Zineb Sedira, Floating Coffins, 2009. Still from video work
Iniva presents the first London exhibition of Zineb Sedira's recently commissioned video work Floating Coffins at Rivington Place.
Floating Coffins was filmed on the little known but beautiful coastline of Mauritania, a bird watcher's paradise. It is also where the world's shipping is beached and broken up, drawing parallels with another of the region's characteristics - the habour city of Nouadhibou, which has become a point of departure for African migrants trying to reach Europe.
This unique phenomenon on the Saharan shores represents both a hazard to shipping and an ecological threat. Also the sea becomes a space of ‘decline' and an inactive landscape where lifeless ships and human bodies can be found rejected by the sea. Zineb Sedira
Acclaimed international artist Zineb Sedira is also showing new photographic and light box works to accompany Floating Coffins at Rivington Place.
The installation is presented on a complex arrangement of 14 screens with layered sound compiled by Mikhail Karikis. The work lingers with surreal ease on figures removing scrap, birds arriving, and the extraordinary landscape where desert, sea and man's struggle to survive, all combine.
‘Floating Coffins is a space where life, death, loss, escape, abandoned and shipwrecked journeys meet. It's both a toxic graveyard and a source for survival and hope.' reflects Zineb Sedira.
Zineb Sedira came to wider attention through the British Art Show and her solo show Saphir at the Photographers' Gallery in 2006. Sedira continues to explore her interest in displacement, mobility and the haunting beauty of abandoned landscapes in her new work.
Curator Tessa Jackson (CEO of Iniva) said: ‘Iniva is delighted to present Zineb at Rivington Place. Her lyrical and quietly compelling films reflect on dialogues Iniva has long been engaged with concerning diverse experiences of migration, transition and loss.'
A programme of special events, talks and workshops will run alongside the exhibition.
For further information please check the Iniva website www.iniva.org.
Zineb Sedira
Zineb Sedira has worked with installation, photography and video since 1997. Sedira has exhibited internationally and was included in the 2006 British Art Show and Africa Remix at the Hayward in 2005 with solo exhibitions at The Photographers’ Gallery, London, and Cornerhouse Manchester UK.
Zineb's new body of work which started with Saphir (2006) represents a significant new stage in Zineb's artistic trajectory where her work explores the metaphors of ‘the sea, the boats, arriving and departing... stasis and transition, entrapment and escape, belonging and not belonging’.
Richard Dyer, 2006
Mikhail Karikis
Mikhail Karikis is a London-based artist working with music, architecture and visual art. He works with sound art, composition, performance, drawing and video. Karikis created the sound for Sedira’s piece MiddleSea (2008) which premiered at The Wapping Project, London, in September 2008.
Floating Coffins was commissioned by New Art Exchange, Nottingham, and produced by Artsadmin.
Further information is available at www.iniva.org
Listings Information
Venue: Rivington Place, London, EC2A 3BA
Exhibition: Floating Coffins New Work by Zineb Sedira
Dates: 21 May – 25 July 2009
Public opening hours: Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday: 11am – 6pm
Late Thursdays: 11am – 9pm (Last admission 8.30pm)
Saturday: 12noon – 6pm
Sunday, Monday: Closed
Admission: Free
Nearest tubes: Old Street & Liverpool Street
Rivington Place is fully accessible in all public areas
For parking & wheelchair facilities or further information about Rivington Place +44 (0)20 7749 1240, info@rivingtonplace.org, http://www.rivingtonplace.org
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