Why am I here?

2011 kryptothek

Wood, metal, raffia, projector, spotlight, video (HD, 8’06, loop)

Based on an original fetish figure of the Mbete tribe in Gabon, which at the same time serves as alter ego of the artist herself, Naho Kawabe expresses her search for the definition of existence in the room-sized installation Why am I here? Kawabe originally discovered the figure at a Hamburg curio shop called Harry’s Hamburger Hafenbasar & Museum, where it was placed together with other fetish figures from different countries, detached from its original function and significance. The figure had probably travelled accidentally to Hamburg by ship and ended up as a “seafarer’s treasure” at the bazaar on Reeperbahn where it stood around as one curio among others, stripped of its cultural context. In Kawabe’s installation, the figure finds itself in another, completely foreign context. Originally a fetish and transplanted into a constantly changing spatiotemporal constellation, the figure raises questions about the stability our self-positioning that is still possible today. Why am I here? confronts the viewer with questions of cultural belonging, border crossings and, in a general sense, the existential question how the coordinates of space and time help shape our identity concepts.

Text by Magnus Pölcher
in: Fuzzy Dark Spot. Videokunst aus Hamburg. Deichtorhallen Hamburg / Sammlung Falckenberg

Exhibtions: Shiseido Gallery, Tokyo (JP) / Ermekeilkaserne, Bonn (DE) / Deichtorhallen Sammlung Falckenberg Hamburg (DE) /Kunsthaus Hamburg (DE)
Images: Broschüre ” Shiseido Art Egg 05″ / Catalogue “Observer Effect” / Catalogue “Fuzzy Dark Spot. Videokunst aus Hamburg” / Catalogue “INDEX 11”

Video

Curtain

2010 kryptothek

9’28, Loop

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Exhibitions: Port Gallery T, Osaka (JP) / Kunsthaus Hamburg (DE) / Pane e Tulipani, Hamburg (DE)
Images: Katalog “Observer Effect” / Katalog “INDEX 11”

Video

Fall Float Evenly

2010 kryptothek

Single-channel, HD, 16:3, 07′ 20, loop

Exhibitions: Kunsthaus Hamburg (DE) / Künstlerforum, Bonn (DE) / Kunsthaus Dresden (DE)
Screening: Museum Folkwang, Essen (DE)
Image: Catalogue “EXTRA 3” / Catalogue “Observer Effect”

Video

Der Weg I

2009 kryptothek

4:3, PAL, 31’18

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The way: La route Lister (Chemin Walter Benjamin).
The area: Eastern Pyrenees on the Mediterranean
The place: Banyuls sur Mer, France
The water: Port Bou, Spain
The media theorist and philosopher Walter Benjamin escaped from the National Socialists in 1940 moving from Banyuls to Port Bou. Alongside many other exiles he took the same smuggler’s path over the Pyrenees and is still the boundary between France and Spain today. When Benjamin reached Port Bou only to find out that his transit visa was not valid; he committed suicide. My half-hour video shows the climb along the mountains from the perspective of a person walking, and looking constantly downwards at the stony path. For this video, I held my camera in my hand as if carrying a heavy suitcase, mimicking the philosopher who always carried a black briefcase that probably accommodated his last extensive text. In this way, the fizziness and shaking of the video footage can be associated with the psychological condition of Benjamin – a refugee.

Exhibtions: Kunsthaus Hamburg (DE) / Johann-Friedrich-Danneil-Museum, Salzwedel (DE) / Hamburger Kunsthalle/Galerie der Gegenwart (DE) / Schloßkirche, Universität Bonn (DE) / Waitingroom, Tokyo (JP)
Images: Catalogue “Observer Effect” / Catalogue “delikatelinien“
Collection: Hamburger Kunsthalle (DE)

Charcoal | Installation

Wenn Licht sich staut …

2007 kryptothek

Charcoal, 198 x 364 cm

Exhibtion: Kunsthaus Hamburg (DE)
Image: Catalogue “Observer Effect“

Catalogue

Claus Böhmler. Smart Artist

2007 kryptothek

Claus Böhmler. Smart Artist
2019 Textem Verlag
21,5 x 30 cm, 120 pages
Language: DE

Hrsg.: Michael Glasmeier, Naho Kawabe, Nora Sdun
Text: Michael Glasmeier
Design: Claus Böhmler, Naho Kawabe, Christoph Steiniger (Interkool)

Order here: Textem Verlag (Hamburg)

ISBN 978-86485-179-7

Video

Wash Your Blues

2007 kryptothek

4:3, PAL, 4’00, loop, sound: Veit Kenner

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During the video, the color is reduced and changes to white as a gradual loss of power and energy, but also as an image for the ice of the animal’s natural habitat into which it dreams itself back.

Exhibitions: Kunsthaus Hamburg (DE) / Via Pietro Garzoni 5, Venedig (IT) / blinkvideo.de
Image: Catalogue “Observer Effect”

Video

Sugarhouse

2004 kryptothek

4:3, NTSC, 4′ 00

Exhibitions: Warenhouse, Shanhai (CN) / Kunstverein Hannover (DE) / Sculpture squer, Singapore (SG) / Juan Media Festival, Inchon (KR) / Galerie im Marstall, Ahrensburg (DE)
Image: Catalogue „Observer Effect“
Collections: Sparkassen-Kulturstiftung Stormarn (DE) / private