Gabriella Hirst

A REAR WINDOW PROJECT

In Interlude, the dynamic between observer, subject, and object unfolds through the artist’s performance. Depending on the point at which you encounter this video, you might witness Australian artist Gabriella Hirst morphing into a covered seat or arrive at the image of the seat already in place as Hirst activates the fissures between illusion and perception. The isolated figure moves through an otherwise deserted indoor space, a device used in film to signify memories conjured. Here, the artist specifically cites Ingmar Bergman’s film Sommarlek or Summer Interlude from 1951. The interplay between the performed act of camouflage and the nature of the artwork’s moving image medium speaks to how we often perceive reality as echoes or shadows through intermediaries of screens and recordings.

Born on Cammeraygal land in New South Wales, and currently based in Berlin, Hirst engages with performance, installation, moving image, and gardening in her practice. Her recent work explores the nuances and genealogies of taxonomies and language, the garden as a site oscillating between nurture and control, and the legacies and histories of nuclear science and industry.