Activating Exodus: The Art of Melissa Shiff

Immediately, the viewer confronts a screen embedded in a crushed velvet pillow surrounded by a wall of matzah, showing a montage of video clips imaging the ten ancient plagues that Yahweh cast on the land of Egypt: blood, frogs, vermin, beasts, cattle disease, boils, hail, locusts, darkness, and the slaying of firstborn sons. An accompanying voice-over rhythmically recites the plagues in Hebrew and in English, not simply the ancient plagues but also possible analogies to our present-day plagues of homophobia, unbridled profit motive, hatred toward the Other, AIDS, rape of nature, war, one-dimensional rhetoric, religious fundamentalism, and exploitation of the Other. Upon entering the dimly lit scene of Medium is the Matzo, Canadian artist Melissa Shiff's 2005 Passover installation at the Bronfman Center at New York University, one first moves through a corridor of walls tiled with matzo and a floor lined with small detailed pillows reading oppression overlaid upon the image of matzo. The viewer walks over these floors, literally crushing the matzo beneath their feet along the way. In total, the gallery is covered with approximately 4,000 pieces of matzo donated by Manischewitz. Haunted and hallowed, there is a sense that one has entered a consecrated space and time, a moment loaded with meaning. This passageway opens up into a room with a video installation that projects onto a large screen the scene of the Israelites departing through the pathway in the Red Sea, orchestrated by Moses in Cecil B. DeMille's iconic film The Ten Commandments (1956). Here, the viewer sees themselves inserted into the scene, a participant in the Exodus. The passage from the ritual text in the Haggadah that states You yourself feel as if you are leaving Egypt is evoked; the emphasis is on the here and now. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] This visual invocation of Judeo-kitsch, Biblical weightiness, and the media theory of Marshall McLuhan is only the beginning of Shiff's project to critically reconsider the medium and the message of ritual, popular culture, social activism, and contemporary art. Media, according to Shiff, a video, installation, and performance artist, is the place where social action begins. Shiff's invocation of the movement through Mitzrayim, the Hebrew word for the land of and narrow spaces, as it relates to the parting of the Red Sea (in itself, a movement through spaces) is at once symbolic and literal in terms of physical and philosophical oppression. The video loop proposes that this reenactment is and must be continuous. These spaces can be read not simply as the physical or geographic relation of place and situation, but moreover as a way of thinking that must be overcome. Moving through the corridor of the installation, there is a poignant suggestion that tunnel vision be deposed. Working on both levels, this installation recounts the story of Exodus and recalls the Haggadah's mandate to put one's self in the position of the oppressed, to escape mindedness, and to crush oppression. This remembering is not done in the form of passive contemplation, but rather in active participation. The visitor becomes an Israelite escaping and the pharaohs--moving between these overwhelming walls of water from slavery to liberation, as Moses parts the Red Sea. This story becomes metaphorical rather than fundamentalist; it serves as a call to action, a call to abolish the plagues through social action. Within our contemporary context, today's pharoahs can be read as the individuals and institutions that oppress people and the environment in the interest of globalization and personal gain. space of liberation consists of two installations, Elijah Lounge and Bar, both designed in a style that is hip, sleek, and functional. Bar symbolizes sustenance and spiritual renewal, recalling Miriam who divined water during the passage of the Exodus. …

Récupéré en direct depuis OpenAlex et désinversé. Les résumés ne sont pas conservés dans cette base de données : les index inversés représentent 8,6 Go des 9,3 Go de texte de la base, et le serveur dispose de 13 Go libres.