica of the Western Wall. I’ve ever done,” says Barta- wondering where national whom she is critical. Perhaps to the Shoah. “The use of Nazi dialogue? Is her pose an act guilt casts a tragic pall over A devout man casts off his na. “It’s been a real journey pride ends and xenophobic this is the plight of an Israeli symbols is strictly forbidden of futility, self-sabotage or a daily life. “True Finn,” a hybrid of prayer shawl, revealing gi- for me because I’m really hatred begins. artist who dares to show in Germany. So for me, wear- victory over past demons? “The clash of the beauty MTV’s “The Real World” ant wings, the symbol of the quite secular...” In a sense, all those issues abroad and examine her sta- ing the taboo is like returning “I call this portrait ‘Sta- and the atrocity is something and Finland’s “Extreme Es- Israeli Air Force, tattooed on Does Bartana even con- come to the fore in her self- tus as “the other.” to the crime scene.” lag,’” Bartana continues, we still cannot grasp, looking capades,” is a parody of sorts, his back. In the background, sider herself Jewish? portrait. “When I was exploring Po- But resolution is the very referring to the Nazi-exploi- at the Nazi propaganda ma- and seems thoroughly Scan- a vendor hawks T-shirts of She pauses. “Yes, but I’m “My friends call me Yaeli land before I made ‘And Eu- antithesis of what she ac- tation genre of comics that chine,” says Bartana. “The dinavian until you realize the holy temple, as a donkey still trying to find the Jewish Riefenstahl,” she says, on rope Will Be Stunned,’ I went complishes: Like a true sprung up in Israel during power of manipulation and that Bartana borrowed the strides among the crowds. in me. I certainly feel closer a recent trip to New York. along on the annual pilgrim- post-modernist — and a good the 1950s and ‘60s. the seduction.” famous discourse of “Who “It’s part Utopian, part ri- to it than I ever did ... Identity “I guess I’m forming a new age to [the icon of the Virgin Jew — Bartana answers her She isn’t so much following If people don’t detect is a Jew?” to ask: “Who is a diculous,” says Bartana with is something all Jews grapple message by taking apart the Mary] ‘The Black Madonna query with questions, leaving in the Stalag footsteps as she irony in the self-portrait, Finn?” a chuckle. with, whether we want to or propaganda.” of Czestochowa,’” Bartana her work open ended. is trying to wrestle with the they’d be blind not to see it The film addresses But perhaps it’s no more not.” Her new exhibit (on in says. “There I was, in the Unlike the Riefenstahl New York through February midst of this Catholic proces- self-portrait on which hers is 14) features two videos – “In- sion, the very embodiment based, Bartana isn’t crouch- ferno,” shot in the style of of everything these people ing down. She’s pointing the biblical epics, about a Pente- bearing crosses and stat- camera and one eye at you costal sect that’s attempting ues of Mary were against: a – rejecting her role as the Spielberg project targets Arab film buffs to rebuild the Temple of Solo- Jew, a lesbian, an Israeli. I passive subject, shaking you mon in Sao Paolo, and “True thought, if they only knew.” out of your voyeuristic com- Gift enables Jerusalem Cinematheque to add Arabic subtitles to Israeli, foreign movies Finn,” a reality-TV type proj- That same feeling of es- placency. Do you look away? ect, in which a group of Finns trangement informs her cur- Stare back? from all over the country, which is more important Nirit Anderman attempts to forge a new, na- rent exhibit. “I’m also wearing an Is- along with a few East Jerusa- than success at the box of- tional identity — is all about “Being a Jew living in Ger- raeli military cap,” she adds. t turns out, rather sur- lemites. fice. More groups are com- reframing sociocultural and many, you can’t escape the “So I’m including a piece of prisingly, that only The Cinematheque has ing, she reported, but the geopolitical dialogues. Holocaust and the national my past, too.

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