Yazan Khalili Palestinian , b. 1981
Medusa: Don't Be a Stranger, 2020
6 channel video with mixed media
Edition of 5 plus 2 artist's proofs
Courtesy of the Artist and Lawrie Shabibi
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Medusa (2020)—a video installation based on the artist’s long-standing engagement with digital archiving in times of political unrest. Khalili addresses the rise of facial recognition technologies. The human face as...
Medusa (2020)—a video installation based on the artist’s long-standing engagement with digital archiving in times of political unrest. Khalili addresses the rise of facial recognition technologies. The human face as basic mode of identification triggers well-known dystopic tropes and scenarios. However, technology is created by humans and their respective weaknesses; and thinking technology needs to be informed by human imagination in its overtly emancipatory capacity.
The artwork asks whether digital archives can be a medium that frees memory from overdetermined, institutionalized narratives. Specifically, Medusa engages with the rise of facial recognition technologies. While the human face is an everyday mode of personal identification, the COVID-19 pandemic is an unprecedented historical transition in how we perceive one another—recently we are communicating almost entirely via video and various social platforms. Despite the fact that Medusa was produced prior to the pandemic, the current requirement to mask up in public space has introduced a new, universal, layer of facial concealment from which to engage with the ideas of Medusa and the mythology it references.
Medusa was supported by The Consortium Commissions—a project initiated by Mophradat with institutional partners including MOCA Toronto, Hammer Museum, LA; CCA, Glasgow and KW, Berlin.
The artwork asks whether digital archives can be a medium that frees memory from overdetermined, institutionalized narratives. Specifically, Medusa engages with the rise of facial recognition technologies. While the human face is an everyday mode of personal identification, the COVID-19 pandemic is an unprecedented historical transition in how we perceive one another—recently we are communicating almost entirely via video and various social platforms. Despite the fact that Medusa was produced prior to the pandemic, the current requirement to mask up in public space has introduced a new, universal, layer of facial concealment from which to engage with the ideas of Medusa and the mythology it references.
Medusa was supported by The Consortium Commissions—a project initiated by Mophradat with institutional partners including MOCA Toronto, Hammer Museum, LA; CCA, Glasgow and KW, Berlin.
Exhibitions
KW, Berlin (2020); MOCA, Toronto (2020); Para Museum, Istanbul (2020); ICA, Maine (2021); V2, Rotterdam (2021/2022).Join Mailing List
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