Performing Indetity: Installation by Barbara Wagner and Benjamin de Burca

Bárbara Wagner & Benjamin de Burca have been working as a duo on their projects since 2013. There works are on display in both the worlds of fine arts and film. Their current project »Swinguerra« was produced for the Brazilian pavilion at the Venice Biennale, representing both Brazil and its great diversity. Their films are based on pop-cultural phenomena which they put into societal and economic context. They transform the original stories by their protagonists for the big stage in well-founded processes of appropriation and research without losing sight of them. On the contrary. Pop becomes opera. Bárbara Wagner & Benjamin de Burca’ works run along the interface of fiction and documentation. Their films are hybrid arrays. In the exalted staging their protagonists who portray themselves are never exposed, but rather transformed to eye level height by their exaltation. The protagonists are serene, leaving no doubt regarding their autonomy. This respect shown by the artists for their subjects’ autonomy is immediately felt and appreciated by the audience. The protagonists’ degree of dedication is reproduced in the aura of the works. An encounter on eye level becomes possible. The autonomy of the individual is the basis for encounters. Bárbara Wagner & Benjamin de Burca allow access to worlds that we need to make togetherness possible. In the end, we’re all on stage.

The exhibition “Sitting on the Earth of Tomorrow’s Sunrise” at the Open Space of the Hamburg Short Film Festival is their first single exhibition in Germany.

- Estás vendo coisas (You are seeing things)
- Bye Bye Deutschland! Eine Lebensmelodie
- Rise

Exhibition Opening by Bettina Steinbrügge, director of the Hamburger Kunstverein.
Tuesday, 4th of June | 9.30 pm | Festival Center Post, Open Space

Artist Talk  with Bettina Steinbrügge, Bárbara Wagner und Benjamin de Burca
Wednesday, 5th of June | 7 pm | Kunstverein Hamburg

Introduction to the exhibition with the artist duo
Saturday, 8th of June | 1 pm | Festival Center Post, Open Space

Exhibition opening hours
Wed-Sun from 3pm on, Sat from 1 pm on

Biography
Bárbara Wagner (b. 1980 in Brasília) and Benjamin de Burca (b. 1975 in Munich) live in Recife, where they collaborate since 2011. In their body of works, Bárbara and Benjamin develop a collaborative practice in which decisions are taken bilaterally between the duo and the ones they portray. Their films take the form of musicals that defy conventional notions of genre insofar as the fictional and documentary dimensions become hybrid in order to establish a third language-territory. Among the duo’s shows are: Bárbara Wagner & Benjamin de Burca, AGYU (Toronto, 2018); and Aspirations, MOCAD (Detroit, 2017), FRONT International – Cleveland Triennial (Cleveland, 2018); Corpo a Corpo, IMS (São Paulo, 2017, and Rio de Janeiro, 2018); Berlinale Shorts (Berlin, 2017, 2018 and 2019); Panorama de Arte Brasileira (São Paulo, 2017 and 2013); PIPA Awards, MAM (Rio de Janeiro, 2017); Skulptur Projekte (Münster, 2017); Bienal de Arte de São Paulo (2016); Histórias da Infância, MASP (São Paulo, 2017); 36. EVA International (Limerick, 2014); Biennale Arts Actuels (Réunion, 2013). Their works are part of several important collections, among them: MASP (São Paulo), MAM (São Paulo), Museum Het Domein (Sittard, Holland), CIFO (Miami, USA), among others. At the end of 2018, Wagner & de Burca were invited to represent Brazil at the 58th Venice Biennale, which opened in May 2019. At the Brazilian pavilion in the Giardini they present the new video work »Swinguerra«, shot in Recife in February 2019. In February this year, Wagner & de Burca won the Audi Short Film Award at the 69th Berlinale.