Amar Kanwar
08 Oct - 09 Nov 2008
© Amar Kanwar
the torn first pages
still from ‘the face’, 2005
courtesy: amar kanwar and galerie marian goodman, paris
the torn first pages
still from ‘the face’, 2005
courtesy: amar kanwar and galerie marian goodman, paris
AMAR KANWAR
"The Torn First Pages"
08 oct 08 > 09 nov 08
‘imagine a formal visualisation of poetry as evidence in a future war crimes tribunal. Imagine nineteen sheets of paper floating forever in the wind ...’
amar kanwar
amar kanwar’s 19-part film essay ‘the torn first pages’ emerged between 2003 and 2008. it is shown in its entirety for the first time at the haus der kunst. it is devoted to the democratic resistance in burma and is inspired by the story of the bookseller ko than htay, who was arrested because he kept tearing out the obligatory front pages containing the military regime’s propaganda before selling the books. in ‘the torn first pages’ amar kanwar deals in a direct, elliptical and metaphorical way with the fight for a democratic society, with political exile, memory and alienation. from a harsh perspective, the artist recovers the forgotten and lost images of the protest movement’s victims, re-animates their stories and instigates the processes of remembrance. kanwar accompanies the viewer on a journey that shows the burmese resistance fighters’ struggles, lives and violent deaths. he follows their traces into exile, tells of the diaspora and looks at old as well as new archive material, which has been filmed anonymously and secretly by resistance members. in addition he draws on rare material from the time of the independence movement, the political fight in 1988 and the monks’ uprising in 2007.
"The Torn First Pages"
08 oct 08 > 09 nov 08
‘imagine a formal visualisation of poetry as evidence in a future war crimes tribunal. Imagine nineteen sheets of paper floating forever in the wind ...’
amar kanwar
amar kanwar’s 19-part film essay ‘the torn first pages’ emerged between 2003 and 2008. it is shown in its entirety for the first time at the haus der kunst. it is devoted to the democratic resistance in burma and is inspired by the story of the bookseller ko than htay, who was arrested because he kept tearing out the obligatory front pages containing the military regime’s propaganda before selling the books. in ‘the torn first pages’ amar kanwar deals in a direct, elliptical and metaphorical way with the fight for a democratic society, with political exile, memory and alienation. from a harsh perspective, the artist recovers the forgotten and lost images of the protest movement’s victims, re-animates their stories and instigates the processes of remembrance. kanwar accompanies the viewer on a journey that shows the burmese resistance fighters’ struggles, lives and violent deaths. he follows their traces into exile, tells of the diaspora and looks at old as well as new archive material, which has been filmed anonymously and secretly by resistance members. in addition he draws on rare material from the time of the independence movement, the political fight in 1988 and the monks’ uprising in 2007.