Gravity

source: newsle

Aleksandra Mir (b. 1967, Lubin, Poland) is an artist currently based in London. She studied Communications at Schillerska/Gothenburg University in Gothenburg (1986–87), Media Arts at the School of Visual Arts in New York (earning her BFA in 1992), and Cultural Anthropology at The Graduate Faculty, The New School for Social Research in New York (1994–96). She holds a dual Swedish – American citizenship. In much of her work, Mir solicits the participation of friends, acquaintances, and strangers in playful upheavals of social norms. She has unleashed her wry and often pathetic critiques in works like Life is Sweet in Sweden (1995), advocated for more female bands among stoned festival goers in New Rock Feminism (1996), recorded and broadcast cat-calling whistles in Copenhagen’s central square in Pick Up (Oh Baby) (1996).
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source: artscatalystorg

Aleksandra Mir’s vast rocket (20 metres high), a monumental ephemeral sculpture, was built in the former engine shed of The Roundhouse in September 2006. It was constructed out of junk: steel, fibreglass, tractor tires, industrial fans and a discarded tank from a toothpaste factory. It took two days of construction on site, stood erect for three days only and was dismantled in another two days.

The rocket that effectively went nowhere is commemorated through a mixture of production stills, drawings, space ephemera and the artist’s own pin up photos taken in scrap yards around England during the search for old and dirty things to make the work. Throughout the calendar, data inserted in its corresponding date highlights failure or resistance in the history of space exploration – a catalogue of various failures, disasters, minor mishaps and political hurdles.
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source: uitinvlaanderenbe

De tentoonstelling The Space Age brengt in M een overzicht van Aleksandra Mirs werk rond de verkenning van de ruimte van de afgelopen veertien jaar (1999-2013). Enkele historische momenten van de ruimtevaartgeschiedenis vormden hierbij het uitgangspunt: zoals de ontdekking van de wetten van de fysica, het begin van de experimentele (fatale) raketlanceringen en de eerste succesvolle maanlanding.

Het verband dat Mir legt tussen wetenschap en religie gaat terug op een citaat van de wereldberoemde 16de-eeuwse Italiaanse wetenschapper en filosoof Galileo Galilei, die verklaarde ‘in zijn ontdekkingen meer te hebben geleerd door goddelijke genade dan door telescopen’. Via vormelijk onderzoek naar zowel de beelden van NASA als de iconografie van de Katholieke Kerk, ziet Mir verschillende gelijkenissen: ‘Zo wordt de hemel op een gelijkaardige manier weergegeven, lijken astronautshelmen op stralenkransen van heiligen en benadert de uitdrukking van ontzag bij de lancering van een raket die van gelovigen tijdens religieuze rituelen’.

De expositie toont drie films : First Woman on the Moon (1999), Gravity (2006) en The Seduction of Galileo Galilei (2011), naast de reeks collages getiteld The Dream and the Promise (2009). Parallel aan de tentoonstelling zal een publicatie worden uitgegeven. De Zweeds-Amerikaanse kunstenares Aleksandra Mir werd geboren in 1967 in Lubin, Polen. Ze leeft en werkt momenteel in Londen.
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source: blognaver

여성작가 알렉산드라 미르(Aleksanda Mir/네델란드,1967~)는 산업폐기물을 재활용, 20미터 높이의 로켓을 만들었습니다. 꿈만 같았던 우주선. 달여행. 천문학적인 돈이 들어가는 우주선(돈먹는 하마). 아폴로프로젝트엔 50조원, 10여년의 기간이 소요되었다고 합니다. 상상을 초월하는 지구 최대 규모의 프로젝트이자 퍼포먼스인 셈입니다.

우주 개척의 신화는 남성 중심이었습니다. 작가는 여기에 발상을 얻어 작품을 만들게 됩니다. 날 수도 갈 수도 없는 깡통로켓이 담고 있는 의미는 무엇일까요. 달에 선 최초의 우주인은 여성이 될 수 없었을 까요? 그 물음에 답이라도 하듯 1963년 6월 16일 소련 바이코니르에서 세계 최초의 여자 우주비행사인 발렌티나 테레슈코바가 탑승한 보스토크 6호가 발사되었습니다.

우주선. 우주개척이 인류에게 안겨다 줄 것은 무궁무진하다고 하지만, 돈 많이 들어가는 이벤트로 보이기도 합니다. 우주선프로젝트에 들어가는 비용이면 한 나라의 일년 살림살이를 해결 할 정도이니까요. 그 비용으로 다른 일에 쓴다면? 우주선 정보 또한 극비이니까요.