Italian artist Caterina Tongon has arranged the inauguration of her new gallery on the occasion of the 56th Art Biennale in Venice. One of the event’s elements will be Katarzyna Kozyra’s exhibition “Looking for Jesus”, presenting a documentary film about persons identifying with biblical characters.
“Looking for Jesus” is a project in which Kozyra takes the role of a researcher and explorer. The so-called Jerusalem syndrome – a serious delusional disorder, described by medicine in the second half of the 20th century – served as her point of departure. People suffering from this illness who visit Jerusalem or the so-called Holy Land identify with people presented in the Bible – most of all with the Messiah.
In 2012 Kozyra and a film crew went to Jerusalem to find people there who believe, now, at the beginning of the 21st century, that they are Jesus himself. This journey resulted in film of the preparations for Easter in the Holy Land – photos of Jerusalem as a setting for religious rituals; a stage for people of different beliefs, religions and skin colours; a succession of Messiahs, each trying to convince Kozyra of their divinity; and a colourful crowd of pilgrims and Jerusalem inhabitants constantly surrounding her. The Polish artist witnesses a permanent performance of which she is not the main heroine or even a participant, but just a viewer, trying to find and register at least a fragment of what happens in this holy city. As Andrzej Wajs wrote of her film:
It is not a record of any of the peculiarities associated with a place such as Jerusalem, nor a description of the clinical state of ecstatic religiousness. It is a story about lack, absence and craving (...) Looking for Jesus is not a documentary film in the basic sense of the word. That is the diagnosis made by the artist herself and also her travel diary, which at certain moments notes that she tells her own story as well. (...). The Jerusalem episode leads her to better understanding the phenomenon of self-identification, because now she can see it as if from the outside. But the difference between Kozyra and the heroes of her film lies in the fact that while she has long been aware that her identity is in the power of another (another who is, of course, herself) and she is just its leaseholder (without the right of preemption), the others are firmly convinced that otherness (including cultural alienation) is a flaw they must erase and that only by looking for themselves they will find a way to Jesus as to the guarantor and the guardian of their subjectivity. If they feel they are its tenants, it is only for his consent. Like the apostles. That is what this film is about. "
Katarzyna Kozyra’s exhibition "Looking for Jesus" was created in collaboration with the Żak Branicka Gallery from Berlin, with special thanks to the Katarzyna Kozyra Foundation.
The inauguration of the new gallery will also include an exhibition of jewellery, "Works from Dakar" by Dutch artist Mieke Groot.
Katarzyna Kozyra "Looking for Jesus"
May 7 – November 22, 2015
Vernissage: May 6, 2015
Caterina Tongon Gallery
Ca Nova di Palazzo Treves
Corte Barozzi – San Marco 2158
30124 Venice, Italy
Sources: csw.art.pl, atlassztuki.pl, caterinatongon.com, edited by AS, translated by MK 06/05/2015