嘿嘿视频

On View

Inside the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum
Photo: Karen Higgins/嘿嘿视频

An ambitious new exhibition at the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art looks at the power and politics of viewing acts of protest and resistance through moving images. 鈥淔rom Moment to Movement: Picturing Protest in the Kramlich Collection,鈥 a large-scale exhibition of film and video installations, occupies three galleries. Video monitors of all sizes, as well as life-size projections, fill the space, where walls have been painted, moved and constructed to give each piece its own environment.

鈥淔rom Moment to Movement鈥 spans 30 years and brings together an international, intergenerational group of prominent contemporary artists: 嘿嘿视频 Professor of Art Shiva Ahmadi, Dara Birnbaum, Kota Ezawa, Theaster Gates, Nalini Malani and Mikhael Subotzky. Each work examines a different event grounded in the real world, using specific moments from the United States, China, India and South Africa to explore protest from different angles, including the role of media in our understanding of events, and ongoing dialogues around racism and social inequity. Organized by the museum鈥檚 associate curator, Susie Kantor, the timely exhibition is drawn primarily from the renowned Bay Area-based Kramlich Collection, which has a strong focus on new media artworks with social impact.

The museum commissioned Associate Professor of Design Brett Snyder and seven undergraduate design students (now alumni) 鈥 Ama Benkuo Bonsu 鈥20, Marcus Dubois 鈥20, Jen Piccinino 鈥21, Alejandra Valladares-Alvarez 鈥20, Zoey Ward 鈥21, Jovita Lois Wattimena 鈥21 and Genevieve C. Zanaska 鈥21 鈥 to design the exhibition鈥檚 layout. They began meeting regularly with museum staff on Zoom in summer 2020.

鈥淲e worked on the design in the wake of the protests following the murder of George Floyd,鈥 Snyder recalled. 鈥淚t gave all of us the chance to consider the many forms of protest and a chance to think about the relationship of art and activism in a meaningful way.鈥

Seeking to fuse the idea of artists whose work is at the intersection of time-based art and protest, Snyder and his students brainstormed a graphic concept for a dramatic lenticular wall based on the exhibition title.

鈥溾楩rom Moment to Movement鈥 poetically captures the concept so succinctly 鈥 both as a play on words related to film and to protest,鈥 Snyder said. 鈥淲e liked the idea that as a visitor walks in, they would see one message (鈥榝rom moment鈥), and as they move through the gallery, that message would change (鈥榯o movement鈥) in a filmic way.鈥

Kantor said she appreciated the group鈥檚 level of engagement and enjoyed the collaboration. 鈥淚 had a wonderful time working with them and getting to see the way they understood the exhibition and the thoughtful way they applied it to the design,鈥 she said.

Other faculty also played a role, contributing background and resources to the museum鈥檚 website to help visitors put the historical and political events depicted in context.

鈥淔rom Moment to Movement: Picturing Protest in the Kramlich Collection鈥 is on view at the Manetti Shrem Museum through June 19, 2022.

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