Ronit Agassi. 14|02–05|05|2019 · 2019. 2. 19. · Ronit Agassi Ronit Agassi was born in 1948 at...
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Ronit Agassi. The Fifth Season 14|02–05|05|2019 The art installation ‘The Fifth Season’ by Israeli artist Ronit Agassi will be shown at the Munich Documentation Centre for the History of National Socialism from 14 February. Agassi’s works and objects, some of which were created especially for the Documentation Centre, revolve around the seasons and various aspects of human threat. In her work, Ronit Agassi weaves together various strands of narrative referencing both the history of the twentieth century and her own biography. Born on a Kibbutz in 1948, the year the State of Israel was founded, Ronit Agassi’s childhood and youth were shaped by the myth of Israel as a collective agricultural utopia. At the same time, her early life was also affected by images of war, the military and the trauma of the Holocaust. Taking the theme of the four seasons – autumn, winter, spring and summer – as well as a fifth season that has no name and neither a future nor a present, Ronit Agassi creates a disturbing yet poetic sequence of sculptures, readymades, textile works, drawings and a video, which she links associatively. Ronit Agassi likes to work with organic, fragile materials such as leaves, pebbles and Japan paper, 13.02.2019 Press information Dr. Kirstin Frieden Public Relations Tel. +49 89 233-67013 Fax +49 89 233-67005 [email protected] www.ns-dokuzentrum-muenchen.de Twitter @nsdoku | #nsdoku A institution run by the City of Munich © NS-Dokumentationszentrum München | Orla Connolly | Jens Weber
Transcript of Ronit Agassi. 14|02–05|05|2019 · 2019. 2. 19. · Ronit Agassi Ronit Agassi was born in 1948 at...
Ronit Agassi. The Fifth Season14|02–05|05|2019
The art installation ‘The Fifth Season’ by Israeli artist Ronit Agassi will be shown at the Munich Documentation Centre for the History of National Socialism from 14 February. Agassi’s works and objects, some of which were created especially for the Documentation Centre, revolve around the seasons and various aspects of human threat.
In her work, Ronit Agassi weaves together various strands of narrative referencing both the history of the twentieth century and her own biography. Born on a Kibbutz in 1948, the year the State of Israel was founded, Ronit Agassi’s childhood and youth were shaped by the myth of Israel as a collective agricultural utopia. At the same time, her early life was also affected by images of war, the military and the trauma of the Holocaust.
Taking the theme of the four seasons – autumn, winter, spring and summer – as well as a fifth season that has no name and neither a future nor a present, Ronit Agassi creates a disturbing yet poetic sequence of sculptures, readymades, textile works, drawings and a video, which she links associatively. Ronit Agassi likes to work with organic, fragile materials such as leaves, pebbles and Japan paper,
13.02.2019Press information
Dr. Kirstin FriedenPublic Relations
Tel. +49 89 233-67013Fax +49 89 233-67005
Twitter @nsdoku | #nsdoku
A institution run by the City of Munich
© NS-Dokumentationszentrum München | Orla Connolly | Jens Weber
Munich Documentation Centre for the History of National Socialism
13.02.2019Press information
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which she either paints or embroiders in fine stitches. In this way, the artist takes her audience on a journey to the fifth season whose sinis-ter tales only gradually emerge below its fragile surface. With ‘The Fifth Season’ Ronit Agassi has created a complex work full of allu-sions. Alongside historical motifs it also uses elements of fairy-tales, literature, music and art history, opening up disparate visual worlds.
The contrast between materiality and motif is shown, for example, in the nine leaves arranged in a tableaux. She has embroidered the delicate organic material in fine cross-stitch in earth and pastel tones in such a way that the faces of leading Nazi figures such as Adolf Hitler and Heinrich Himmler become discernible in the ornamental pattern. Agassi collected the leaves in the Berlin district of Grunewald. It was from Grunewald station that 50,000 Jews were deported to the extermination camps between 1941 and 1945.
In its temporary exhibitions the Munich Documentation Centre delib-erately sets out to use new methodological concepts and approaches to address the history of the Nazi era or to reference current socio-political issues. The installation ‘The Fifth Season’ by Ronit Agassi does this through the medium of contemporary art. The fragile, or-ganic materiality of the installation forms a contrast to the sober documentation and educational approach of the permanent exhibition at the Munich Documentation Centre, which is dominated by text and images. Agassi’s objects develop a visual, emotional power, evoking sub-conscious associations for visitors and encouraging contempla-tion.
The art installation ‘The Fifth Season’ will run from 14 February to 5 May 2019 in the temporary exhibition area of the Documentation Centre. On 14 February, at 5.30 pm, a discussion will take place be-tween the artist, Ronit Agassi, and the curator, Sabine Brantl. There will also be several curator-guided tours of the exhibition.
For further information please visit: www.ns-dokuzentrum-muenchen.de
Ronit Agassi Ronit Agassi was born in 1948 at Merhavia Kibbutz in northern Israel. She studied at Oranim College in Tivon, and at the University of Haifa where she graduated in art education and art therapy. Until 1987, she worked as an art therapist at the Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv. Agassi had her first solo exhibition ‘Points of Encounter’ in 1980 at the Tref-fpunkt Gallery in Zurich. Ronit Agassi’s work has been shown all over the world, including in Britain and Germany as well as Israel. She has won many prizes and scholarships. In 2007 and 2014, she was Guest Artist at the Villa Waldberta, the international artist residence of the City of Munich.
Solo exhibitions1980 Points of Encounter. Treffpunkt Gallery, Zurich; ART ROOM Gallery, Baden
1982 Pastel Drawings. Margaret Fischer Gallery, London
1995 Giornata. Janco Dada Museum, Ein Hod
1999 Layers. Reinfeld Gallery, Bremen
2001 The Last Leaf. Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art, Herzliya
2002 Green House Testimonies – dialogue with Filipina artist Penny Velasquez. The Manila Museum of Visual Arts and Janco Dada
13.02.2019Press information
Dr. Kirstin FriedenPublic Relations
Tel. +49 89 233-67013Fax +49 89 233-67005
Twitter @nsdoku | #nsdoku
A institution run by the City of Munich
© NS-Dokumentationszentrum München | Orla Connolly | Jens Weber
Munich Documentation Centre for the History of National Socialism
13.02.2019Press information
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Museum, Ein Hod
2010 Meeting Points: Ronit Agassi and Garry Goldstein. Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv
Group exhibitions1997 Fields of Memory. National Art Gallery, Salzburg; Artists’ House, Moscow; Latvia Museum of Foreign Art, Riga
1998 Story Time. British Foundation for the Arts, Kinder Gallery, London
2002 Firing Range. Kibbutz Gallery, Tel Aviv
2002 Views: Israeli Art from the Collection. The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
2003 Contemporary Art from Israel. Robert Sandelson Art Gallery, London
2004 Togetherness: The Group and the Kibbutz in Israeli Collection sciousness. Tel Aviv Museum of Art
2005 Beauty and the Book. The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
2005 The New Hebrews. Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin
2005 Looking Closely with One Eye. . . Monart Arts Center, Ashdod Museum of Art, Ashdod
2006 Insight of Nature. Academy of Fine Arts and Museum of Natu- ral History, Beijing
2007 One and All. Adi Prize for Jewish Expression in Art and Design
2005 Artists’ House in collaboration with The Israel Museum, Jerusa lem
2007 Traces III: The Biennale for Drawing in Israel, Artist’s House, Jerusalem
2010 ‘The Freedom to Create Prize’. Victoria and Albert Museum, London
2012 Good Night. The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
2013 Blood of the Maccabees: Memory and Bereavement in Israeli Art. The Negev Museum of Art, Beersheba
2015 One/Israel: Contemporary Artists from Israel. Imago Mundi- Luciano Benetton Collection, New Art, Venice
2016 One/Israel: Contemporary Artists from Israel. The Pratt Institute of Brooklyn, New York
2017 On the Edge: Israeli Paper. Eretz Israel Museum, Tel Aviv
2018 Intense Stillness. Wilfrid Israel Museum, Kibbuz Hazorea
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Press images
Ronit Agassi. The Fifth Season14|02–05|05|2019
13.02.2019Press information
Dr. Kirstin FriedenPublic Relations
Tel. +49 89 233-67013Fax +49 89 233-67005
[email protected]@muenchen.de
www.ns-dokuzentrum-muenchen.de
A institution run by the City of Munich
The images may be used in press reporting free of charge provided
the full image credits are given. High-resolution files and other
motifs can be obtained by sending a mail to:
03 | Object from the arrange-ment WinterTin soldiers, cardboard, vari-ous sizesPhoto: Orla Connolly, JensWeber
02 | Object from the arrange-ment AutumnChildren’s prayer tableWood, light 71 x 40 x 40Photo: Orla Connolly, JensWeber
01 | Object from the arrange-ment AutumnEmbroidered leaf, various sizesPhoto: Orla Connolly, JensWeber
Munich Dokumentation Centre for the History of National Socialism
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07 | View of the exhibitionPhoto: Jens Weber
05 | View of the exhibitionPhoto: Jens Weber
04 | Ronit Agassi Photo: Orla Connolly
06 | View of the exhibition Photo: Jens Weber
