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Langlands & Bell, The House of Osama bin Laden
(Detail: still from interactive animation), 2003
Courtesy of the artists and VSpaceLAB

VISIT
“Image Counter Image” at
Haus der Kunst, Munich

June 15 2012
4:07 PM

How does one perceive a conflict transmitted through images? The exhibition “Image Counter Image” at Haus der Kunst, which marks the museum’s 75th anniversary alongside “Histories in Conflict: Haus der Kunst and the Ideological Uses of Art, 1937- 1955″ on view simultaneously, focuses on a crucial and timely topic: how do artists respond to images of conflict and violence as portrayed in the media?  In a period of time spanning the First Gulf War (1990-1991), September 11, 2001 and the Arab Spring of 2011, the works of over 20 artists, including bureau d’études, Harun Farocki, Omer Fast, and Ahlam Shibli, bear witness to these events and their mediation. From traditional photo-journalistic accounts competing in printed media or television, to images uploaded onto the Internet and circulated via social media platforms, violent conflicts obtain an intensified dimension through their visual depiction and global distribution network. Yet what sub-texts do these images hold? Nin Brudermann’s depictions of Iraqi targets in “Waiting for War” (1998) are countered by Hans-Peter Feldmann’s found newspaper coverage the day after the terrorist attacks of September 11, while Alfredo Jaar’s “Untitled [Newsweek]” (1994) and Jasmila Žbanić’s “Images from the Corner” (2003), investigate journalistic responsibility, image by image, frame by frame… (Anja Isabel Schneider)