Jananne
Al-Ani, The Aesthetics of Disappearance: A Land Without People
(detail), 2010, production still, dimensions variable. Photography:
Adrian Warren. Courtesy of the artist
Jananne
Al-Ani
This
survey exhibition of Jananne Al-Ani’s work highlights a number
of recent film and video installations and a selection of
photographic works dating from 1991 onwards, many of which
were produced in the region. The exhibition traces Al-Ani’s
longstanding interest in the power of testimony and the documentary
tradition, be it through intimate recollections of loss and
memory, the exploration of more formal, official accounts
of historic events or the way in which the enduring 19th century
Orientalist stereotype of the middle eastern landscape, as
an exotic and unoccupied space, continues to inform western
media representations of the region. In 2003 a significant
shift in Al-Ani’s practice occurred, with the site of production
moving from the controlled environment of the studio out into
the landscape. The exhibition premiers the first part of The
Aesthetics of Disappearance: A Land Without People. Shot in
the south of Jordan, the work explores the disappearance of
the body in the real and imagined landscapes of the region.
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Jananne
Al-Ani was born in Kirkuk, Iraq in 1966. She
lives and works in London. Al-Ani studied Fine Art at
the Byam Shaw School of Art and graduated with an MA
in Photography from the Royal College of Art in 1997.
Exhibiting widely, she has had solo shows at Tate Britain
and the Imperial War Museum, London. Recent group exhibitions
include Closer, Beirut Art Center and Without Boundary:
Seventeen Ways of Looking, MoMA, New York. Al-Ani has
co-curated exhibitions including Veil and Fair Play.
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