Adel Abidin "Abidin Travels"
WHITE BOX
This event has ended.
This September, WHITE BOX presents the U.S. premiere of Adel Abidin's Abidin Travels as the inaugural exhibition at our new Bowery location. This work was featured in the Nordic Pavilion at the 2007 Venice Biennale. As the first exhibition at WBX Bowery, WHITE BOX presents the installation revitalized with additional features that address the architectural space as well as sell real tickets available for travel to Baghdad. In the under-construction Black Box, WHITE BOX will screen a new film, Construction Site , also viewing at MoMA September 15th. I am Sorry will premiere as the first ever piece exhibited in the vertical Tower Projects.
In the shadow of the upcoming 2008 presidential elections, this multi-disciplinary installation offers a new perspective on the remnants of this Middle Eastern city in the wake of the 2003 American invasion. Fabricating the space into a travel agency, Adel Abidin's installation includes travel brochures, a travel website, and an office with live tourist agents selling real holidays all to Iraq. Abidin's wry commentary attempts to mask the gross reality of Baghdad's volatility. Shrouded in controversy and convoluted to the point of abstraction, Baghdad and the Iraq War have somewhat managed to escape the subjective eye of the art sphere. Choosing to satirize the catastrophic implications of the American occupation due to the impossibility of communicating the unimaginable horror of Occupation, Abidin highlights how Western desensitization, in part fed by an overwhelmingly biased media, has perpetuated the ongoing atrocities.
Curated by Marketta Seppälä
Media
Schedule
from September 24, 2008 to October 23, 2008
Opening Reception on 2008-09-24 from 18:00 to 21:00