Walid Raad: LES LOUVRES and/or KICKING THE DEAD (Lebanon, United States)

Walid Raad is a visual and performing artist. He teaches at The Cooper Union in New York. His work can be roughly divided into two stages: his work as part of The Atlas Group between 1989 and 2004, revolving around the protracted Lebanese wars (1975–1991); and Scratching on Things I Could Disavow where he engages the emergence of a new artistic infrastructure in the Middle East.

In Kicking the Dead, Raad is an exhibition guide and story-teller. He uses artefacts and data as starting points, and uses different narrative approaches to take these well beyond their documentary value. His stories – though informed by the knowledge of the history of wars and imperialism, the biographies of different scientists, writers and inventors, art history, capital and property dynamics, the art market – make us shift from being fascinated by the lively narrative to being on a guard as to where the narrative moves away from historical and social facts and passes to other kinds of facts (aesthetics, emotional, cultural).

From and with: Walid Raad
Project management: Celesta Rottiers
Technical direction: Herman Sorgeloos
Co-produced by: steirischer herbst in Graz, Art Center Buda in Kortrijk for Gone West – NEXT Festival, HAU Hebbel am Ufer in Berlin, Fast Forward Festival/Onassis Cultural Centre in Athens, Festival d’Automne à Paris.Support by Sfeir-Semler Gallery (Hamburg/Beirut), Paula Cooper Gallery (New York).
Thanks: Jack V Sturiano, Marcella Lista, Belal Hibri, SITU Studio, Christopher Kissoon, Raphael Fleuriet, Karolien Derwael
In collaboration with the Museum of Contemporary Art Metelkova.

60 minutes

The performance is in English, Slovene summary will be available.

Information and ticket reservations: info@bunker.si