Radical Closure launches at e-flux in NYC and Whitechapel Gallery in London

Video Data Bank (VDB) is pleased to release the highly anticipated DVD box set, Radical Closure. Curated by Lebanese video artist Akram Zaatari, Radical Closure features works produced in response to situations of physical or ideological closure resulting from war and territorial conflicts. The program looks at what is known as the Middle East, and how the moving image has functioned throughout its history, charged with division, political tension, and mobilization. The 5-DVD box set has an accompanying monograph with curator's essay, and features important work by 24 artists including Guy Ben-Ner, Harun Farocki, Mona Hatoum, Walid Raad, and Avi Mograbi. Many of the titles on Radical Closure, which is available through VDB for educational purchase and screening rental, are being made accessible to audiences for the first time. 

We will be celebrating the launch of the box set with two public screenings in both New York City (Monday, October 18, 7:30 PM at the e-flux storefront space on the Lower East Side) and London (Saturday, November 6, 3:00 PM at Whitechapel Gallery's Zilkha Auditorium). Screening details below. The special promotional program, which will be shown at both venues, concentrates on works portraying unsettling situations, narrated with both considerable emotional investment and critical distance, and includes these titles from the box set:

Lisa Steele, Birthday Suit with scars and defects, 1974, 13:20, Canada
Hatice Güleryüz, Intensive Care, 2001, 2:20, Turkey
Hatice Güleryüz, The First Ones, 2000, 4:40, Turkey
Marwa Arsanios, I've Heard Stories 1, 2008, 4:42, Lebanon
Mahmoud Hojeij, we will win, 2006, 7:30, Lebanon
Köken Ergun, Ben Askerim (I, Soldier), 2005, 7:11, Turkey
Elia Suleiman, Homage by Assassination, 1992, 27:37, Palestine/U.S.
Running time: 68 minutes

SCREENING DETAILS
Monday, October 18, 2010, 7:30 PM
e-flux
41 Essex Street
New York, NY 10002
To be introduced by VDB Director Abina Manning in person.
Free admission.

Saturday, November 6, 2010, 3:00 PM
Whitechapel Gallery
Zilkha Auditorium
77-82 Whitechapel High Street
London E1 7QX UK
£3