Viviane Sassen: Pikin Slee
Dor Guez: The Sick Man of Europe
3 February–12 April 2015
Institute of Contemporary Arts
The Mall
London SW1Y 5AH
www.ica.org.uk
The ICA is delighted to present a solo exhibition of recent work by Viviane Sassen, a photographer who has garnered parallel critical acclaim as a fashion photographer and in the context of contemporary visual art. The content of the exhibition focuses predominantly on a body of work that Sassen made in Pikin Slee, Suriname, South America, in 2013.
Pikin Slee is the second-largest village on the Upper Suriname River, deep within the Surinamese rainforest. Sassen’s eye was caught by the overwhelming natural beauty and the Saramacca’s very traditional way of living, combined with the more mundane objects that permeate daily life.
Shot mainly in black and white and of contained format, Sassen’s series of abstract compositions and elusive subjects are an exploration of the beauty of the everyday, an investigation of the sculptural qualities of the ordinary.
Programme supporter: Maryam and Edward Eisler. The exhibition is supported by Kingdom of the Netherlands and mondriaan fund. Additional support from the Viviane Sassen Exhibition Supporters Group including The Stanley Foundation and all those who wish to remain anonymous.
Related events
Educators’ tour: ICA exhibitions led by ICA curators Matt Williams and Juliette Desorgues
Wednesday 4 February, 5pm
Artists’ Film Club: Ilha de Sao Jorge
Wednesday 11 February, 6:30pm
Artist’s talk: Viviane Sassen in conversation with Matt Williams
Wednesday 4 March, 6:30pm
“Styled-Un-Styled”: workshop on photography
Saturday 21 March, 10am
Dor Guez: The Sick Man of Europe
3 February–12 April
Upper Gallery
In collaboration with The Mosaic Rooms, ICA presents the first UK institutional solo exhibition of artist Dor Guez. As an artist of Christian Palestinian and Jewish Tunisian descent, living in Jaffa, he is considered a leading and critical voice from the Middle East, whose practice questions the role of contemporary art in narrating unwritten histories.
Titled The Painter, this new installation is the first of five from a new body of work, The Sick Man of Europe. Guez’s most ambitious project to date, it reflects on the military history and current political climate of the Middle East through the creative practices of individual soldiers from the region.
Accompanying the exhibition will be a publication, produced in collaboration with The Mosaic Rooms, including an essay by Achim Borchardt-Hume, Head of Exhibitions, Tate Modern.
In collaboration with The Mosaic Rooms, with support from the A M Qattan Foundation.
Related events
Artist’s talk: Dor Guez in conversation with Simon Grant
Wednesday 4 February, 6:30pm
Gallery tour with View Festival: Dor Guez led by Juliette Desorgues
Friday 27 February, 5pm
Gallery tour: Dor Guez led by Astrid Schmetterling
Thursday 26 March, 6:30pm
Panel discussion at The Mosaic Rooms
Wednesday 8 April, 7pm
A panel discussion around the themes in Dor Guez’ exhibition The Sick Man of Europe
Artist film screening: Dor Guez
Saturday 11 April, 2pm
Also showing:
First Happenings: Adrian Henri in the ’60s and ’70s
27 January–15 March 2015
Fox Reading Room
First Happenings: Adrian Henri in the ’60s and ’70s, offers a focussed look at Adrian Henri’s pioneering role in the “happenings movement” in Britain, setting up the first “Event” in 1962, through to enabling various collaborative events into the 1970s.
The exhibition is curated by Paris-based art historian Catherine Marcangeli in collaboration with the ICA.
All works from the Estate of Adrian Henri. With thanks to support from Penguin Classics. The Fox Reading Room was made possible by the generous support of the Edwin Fox Foundation.
Related event
Panel discussion: “Adrian Henri: Performance, Environments and Happenings”
Saturday 28 February, 2pm
