The Shadow, 2017 - planning.ubc.ca · spending her summers on Cortes Island, BC. Her work...
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Esther Shalev-Gerz The Shadow, 2017 Cement pavers, 100 x 22 meters Location: University Plaza in front of The Nest, the new AMS building Commissioned with support from the Burrard Arts Foundation, Rick Erickson and Donna Partridge, Brigitte and Henning Freybe, the Morris and Helen Belkin Foundation and UBC’s Matching Fund for Outdoor Art through Infrastructure Impact Charges In The Shadow, Esther Shalev-Gerz embeds a ghostly shadow of a first-growth Douglas fir across the expanse of University Plaza, which is situated on the traditional, ancestral and unceded territory of the Musqueam people. Pixilated through the use of differing shades of paving stones, the shadow engages pedestrians through its varied texture and tone underfoot, yet does not reveal the entire form. As in the landscape, the totality of the tree can only be grasped from a distance: The Shadow requires a view from higher ground to be complete. In the artist’s previous installations in public space, such as Monument Against Fascism or White Point/Meeting Point, specific sites are explored through investigating the horizontal plane. Rather than extend forms into vertical space, The Shadow, like the earlier works, presents an absence as a hovering memory beneath our feet. Each tree carries a unique testimony of its history and surroundings. The Shadow reminds us of the scale of the trees that once existed on this site and illustrates the vast change that has taken place in a relatively short period of time. It establishes a dialogue between culture and nature, past and present and potential future. Esther Shalev-Gerz is an internationally renowned artist. Born in Vilnius, Lithuania, she was raised in Jerusalem, Israel and has been residing in Paris since 1984, spending her summers on Cortes Island, BC. Her work investigates the construction of knowledge, history and Cultural identities. She has exhibited internationally, amongst other places, in San Francisco, Paris, Berlin, Vancouver, Finland, Detroit, Geneva, Guangzhou and New York and created permanent projects in public space in Hamburg, Israel, Stockholm, Wanas, Geneva and Glasgow. For more information please consult her website: www.shalev-gerz.net The on campus installation of the work is scheduled in 2017-18.
The Shadow, 2017 - planning.ubc.ca · spending her summers on Cortes Island, BC. Her work investigates the construction of knowledge, history and Cultural identities. She has exhibited
Esther Shalev-Gerz The Shadow, 2017 Cement pavers, 100 x 22
meters Location: University Plaza in front of The Nest, the new AMS
building Commissioned with support from the Burrard Arts
Foundation, Rick Erickson and Donna Partridge, Brigitte and Henning
Freybe, the Morris and Helen Belkin Foundation and UBCs Matching
Fund for Outdoor Art through Infrastructure Impact Charges In The
Shadow, Esther Shalev-Gerz embeds a ghostly shadow of a
first-growth Douglas fir across the expanse of University Plaza,
which is situated on the traditional, ancestral and unceded
territory of the Musqueam people. Pixilated through the use of
differing shades of paving stones, the shadow engages pedestrians
through its varied texture and tone underfoot, yet does not reveal
the entire form. As in the landscape, the totality of the tree can
only be grasped from a distance: The Shadow requires a view from
higher ground to be complete. In the artists previous installations
in public space, such as Monument Against Fascism or White
Point/Meeting Point, specific sites are explored through
investigating the horizontal plane. Rather than extend forms into
vertical space, The Shadow, like the earlier works, presents an
absence as a hovering memory beneath our feet. Each tree carries a
unique testimony of its history and surroundings. The Shadow
reminds us of the scale of the trees that once existed on this site
and illustrates the vast change that has taken place in a
relatively short period of time. It establishes a dialogue between
culture and nature, past and present and potential future. Esther
Shalev-Gerz is an internationally renowned artist. Born in Vilnius,
Lithuania, she was raised in Jerusalem, Israel and has been
residing in Paris since 1984, spending her summers on Cortes
Island, BC. Her work investigates the construction of knowledge,
history and Cultural identities. She has exhibited internationally,
amongst other places, in San Francisco, Paris, Berlin, Vancouver,
Finland, Detroit, Geneva, Guangzhou and New York and created
permanent projects in public space in Hamburg, Israel, Stockholm,
Wanas, Geneva and Glasgow. For more information please consult her
website: www.shalev-gerz.net The on campus installation of the work
is scheduled in 2017-18.
