Project 35, New Orleans Museum of Art, October 20 through January 30, 2011
1. Guy Ben-Ner (Israel, born 1969) Berkeley’s Island, 1999
Duration: 15 minutes
Courtesy of the artist
Selected by Mai Abu ElDahab (Egypt/Belgium), Independent Curator
Guy Ben-Ner constructs an “island” in his tiny kitchen, complete with sand and a palm tree, as the set for his 1999 film, Berkeley’s Island. Inspired by George Berkeley’s dictum, “to be is to be perceived,” the artist explores theories of solipsism, while providing the viewer with a glimpse into his physically confining, but imaginatively expansive domestic life. Creative and sexual impulses fuel the often hilarious scenes, which reflect his conflicting roles as artist and father. As an artist, we see him delve deeper and deeper into his self-conscious, acknowledging his most primitive urges. He expresses an awareness of and a desire to remain in tune with his pure, wild nature, despite his new role as a husband and father. In a 2006 press release, Postmaster’s Gallery in New York described the work: “Low-tech, but ingeniously inventive, Ben-Ner videos center around home and family, exploring, exposing and exploiting the relationship he has with his children.”1
The narrative quality of the piece, which resembles that of Robinson Crusoe, is significant because it provides the framework around which the artist can apply his own story. “In my earlier movies, literature functioned more like a construction upon which I could mount my own material,” said Ben-Ner.2 Indeed, in Berkeley’s Island, the artist relates his own imaginative island to the fictional one written about by Daniel Defoe. “My island does not exist. It is a fantasy inaccessible to foreign eyes. It is Crusoe’s island living in complete secrecy within The Swiss Family Robinson.”3 The Swiss Family Robinson, written by Johann David Wyss, was intended to teach the author’s four sons about family values, good husbandry, the uses of the natural world, and self-reliance. The dichotomy between Ben-Ner’s need to nurture his own imagination within the constraints of the household, and an expectation to nurture the imaginations of his young children provides the basis for the film’s tension. Boundaries are broken when a rock is thrown at his window from the outside, or when a foreign footprint appears in the sand, or when his daughter attempts to claim his island as her own. At the same time, it conveys an understanding that his tale is a classic tale of a transformation into manhood and self-awareness.
The opening Sartre quotation4 alludes to themes of solipsism, in sync with theories advanced by George Berkeley: “to the child who steals and the child who masturbates, to exist is to be seen by adults, and since these secret activities take place in solitude, they do not exist.” His cleverness is displayed in his efforts to use what the island supplies him with, taking advantage of the washing machine’s vibrations or digging holes in the sand in order to masturbate. He explores the periphery of his creativity. “Today I learned the island’s limits. It was the first time I walked from one end to the other. I drew a map, trying desperately to see myself from above—from the outside.”5 He invents a sunburn on his chest, suggesting the one that would have been left by the ship’s wheel, uses mirrors for special effects (appearing to be fornicating in one scene, and cutting off his leg in another), creates the illusion of a storm, and puts eyes on his penis to produce a singing companion. He also learns that this organ can be employed as a candlesnuffer with the ability to extinguish two candles at once.
Guy Ben-Ner received a B.Ed. from Hamidrasha Art Teachers School in Ramat Hasharon, Israel, in 1997 and an MFA from Colombia University, New York, in 2003. New York’s Postmaster’s Gallery was the first to exhibit Berkeley’s Island in the United States in 2006. The piece was presented alongside the artist’s Treehouse Kit, originally commissioned for the Israeli Pavilion at the 51st Venice Biennale (2005). His work has also been presented in many group exhibitions, including Greater New York (2005, P.S.1, New York), Skulptur Projekte Munster (2007), Shanghai Biennale (2008), and Liverpool Biennial (2008).
—Jane Winslow
