Acid Rock, 1982
, 4 min 9 s, colour, sound

Courtesy of Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI), New York

Since the end of the 1970s Dara Birnbaum has been making videos and installations in different formats with which she tries to recontextualise and subvert the icons of pop culture and the mass- media archetypes related to the consumer society and television. This is why her works sometimes take the form of telefilms, soap operas, sports programmes, publicity spots or music videos, into which she inserts subtexts that critically deconstruct the underlying ideology of the images. This is the approach taken in Acid Rock, a video made in 1982 for Documenta 7 in Kassel, during the period when the MTV music video channel flourished and had most influence in the American music industry. Dara Birnbaum recomposes the Doors’ song L.A. Woman and appropriates elements from advertising as though they were ready-mades, turning them into a feminist and anti-consumer tirade criticising the sexism of television advertising.

Joseph Beuys

Joseph Beuys

Dara Birnbaum

Dara Birnbaum

John Sanborn, Kit Fitzgerald (Antarctica)

John Sanborn, Kit Fitzgerald (Antarctica)

Pipilotti Rist

Pipilotti Rist

Bjørn Melhus

Bjørn Melhus

Charley Case

Charley Case

Olaf Breuning

Olaf Breuning

Cheryl Donegan

Cheryl Donegan

Ana Laura Aláez

Ana Laura Aláez

Marc Bijl

Marc Bijl

Carles Congost

Carles Congost

Joan Morey

Joan Morey

 Adel Abidin

Adel Abidin

Hugo Alonso

Hugo Alonso

Charles Atlas

Charles Atlas

Jesús Hernández

Jesús Hernández

César Pesquera

César Pesquera

Jorge Galindo and Santiago Sierra

Jorge Galindo and Santiago Sierra

Memory Building Memories / Memory Room / Memento Mori

Memory Building Memories / Memory Room / Memento Mori

Each memory tells an intimate story; each collection presents us with the reality of containing an intimate story as well. The collection is akin to a whole in which many memories and stories of the artist, the viewer, and the collector are brought together. At the heart of a collection is memory, nurtured from the past and projecting into the future.

Audience with the Mad King

Audience with the Mad King

Celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, Pera Museum invites artist Benoît Hamet to reinterpret key pieces from its collections, casting a humourous eye over ‘historical’ events, both imagined and factual.

Midnight Stories: COGITO <br> Tevfik Uyar

Midnight Stories: COGITO
Tevfik Uyar

He had imagined the court room as a big place. It wasn’t. It was about the size of his living room, with an elevation at one end, with a dais on it. The judges and the attorneys sat there. Below it was an old wooden rail, worn out in some places. That was his place. There was another seat for his lawyer. At the back, about 20 or 30 chairs were stowed out for the non-existent crowd.