Ori Gersht, Far Off Mountains and Rivers, 2009. Lightjet Print. Courtesy of CRG Gallery and Angles Gallery. © Ori Gersht.
Opening next Tuesday at the Museum of Fine Arts is Ori Gersht: History Repeating on view from August 28th through January 6th. This exhibit is unique in that the MFA granted Gersht access to their archives to compliment his own work. His respect for art history comes through in the content of his imagery and he has worked with curators to chose a number of historical pieces to be shown alongside his own work which spans his entire career. This will include several new photographs and a film titled Liquid Assets. This film was created for the Museum of Fine Arts and was inspired by a Greek Coin from the MFA collection.
Ori Gersht’s work reflects the past, beauty and violence, and the holocaust. He uses time as a medium, capturing moments that one cannot see and expanding them, forcing the viewer to slow down and react to each millisecond. The past is referenced in traditional landscape and still lives but is approached with modern digital technology. The theme of beauty and violence is commingled in videos such as Big Bang which depicts a vase of colorful flowers as it explodes in slow motion with light, water and petals filling the space in an act of destruction and beauty at the same time. Other photographs appear serene and beautiful but comment on the history of a place and time that reflects violence from the past.
Ori Gersht, Big Bang, 2006 from Noga Gallery of Contemporary Art on Vimeo.
On Thursday September 6th, there will be a gallery talk from 1:00pm-2:00pm with the exhibit designer Tomomi Itakura, discussing the decisions that are made to enhance your experience of an exhibit.
For more information visit http://www.mfa.org/exhibitions/ori-gersht, view clips of his video work and comments by the artist.