Omer Fast Martin-Gropius-Bau

Talking is not always the solution

2016
Berlin, DE
Type: Exhibition Architecture

MGB web

Credits
  • Spatial Design by Studio Miessen
  • Scenography: Heike Schuppelius
  • Graphic Design: Studio Mahr
  • Project Leader: Markus Miessen, Berta Cusó
  • Team: Felix McNamara, Frixos Petrou, Paula Palermo
  • Photography: © Enric Duch

For Omer Fast’s show at the Martin-Gropius-Bau in Berlin, Berlin-based architects Studio Miessen – in collaboration with scenographer Heike Schuppelius – developed a waiting room typology that unfolds through the exhibition as a series of ideologically charged inbetween-spaces. Relating both to concepts of non-place (Marc Auge) and Junkspace (Rem Koolhaas), these waiting rooms present passive spaces of broadcast political consumption. This is also reflected in the printed matter that was developed for the show in collaboration with graphic designers Studio Mahr, resulting in a freely distributed tabloid magazine that doubles as a catalogue of the exhibition. Sitting between actual events, the waiting room typology reflects the subject matter of death, loss and purgatory; each room setting a backdrop for the content of the respective films to unfold spatially.

Omer Fast (* 1972) is one of the most distinctive film and video artists of his generation. He creates narrations in his films that question the borders between one's own and media narratives and between current and historic events. His works address the friction between documentary and fiction. The Martin-Gropius-Bau is showing seven of his projects at his first large solo exhibition in Berlin.

In his cinematic works, Fast tells stories of trauma, war and relationships. Our impulse to identify with the people whose stories we witness is often undermined by conflicting accounts, inexplicable changes or outright lies. Everything that we know and believe could be entirely different. Omer Fast's films are more than thought experiments or games between narration and enactment. They are simultaneously oppressive and moving.

Works on show: CNN Concatenated from 2002, Looking Pretty for God (after G.W.) from 2008, 5000 Feet is the Best from 2011, Continuity from 2012, Everything That Rises Must Converge from 2013, Spring from 2016, as well as a new work called August from 2016. Shot in 3D, August is based on the life and work of renowned Cologne photographer August Sander (1876-1964).