French-Algerian artist Kader Attia examines ideas of cultural exchange and the complex relationship between non-Western cultures and Europe after decolonisation.
With themes of ‘injury and repair’ central to his practice, Attia addresses the impact of history and its legacy today. Exhibition highlights include a film exploring trauma and the ‘phantom limb’, and towering steel shelves displaying narratives of ‘otherness’ and racial stereotyping. Additional themes of emptiness and void are personified in works such as Ghost (2017) where 160 life-size aluminium-foil female figures kneel in prayer; when viewed from behind they are merely empty shells.
Kader Attia, Oil and Sugar #2 (still), 2007, single-channel digital video, projection, colour, sound. © the artist. Courtesy the artist, Galerie Nagel Draxler, Berlin/Cologne and Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, Sydney
Museum of Contemporary Art Australia
Until 30 July, 2017
Sydney
