CRUDE AESTHETICS
Işık Kaya, Thomas Georg Blank | Türkei, USA 2021 | 15 Min. | OmeU
14.05. | 19:00 Uhr
De France, Saal 1 | TICKETS
zusammen mit A THOUSAND FIRES
Keine andere Nation benötigt so viel Öl wie die USA, auf die jährlich mehr als 20 Prozent des weltweiten Verbrauchs entfallen. Öl bestimmt die US-Politik seit vielen Jahrzehnten und die Bemühungen um die wertvolle Ressource haben sich in die Landschaft eingebrannt. Im Großraum Los Angeles, wo sich das größte urbane Ölfeld und die größten Raffinerien des Landes befinden, verwandelt sich Amerika in einen riesigen Motor, den Schrittmacher des ausgehenden Erdölzeitalters.
Von aneinander gereihten Einstellungen und einer monotonen Soundkulisse getragen stellt CRUDE AESTHETICS die Frage, was der Mensch alles auf sich nimmt, um an Rohstoffe zu gelangen, und wie wir künftig mit unserem Planeten umgehen wollen.
Regie: Işık Kaya, Thomas Georg Blank
Kamera: Işık Kaya, Thomas Georg Blank
Schnitt: Işık Kaya, Thomas Georg Blank
SCREENINGS & AWARDS
VIDEO OF THE MONTH HMKV, Dortmund, Germany
EUROPE FILM FESTIVAL U.K. Best Short Documentary Jury Diamond Award
CINEFEM FILM FESTIVAL 9, Punta del Este Cultural Center, Uruguay
VON M GLICHEN WELTEN, Kunsthalle Basel, Switzerland
CRUDE AESTHETICS, Main Gallery UCSD, USA
BIOGRAPHIES
Işık Kaya (she, her) and Thomas Georg Blank (he, his) are lens based media artists whose work explores the ways in which humans shape and inhabit the world. Their projects often focus on traces of economic infrastructures and how humanity’s dominance over nature finds its manifestation in everyday architecture. By framing their subjects almost exclusively at night, they aim to accentuate the artificial and uncanny qualities of contemporary urban environments and human settlements.
Işık Kaya holds an MFA degree in Visual Arts from the University of California, San Diego, and a BA degree in Photography & Videography from Istanbul Bilgi University, where she studied with a full scholarship. She has participated in exhibitions at Kunsthalle Basel (Switzerland), Die Digitale Düsseldorf (Germany), Royal Geographic Society (UK), CEAAC (France), CICA Museum (Korea), and San Diego Art Institute – ICA San Diego (USA) among others.
Thomas Georg Blank was first trained in cultural and media education focusing on photography before studying art in AdBK Karlsruhe and ENPEG La Esmeralda in Mexico City. He has had several exhibitions in galleries and museums, including Hek Basel, Historisches Museum Frankfurt, Kunsthalle Darmstadt, Kunstverein Pforzheim, Blue Star Contemporary and C/O Berlin. His works have been awarded many times and he has been a scholar of DAAD as a research fellow at UC San Diego’s Center for Human Imagination.
