Vā

Zu sehen bis 29. Juni 2024 Kunstuniversität Linz, Hauptplatz 8, Aula

In Kooperation mit dem Atelierhaus Salzamt lädt die Kunstuniversität Linz zur Ausstellung des Künstlers Ehsan Behmanesh.

Vā consists of seven videos, totalling 5 hours and 27 minutes. It was created as part of an artistic research project (2019-2022), focusing on the TV war documentary series (used as propaganda) 'Ravayat Fath,' produced by Morteza Avini. The series comprises approximately 55 hours of documentary footage captured from the front lines of the Iran-Iraq war between 1985 and 1988.

In Persian, 'Vā' is utilized as prefixes, suffixes, infixes or interjections, conveying various meanings such as 'again,' 're-,' 'back,' 'against,' 'un-,' 'de-,' 'dis-,' 'to,' 'toward,' 'open,' 'separate,' 'with,' 'alas!,' 'oh!,' and 'really?.'

Ehsan Behmanesh is an Artist-Researcher living in Teheran. He studied photography in Tehran and Artistic-research at the Royal Academy of Art The Hague. He has participated in master classes and workshops with various artists such as Abbas Kiarostami, Hito Steyerl, Reza Abedini, and Terry Barrett. His works have been exhibited in numerous exhibitions in Iran, Europe, the United States, the UK, Brazil, India, and Turkey.

“As an artist-researcher in recent years, I have explored more unrestricted methods of research (choosing the topic and the method) through art. I searched for ways to deal with diverse issues, not conventional scientific methods, but by building an interdisciplinary horizontal network and using continental philosophy, social sciences, literature, science, and even emotions, inner desires and intuition. Meanwhile, I have confronted questions that involve the arts themselves. The usage of arts and its relation to society, the economy so politics and also its role in social daily life. I have dealt with the question of how and to what extent the presentation’s location imposes restrictions on the context and also the form of presentation and the piece itself, who is my audience and what do I want them to be?”