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

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Olaf Breuning

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Cheryl Donegan

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Ana Laura Aláez

Ana Laura Aláez

Marc Bijl

Marc Bijl

Carles Congost

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Joan Morey

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 Adel Abidin

Adel Abidin

Hugo Alonso

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Charles Atlas

Charles Atlas

Jesús Hernández

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César Pesquera

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Jorge Galindo and Santiago Sierra

Jorge Galindo and Santiago Sierra

From two portraits of children…

From two portraits of children…

The Suna and İnan Kıraç Foundation’s Orientalist Painting Collection includes two children’s portraits that are often featured in exhibitions on the second floor of the Pera Museum. These portraits both date back to the early 20th century, and were made four years apart. One depicts Prince Abdürrahim Efendi, son of Sultan Abdulhamid II, while the figure portrayed on the other is Nazlı, the daughter of Osman Hamdi Bey.

Journey to the East

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Pera Museum presents an exhibition of French artist Félix Ziem, one of the most original landscape painters of the 19th century. This week we are sharing Ziem’s work inspired by Istanbul and “the East”! 

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As artisanship became a part of artistic practices with the blurring of art and craft, the use of traditional motifs has also flourished. In this context, how are these motifs currently structured or designed beyond their traditional connotations?