Ofri Cnaani’s Participatory Performance as Part of URB 16 Festival at KIASMA

Staged as an ad-hoc image-production station, Ofri Cnaani’s ⌘D (Command+ Duplicate) participatory performance combines items from the visitors’ personal belongings together with objects culled from the artist’s collection of found materials to enact the live creation of a personalized image using a photocopy machine and an overhead projector.

The resulting prints will be signed by the artist and given to the participants as unique works of art, or an “original copy”. A continuous projection on the adjunct wall will display the real-time process of assembling the objects on the working station, thus creating a digital reproduction of an image with no coherent source.  Employing old devices, Cnaani’s piece brings back the value of something hand-made at a slow pace. Her DIY apparatus evokes the playfulness and simplicity involved in composing an image. The photocopier, associated with bureaucracy, is being used as a tool for new dialogues, while efficiency is being replaced by creativity and exchange.

Ofri Cnaani is an artist and educator. In 2015 she presented a live video installation at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, as well as a newly commissioned piece for Inhotim Institute, Brazil and the Israel Museum in Jerusalem. Cnaani’s solo exhibitions and performances include: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC; PS1/MoMA, NYC; BMW Guggenheim Lab, NYC; The Fisher Museum of Art, L.A.; Twister, Network of Lombardy Contemporary Art Museums, Italy; Haifa Museum of Art, Israel; and the Herzlyia Museum of Art, Israel.

Ofri Cnaani is on a month-long residency at HIAP – Helsinki International Artist Programme in August 2016.

Schedule for Performative walks with Ofri Cnaani 4-9 August:

Artist Ofri Cnaani will be leading four super special walks in Helsinki, together with HIAP curators. During the performative walks she will be collecting objects and found ephemera to be included at her URB 16 ‘Command + Duplicate’ performance on 10 August. The audience is invited to join in the walks, no pre-reservation needed.

• Thursday, 4 August, 15:00-17:00: City Collectables walk at Itäkeskus. Meeting point: Itäkeskus metrostop.

• Friday, 5 August, 16:00-18:00: Re-discoveries walk at Arabia Recycling Center with Ofri Cnaani and HIAP curator Marina Valle Noronha. Meeting point: Kyläsaarenkatu 8, 00580, Helsinki.
• Saturday, 6 August, 13:00-15:00: Deserted Island walk at Vallisaari. Meeting point: Vallisaari ferry dock.

• Tuesday, 9 August, 16:00-18:00: Something Borrowed walk at various artists studios, with Ofri Cnaani and HIAP curator Jenni Nurmenniemi. Meeting point: Kiasma.