Past Residents
Past Resident2017: Artist Protection Fund Fellow
Şener Özmen
Şener Özmen questions the certainty of existing conditions and situations, authoritarian structures and existing taboos. His subtle and poetic works focus our attention not only on the perception and the changes in the context of art, but refer mainly to the critical problems of social reality in which the artist positions himself and offers his opinion.
Şener Özmen was born in Idil in 1971. He graduated from the Department of Painting Education in the Faculty of Education at Çukurova University. He has had several solo exhibitions and participated in many group exhibitions both in Turkey and abroad: Germany, France, England, Kosovo, Serbia, Albania, the USA, Iran, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Swiss, Sweden, Holland, Spain, Yugoslavia and Austria. His articles on exhibitions were published in BirGün Newspaper, Artist Magazine, Sanat Dünyamız, Radikal Kitap and Siyahî. His works have been shown in Centre Pompidou, The Worldly House at dOCUMENTA(13), Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Istanbul Modern, and Kunsthalle Fridericianum. Özmen has been awarded an Institute of International Education Artist Protection Fund Fellowship and is in residence at Montclair State University, participating in ISCP’s residency program.
Şener Özmen, Flag, 2010, photography, 59 × 39 in. (149.86 × 99.06 cm)
Şener Özmen, Catharsis, 2010, photography, 59 × 39 in. (149.86 × 99.06 cm)
Şener Özmen, Optical Propoganda, 2012, photography and installation, 47 × 39 in. (119.38 × 99.06 cm)
Şener Özmen, On The Road, 2012, photography, 70 × 47 in. (177.8 × 119.38 cm)
Şener Özmen, What does an artist actually want?, 2012, HD video, 2.19 min
Residents from Turkey
Past Resident2017: Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar
Rhys Himsworth
As an artist working at the junction of analogue and digital media, Rhys Himsworth’s paintings, prints, photographs and multimedia installations attempt to form a discourse around issues of surveillance, mimesis, simulacrum and authorship. He mixes natural elements with the machine to create hybrids and attempts to articulate virtual media though translating its information into physical manifestations. This often takes place through installations that are physical, but have a generative component through their use of network-based media. Information from these sources is then used to generate a physical outcome whereby the viewer is confronted with, and often part of, a complex informational experience.
Rhys Himsworth received his BA in Fine Art from Central Saint Martins and his MA in Printmaking from the Royal College of Art, London. He has exhibited in Europe, North America and the Middle East including solo shows at Reynolds Gallery, Richmond, Virginia and Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar. He also took part in the International Contemporary Art Biennial, Locws International, Swansea, United Kingdom; India Art Fair, New Delhi; and the CICA Museum, Gimpo, South Korea. Himsworth has been a visiting lecturer at Central Saint Martins and University of Hertfordshire, United Kingdom; University of São Paulo Brazil; and Art Institute of Chicago.
Rhys Himsworth, Civilization, 2013, turntables, stepper motors, micro-controllers, processing code, and wikipedia, 59 × 39 × 27 in. (149.86 × 99.06 × 68.58 cm)
Rhys Himsworth, Present Continuous Past, 2013, webcam, processing code, LCD screen, 25 × 23 in. (63.5 × 58.42 cm)
Rhys Himsworth, Entropy, 2011, LED boards, audio speakers, micro-controller, processing code, wikepedia, 196 × 236 × 70 in. (497.84 × 599.44 × 177.8 cm)
Rhys Himsworth, The World Within Itself, 2010, Aluminum cage, society finches, drawing machine, micro controller, web cam, pen, paper, 78 × 78 in. (198.12 × 198.12 cm)
Rhys Himsworth, New Life, 2008, cardiograph, laptop, computer program, paper, website- mydeathspace.com, 59 × 78 × 19 in. (149.86 × 198.12 × 48.26 cm)
Residents from Qatar
Past Resident2017: Danish Arts Foundation
Larissa Sansour
Central to Larissa Sansour’s practice is the tug and pull between fiction and reality in a Middle Eastern context. Recently, she has been interested in the dialectics between myth and history, and explored the sci-fi genre and the role of archaeology in nation building and national identity. In the absence of a viable peace process in Israel/Palestine, archaeology has long since become a battleground for settling territorial disputes. In her works, Sansour explores and reverses the archaeological methodology in an attempt to influence colonialist narratives and manipulate history.
Larissa Sansour (born 1973, East Jerusalem) studied fine arts in London, New York and Copenhagen. She has had solo exhibitions at Bluecoat, Liverpool; New Art Exchange, Nottingham; and Nikolaj Kunsthal, Copenhagen. She was part of group shows at Tate Modern, London; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; Palestinian Art Court – al Hoash, Jerusalem; Reina Sofia Museum, Madrid; Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark; House of World Cultures, Berlin, and Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art. Sansour’s work has been featured in several biennials of cities including Istanbul, Busan, Yinchuan and Liverpool.
Larissa Sansour, And They Covered the Sky Until It Was Black, 2017, installation, 240 × 156 × 120 in. (609.6 × 396.24 × 304.8 cm)
Larissa Sansour, In the Future They Ate from the Finest Porcelain, 2016, video, 29 min
Larissa Sansour, Archaeology in Absentia, 2016, bronze, 4 × 8 × 4 in. (10.16 × 20.32 × 10.16 cm)
Larissa Sansour, Revisionist Production Line, 2016, steel, rubber, and porcelain, 24 × 132 × 36 in. (60.96 × 335.28 × 91.44 cm)
Larissa Sansour, Nation Estate, 2016, video, 9 min
