2016

Miriam Yammad
Mimesis I–IV, Display I

Artist Miriam Yammad is the recipient of the 2016 Ruisdael Stipend – an exhibition project for young artists intended to foster cultural exchange between Germany and the Netherlands. The Ruisdael Stipend was introduced in connection with ‘Residual’, an installation produced by Willem de Rooij for ‘kunstwegen/raumsichten’, a sculpture project held at Bentheim Castle, Lower Saxony, in 2012.

In her videos and installations, Miriam Yammad combines documentary content and references to reality with fictional actions.

Her series ‘Mimesis’ presents forms of imitation and repetition observed in the development and representation of cultural identity, gender and national identity. A clear, precise camera view is combined with artistic images and narratives. Poised between documentaries and staged productions, the videos all show semi-public spaces within Berlin, such as a Turkish barber’s shop, a furniture store or a dance studio. Our gaze is drawn to the performers’ gestures and actions in these spaces. Their imitative repetition, brings them out of their own reality. The images highlight that while the strategy of imitation (‘mimesis’) serves the updating of stereotypical patterns of identity, it also provides an opportunity to reveal and undermine them.

In her installation ‘Display’, Miriam Yammad begins her own unique dialogue with the historical context of the landscape painting, enabled by the presence of Jacob van Ruisdael’s painting at Bentheim Castle. A series of landscape prints produced in Turkey but purchased in Berlin and featuring an assortment of Turkish, European and even North American landscape ideals conveys a sense of yearning for both home and unknown, far-off places.

Miriam Yammad (*1979 in Freiburg, lebt und arbeitet in Berlin) www.miriamyammad.com

Exhibition: September 4 to November 20, 2016

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij

Exhibition view Bentheim Castle 2016, Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij