We don't screw them, we snap them
As an act of rebellion against the system of white walled galleries that tend to be in good taste, I was interested in finding an alternative space. A space that will be, for us, the common people, the last place in the world where one can imagine a contemporary art exhibition. The next idea I had was to make an interactive exhibition, where the images and installation that are represented and exposed in the exhibition will be at the same location with the human environment where the photos were made.
Artists were fascinated by prostitution since the beginning of history, but collective moral tells us to stay away from them.
Prostitution as a profession is known to be the oldest trade in the world. Even today, in the post modernist era, the act of selling the body for money is still judged negatively by society. Being a whore is still the most shameful job which is done discreetly and in the underground.
In capitalist, liberal, western society, we are taught to market almost every part of our mind, body and soul. Hardly any of us will dare to cross the red line demarking money and sex.
Zusmen is the name of an exhibition that reveals a visual anthropological insight into the world of bordellos in Berlin. The main theme in the expo is not why women become whores and Is it done by free will, the fact that girls choose to be hookers or, are they forced to give up their body and lust? The target of this photo project is to focus and show how in a city like Berlin the bordellos are varied, rich and differentiate one from the other. I also wished to raise the question: is it good for the free thinking society to open hidden drawers, or shall we stick to the habit of leaving some affairs in the twilight zone.
The exhibition will take place in a local bordello in Hoch strasse weeding that is called Laufhaus.
Three different types of people, each with a different motivation and interest in art, will be exposed to the photos in the Laufhaus:
The first circle will be the local working girls. They will see fairly large print, portrait photos of themselves, in their own working space, during their shifts.
The second circle is the costumers that usually prefer to go fast up the stairs without looking left or right. It could be interesting to see if in an unconscious way the images of the colourful girls will ring their attention.
The third circle is us, the curious, cultured, intellectual art fags. I bet that quite a few of us, if not all, had some thoughts about these matters, But who's brave enough to admit that she/ he's been inside a whore house?
For women there is no entrance or visiting options at the regularly routine. So I hope it would be a confronting lifting experience for the bourgeois crowd to be in the surroundings of simple bordello house in weeding.
Two different bordellos are explored in the exhibition. The first is a new luxury Harmon palace located on the main highway in the centre of the city. It is called Artemis. In Artemis the house is owned by men but the women work for themselves as freelancers, the women hunt the men and can decide with whom to sleep and how much money to charge from their clients. The girls in Artemis, are fairly young, and supposed to be very good looking, according to the trivial and conventional standards of beauty and sexuality.
The second bordello is the Laufhaus. The bordello is located at a working class neighbourhood called Weeding. In the Laufhause the rooms are basic and small. Due to the fact that time is money, the costumers tend to stay for a short period. the owners of the place are two women, Between the girls and the managers there is an atmosphere of a small warm family. It is hard to identify a typical look and appearance of the girls in Laufhaus., it varies. One can find fat motherly type women next to provocative lesbian punk embracing a big tit fetish leather girl.
The visual language and artistic values of the images made are a mixture of straight documentary photography combined with interference of the artists in the surroundings of the bordellos, and the girls. At Artemis (the more expensive tacky and updated place) Dodi Refinberg, a plastic artist, who deals with nylon plastic bags, brought personal works from his past. The plastic bag works were used in two different ways: the first one was straightforward. The naked hookers wore the sowed plastic bag designer's cloths, made by Dodi. The next step was to try and use the nylon material in a more abstract form that will create a symbolic usage of the plastic, For example, a bulb light object that is made from thousands of small plastic cuts, looks like a long snake with a head of a flower craving for water. Also, an image of a whore under the water in the swimming pool of the house of Artemis covered with a colourful plastic net, which blocks her way towards the surface. The posture of the tramp is like an infant in a womb trapped, in a golden cage.
My intention to photograph, and work together with tramps, comes from curiosity towards the side lines combined with identification of the abuse done to the whores and repressed minorities in society. I didn't want that my discourse and relationship with the girls will be similar to the ones they have with their clients. I wanted that the hookers will not look at me from an inferior point of view, so I made naked self portrait photos of mine, with the girls half dressed in plastic. The next step of the process was to bring large enlargements from my past, plant them inside the rooms of the Laufhause. With my photos in the background take beauty shots of the whores in their rooms. For instance, in the background a photo of a husband and wife, being underwater and performing a marriage kiss. In the foreground a couple of lesbian punk whores sitting holding hands/ Still, another example, snap photo of a group of men wrestling underwater vis-a-vis to three ladies in an orgy posture lying in bed. The goal is to recycle the photo in order to broaden the limits of the image from the past in a way that creates a new meaning. It is intertextuality between different levels of understanding, experiencing the art work and my personal statement. It is an artist aiming for a critical say.
The exhibition will open at 7.10.06 and will be closed at 2.12.06. In The rest of time the Laufhause will be opened in its regular business hours.
Text written by: Zohar Kaniel 20.09.06
Artists were fascinated by prostitution since the beginning of history, but collective moral tells us to stay away from them.
Prostitution as a profession is known to be the oldest trade in the world. Even today, in the post modernist era, the act of selling the body for money is still judged negatively by society. Being a whore is still the most shameful job which is done discreetly and in the underground.
In capitalist, liberal, western society, we are taught to market almost every part of our mind, body and soul. Hardly any of us will dare to cross the red line demarking money and sex.
Zusmen is the name of an exhibition that reveals a visual anthropological insight into the world of bordellos in Berlin. The main theme in the expo is not why women become whores and Is it done by free will, the fact that girls choose to be hookers or, are they forced to give up their body and lust? The target of this photo project is to focus and show how in a city like Berlin the bordellos are varied, rich and differentiate one from the other. I also wished to raise the question: is it good for the free thinking society to open hidden drawers, or shall we stick to the habit of leaving some affairs in the twilight zone.
The exhibition will take place in a local bordello in Hoch strasse weeding that is called Laufhaus.
Three different types of people, each with a different motivation and interest in art, will be exposed to the photos in the Laufhaus:
The first circle will be the local working girls. They will see fairly large print, portrait photos of themselves, in their own working space, during their shifts.
The second circle is the costumers that usually prefer to go fast up the stairs without looking left or right. It could be interesting to see if in an unconscious way the images of the colourful girls will ring their attention.
The third circle is us, the curious, cultured, intellectual art fags. I bet that quite a few of us, if not all, had some thoughts about these matters, But who's brave enough to admit that she/ he's been inside a whore house?
For women there is no entrance or visiting options at the regularly routine. So I hope it would be a confronting lifting experience for the bourgeois crowd to be in the surroundings of simple bordello house in weeding.
Two different bordellos are explored in the exhibition. The first is a new luxury Harmon palace located on the main highway in the centre of the city. It is called Artemis. In Artemis the house is owned by men but the women work for themselves as freelancers, the women hunt the men and can decide with whom to sleep and how much money to charge from their clients. The girls in Artemis, are fairly young, and supposed to be very good looking, according to the trivial and conventional standards of beauty and sexuality.
The second bordello is the Laufhaus. The bordello is located at a working class neighbourhood called Weeding. In the Laufhause the rooms are basic and small. Due to the fact that time is money, the costumers tend to stay for a short period. the owners of the place are two women, Between the girls and the managers there is an atmosphere of a small warm family. It is hard to identify a typical look and appearance of the girls in Laufhaus., it varies. One can find fat motherly type women next to provocative lesbian punk embracing a big tit fetish leather girl.
The visual language and artistic values of the images made are a mixture of straight documentary photography combined with interference of the artists in the surroundings of the bordellos, and the girls. At Artemis (the more expensive tacky and updated place) Dodi Refinberg, a plastic artist, who deals with nylon plastic bags, brought personal works from his past. The plastic bag works were used in two different ways: the first one was straightforward. The naked hookers wore the sowed plastic bag designer's cloths, made by Dodi. The next step was to try and use the nylon material in a more abstract form that will create a symbolic usage of the plastic, For example, a bulb light object that is made from thousands of small plastic cuts, looks like a long snake with a head of a flower craving for water. Also, an image of a whore under the water in the swimming pool of the house of Artemis covered with a colourful plastic net, which blocks her way towards the surface. The posture of the tramp is like an infant in a womb trapped, in a golden cage.
My intention to photograph, and work together with tramps, comes from curiosity towards the side lines combined with identification of the abuse done to the whores and repressed minorities in society. I didn't want that my discourse and relationship with the girls will be similar to the ones they have with their clients. I wanted that the hookers will not look at me from an inferior point of view, so I made naked self portrait photos of mine, with the girls half dressed in plastic. The next step of the process was to bring large enlargements from my past, plant them inside the rooms of the Laufhause. With my photos in the background take beauty shots of the whores in their rooms. For instance, in the background a photo of a husband and wife, being underwater and performing a marriage kiss. In the foreground a couple of lesbian punk whores sitting holding hands/ Still, another example, snap photo of a group of men wrestling underwater vis-a-vis to three ladies in an orgy posture lying in bed. The goal is to recycle the photo in order to broaden the limits of the image from the past in a way that creates a new meaning. It is intertextuality between different levels of understanding, experiencing the art work and my personal statement. It is an artist aiming for a critical say.
The exhibition will open at 7.10.06 and will be closed at 2.12.06. In The rest of time the Laufhause will be opened in its regular business hours.
Text written by: Zohar Kaniel 20.09.06
