Artists

Omer Fast Born in 1972 in Jerusalem, Israel | Lives and works in Berlin

A central role in Omer Fast’s video works is his examination of the question of how experiences are transformed, stored, superimposed, augmented or suppressed, and finally shared. The starting point is usually concrete events or reports from concrete persons that Fast checks for their potential to be retold.

According to experience, his video installations, set up as multi-channel works, quite often do not allow the conventions of historical reconstruction to be converted into a coherent and easily consumable narrative. In fact, he understands the process of writing history to be an ambiguous bonding of memories, fiction and imagination.

His work,Talk Show(2009), combines the children’s game ofBroken Telephonewith a talk show format in which people relate personal experiences. A woman tells the story of her husband, his mistress, and their involvement in political conflicts in Iraq to an actor, who tells it to some one else, who, in turn, tells it to another person, etc. Through the various personalities, storytelling styles, and lapses in memory, the story changes from version to version.Talk Showillustrates in fast motion the effects of the interplay of storyteller, listener, and the medium. In this way,Talk Showalso becomes a reflection on the transmission of events through language, its necessity and failure.

Education

1995 BFA School of the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, USA
2000 MFA Hunter College, New York, USA

Awards

2009 Preis der Nationalgalerie fĂĽr junge Kunst
2008 Kunstpreis der Whitney Biennale, New York

Solo exhibitions (selection)

2011 Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne
Netherlands Media Arts Institute, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Herzliya Museum of Art, Herzliya, Israel
2001 Screening, MNAM, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France
The Casting, Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, USA
2009 Nostalgia, Whitney Museum of American Art,
New York, USA
Omer Fast, Kunsthaus Baselland, Basel, Switzerland
Nostalgia, Berkeley Art Museum, Berkeley, USA
Omer Fast, Lunds Konsthall, Lund, Sweden
Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver, USA
Omer Fast, Kunstverein Hannover
2007 Omer Fast: The Casting, Museum of Modern Art, Mumok, Wien, Austria
Godville, Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, USA
2005 Mixed Doubles (mit Nam June Paik), Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh, USA
Omer Fast: Godville, Midway Contemporary, Minneapolis, USA
2004 ars viva, Pinakothek der Moderne, MĂĽnchen; Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt/Main;
Brandenburgischer Kunstverein (mit Jeanne Faust), Potsdam

Group exhibitions (selection)

2011 Speak, Memory, Stroom Den Haag, Netherlands
2010 The More Things Change, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, USA
History in Art, Museum of Contemporary Art of Krakow, Krakau, Polen
5x5, Espai d’Art Contemporani, Castelló, Spain
Blockbuster: Cinema of Exhibition, CIAC, Mexiko
Talking Heads, Ireland Museum of Contemporary Art, Dublin, Irland
2009 Kunstpreis der Nationalgalerie fĂĽr junge Kunst, Museum Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin
Actors and Extras, Argos Centre for Art and Media, BrĂĽssel, Belgien
2008 Made Up, Liverpool Biennial International 08, Liverpool, Great Britain
THE SOUL (or, Much Trouble in the Transportation of Souls), Manifesta 7, Trient, Italy
The Whitney Biennial, Whitney Museum, New York, USA
Les Inquiets, cinq artistes sous la pression de la guerre, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France