Photographer and installation artist, Kader Attia, will lecture on his work tonight at 7:30 pm at Trustee's Theater.
"Signs of Reappropriation" will feature a site-specific installation of Attia's 2007 "Untitled (Skyline)" series and a newly commissioned body of photographs.
"Untitled (Skyline)" consists of 80 discarded refrigerators painted black and covered in tiny, geometric mirror "windows." This cityscape of customized household appliances addresses the impact of architecture and urbanism on people's everyday lives, and particularly examines the way power is used to oppress populations.
The photographic series explores the relationship between the concrete buildings of Attia's former Parisian neighborhood and a beach in Algiers where he spent time as a youth. Nicknamed Rochers Carres by locals, the beach is covered with huge concrete blocks, and its architecture resembles Baron Hausmann's city plan in Paris. Rochers Carres attracts Algerian youth, yet serves as the ultimate boundary that separates them from Europe and, by extension, their dreams of a better life.
Attia ultimately began to see similarities on both sides of the Mediterranean Sea. The hard existence of the young Algerians reminds him of the struggles of young people in his French neighborhood. The youth in both places express a lack of hope for a better future, a lack of social acknowledgement, feelings of failure and a sense of suffering.
Exhibition curator and SCAD Executive Director of Exhibitions Laurie Ann Farrell said, "The juxtaposition of the oversized photographs taken at Rochers Carres with Attia's 'Untitled (Skyline)' sets up a powerful visual and psychological landscape for gallery visitors to traverse."
