Lecture: Alfredo Jaar - It is difficult

Alfredo Jaar, an artist, architect and filmmaker known as of one of the most uncompromising, compelling and innovative artists working today, will present his first lecture in Shanghai at the Shanghai Himalayas Museum on Tuesday, August 11, 2015.
He will introduce his most recent projects realized around the world, including places such as Fukushima, Buenos Aires, Montreal, Leipzig, Santiago, and New York, among other locations. He will also present a selection of his most iconic works, like A Logo for America (1987), his historic public intervention revived last year in New York's Times Square, and The Skoghall Konsthall (2000), the world's first paper museum, which he created only to burn to the ground 24 hours after its creation in order to ignite a community's yearning for a space for culture. The artist will also discuss his early Hong Kong projects documenting the hundreds of thousands of so-called "boat people" who fled the crushing poverty of post-war Vietnam in the late 1970s and landed in Hong Kong, searching for a better life. Untitled (Water) (1990) and A Hundred Times Nguyen (1994), most notably, were created from photographs he took in the 1980s when he visited Hong Kong's refugee camps. The grim ocean passages, the refugees, the detention camps, and the intolerable conditions of the unpredictable and often interminable wait for refugee status are an unfortunate echo to scenes we can now observe on shores throughout the world.
Alfredo Jaar's installations and public interventions have earned him international acclaim. His work has been shown extensively around the world. He has participated in the Biennales of Venice (1986, 2007, 2009, 2013) and Sao Paulo (1987, 1989, 2010) as well as Documenta in Kassel (1987, 2002). Important individual exhibitions include The New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York; Whitechapel, London; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Rome; and Moderna Museet, Stockholm. A major retrospective of his work took place in 2012 at three institutions in Berlin: Berlinische Galerie, Neue Gesellschaft fur bildende Kunst e.V. and Alte Nationalgalerie. In 2014, the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma in Helsinki hosted the most extensive retrospective of his career. Currently, a major exhibition is taking place at MAC, Museum of Contemporary Art in Marseille, France (Nous l'avons tant aimée, la révolution, July 3, 2015–January 10, 2016).
Tuesday, August 11, 2015, 7–9pm
For lecture reservations, please email your name and contact details to: information@himalayasmuseum.org.
Shanghai Himalayas Museum 3M, Zone A, No.869
Yinghua Road
Pudong District
Shanghai, China
www.himalayasmuseum.orgwww.alfredojaar.net