Chiesa di San Lorenzo – Ocean Space
Joan Jonas – Moving Off Land II
Ocean Space, is a
new collaborative platform for change, initiated by TBA21–Academy, the new embassy for the oceans which will catalyze
transdisciplinary research and foster collective action, encouraging audiences
to radically reimagine how we see and treat the defining feature of our blue
planet. Located in the Chiesa di San
Lorenzo, Ocean Space reintegrates the historic building back into the
cultural fabric of the city, after two years of conservation and renewal, and
more than 100 years of being largely closed to the public.
Chiesa di San Lorenzo – Ocean Space
Joan Jonas – Moving Off Land II
To inaugurate Ocean Space, TBA21–Academy presented an
immersive multimedia installation by the acclaimed artist Joan Jonas, the culmination of three years of intensive research
and explorations with the nomadic academy. Moving Off the Land II is
curated by Stefanie Hessler, on view
until September 29.
Joan Jonas – Moving Off Land II - Mirror Pool – Video Still
The opening conference
included a conversation between acclaimed artist, Joan Jonas and Dr. Sylvia
Earle, marine biologist and National
Geographic Explorer-in-Residence, moderated by curator Stefanie Hessler; and a discussion between Francesca Thyssen-Bornemisza, founder and chairperson of TBA21, together with Markus Reymann Co-founder and director.
Ecologist,
paleobiologist, and conservationist, Jeremy
B.C. Jackson, Sylvia Earle, Francesca
Thyssen-Bornemisza, Joan Jonas, Ozu, Markus Reymann, David Hrankovic, CEO, TBA21 and Stefanie Hessler
Chiesa di San Lorenzo – Ocean Space Inaugural
Program
Joan Jonas – Moving Off Land II
Joan Jonas’s exhibition
“Moving Off the Land II” is the
inaugural public project at the Ocean
Space. The installation is the culmination of three years of intensive
research in aquariums around the world as well as in the waters off the coast
of Jamaica, commissioned by TBA21–Academy. Curated by Stefanie Hessler, and on view until
September 29, “Moving Off the Land II” unfolds across 500 square
meters of what was once the nave of the church of San Lorenzo. The show comprises new video, sculpture, drawing, and
sound works, as well as a performance on May 7, centering on the role the
oceans have played for cultures throughout history as a totemic, spiritual, and
ecological touchstone.
Joan Jonas is one of
the most renowned artists of her generation. She is celebrated for her
groundbreaking work in performance, installation, and video since the 1960s. At
a time when art started leaving the confines of the gallery space, Jonas
created work that converged with dance, music, and theater. Ever since, her
work has tackled complex questions regarding humans’ relationship with the
environment. Jonas represented the United
States at the 56th Venice Biennale
in 2015. With this new work, she returns to Venice and revisits some of the themes touched upon in her US Pavilion exhibition “They Come to Us
Without a Word”: the natural world and the animals inhabiting it—from bees to
fish—as well as the present danger of climate change and extinction.
Joan Jonas and Ozu
Joan Jonas - Moving Off
the Land II - 2019, video still - courtesy
of the artist and TBA21
Joan Jonas
- Moving Off the Land II – 2019 - video
still
Francesca Thyssen-Bornemisza
Joan Jonas
- Moving Off the Land II – 2019
Dr. Sylvia
Earle
In
Moving Off the Land II, Jonas pays
tribute to the oceans and their creatures, biodiversity, and delicate ecology.
Her new works dive deep into the ocean water, swim with the fish inhabiting it,
and weave in literature and poetry by writers who have homed in on the liquid
masses that cover two thirds of the planet. Following the methodology that has
gained her lauded reputation, Jonas combines poetry and prose by writers like Emily Dickinson and Herman Melville with texts by Rachel Carson and Sy Montgomery, and with moving images filmed in aquariums and in Jamaica, where algae bloom and
overfishing pose urgent threats to the environment.
Stefanie
Hessler and Hili Perlson
Joan Jonas
- Moving Off the Land II – installation
Photo - Eliisabet Daviiosdoottit - Courtesy the artist and Gavin
Brown’s Enterprise - New York/Rome – TBA21
Joan Jonas - Moving Off the Land - 2016/2017
Performance with Mariia Huld Markan - Sequences Art Festival
Reykjavík – 2017
Performance with Mariia Huld Markan - Sequences Art Festival
Reykjavík – 2017
Joan Jonas, Moving Off
the Land II, 2019, video still, courtesy
of the artist and TBA21
Joan Jonas
- Moving Off the Land II – 2019 – Video still