Waiting for Omar Gatlato: Contemporary Art from Algeria and Its Diaspora
Transcript
00:00
[MUSIC PLAYING]
00:08
My name is Natasha Marie Llorens,
00:11
and I'm the curator of this exhibition,
00:13
Waiting for Omar Gatlato.
00:15
The way the title works is that it asks the viewer a question.
00:19
Who is Omar Gatlato?
00:21
Why are we waiting for him?
00:22
Where is he?
00:23
Is he Algerian?
00:24
There are all kinds of questions that
00:25
are opened up by just the notion of waiting for something.
00:29
I think each artist in this exhibition
00:31
has his own idea of what is Algeria.
00:35
And that is very interesting to represent
00:38
Algeria in this diversity and complex composition.
00:43
The show is pretty evenly split between artists
00:45
that are based in Algeria, and then the other half of the show
00:49
are artists who are based in the diaspora, largely in France.
00:53
So their experiences of their art scenes are really diverse.
00:56
This is called CV.
00:57
It's a work by Adel Bentounsi.
01:00
And on the surface of the pressure cooker,
01:02
there are these bilingual decals.
01:04
And that's a really common thing to find
01:07
on a lot of computer keyboards in North Africa,
01:10
because they're constantly toggling between French
01:12
and Arabic, both of which are official languages
01:15
of the country.
01:15
If you think of North Africa, you think of Morocco,
01:18
you think of Tunisia, and then you think of Algeria,
01:21
because we've heard more about what's been going on
01:24
in the other two countries.
01:26
Now there are reasons for that having to do
01:28
with the politics of Algeria.
01:30
But this is really an opportunity
01:32
to sort of break open some of the boundaries and barriers
01:36
that have been placed in front of us
01:38
and in front of these artists, and to start
01:40
to understand where their work is coming from
01:42
and what it's about.
01:43
The thing that brings all of these works
01:45
together is their commitment to thinking
01:47
about what happens on a day-to-day basis
01:49
for ordinary people.
01:51
And in that sense, I think it's a show that you can meet,
01:53
because it's not talking about things that you need to know
01:55
in advance in order to get.
01:58
[MUSIC PLAYING]
[MUSIC PLAYING]
00:08
My name is Natasha Marie Llorens,
00:11
and I'm the curator of this exhibition,
00:13
Waiting for Omar Gatlato.
00:15
The way the title works is that it asks the viewer a question.
00:19
Who is Omar Gatlato?
00:21
Why are we waiting for him?
00:22
Where is he?
00:23
Is he Algerian?
00:24
There are all kinds of questions that
00:25
are opened up by just the notion of waiting for something.
00:29
I think each artist in this exhibition
00:31
has his own idea of what is Algeria.
00:35
And that is very interesting to represent
00:38
Algeria in this diversity and complex composition.
00:43
The show is pretty evenly split between artists
00:45
that are based in Algeria, and then the other half of the show
00:49
are artists who are based in the diaspora, largely in France.
00:53
So their experiences of their art scenes are really diverse.
00:56
This is called CV.
00:57
It's a work by Adel Bentounsi.
01:00
And on the surface of the pressure cooker,
01:02
there are these bilingual decals.
01:04
And that's a really common thing to find
01:07
on a lot of computer keyboards in North Africa,
01:10
because they're constantly toggling between French
01:12
and Arabic, both of which are official languages
01:15
of the country.
01:15
If you think of North Africa, you think of Morocco,
01:18
you think of Tunisia, and then you think of Algeria,
01:21
because we've heard more about what's been going on
01:24
in the other two countries.
01:26
Now there are reasons for that having to do
01:28
with the politics of Algeria.
01:30
But this is really an opportunity
01:32
to sort of break open some of the boundaries and barriers
01:36
that have been placed in front of us
01:38
and in front of these artists, and to start
01:40
to understand where their work is coming from
01:42
and what it's about.
01:43
The thing that brings all of these works
01:45
together is their commitment to thinking
01:47
about what happens on a day-to-day basis
01:49
for ordinary people.
01:51
And in that sense, I think it's a show that you can meet,
01:53
because it's not talking about things that you need to know
01:55
in advance in order to get.
01:58
[MUSIC PLAYING]