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| ýmsir listamenn / various artists |
| Guðs útvalda Þjóð / God´s chosen people |
| 02. 09. 2006 - 01. 10. 2006 |
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Opens Saturday 2nd of September at 5 pm
Open Thursday-Sunday from 2-6 pm.
The show´s statement does not reflect the views of Kling & Bang
gallery, however the gallery has no wish to engage in censorship.
God´s chosen people
"Now therefore, if you will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then you shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people. For all the earth is mine: and you shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation"
Our society is controlled by capitalism and greed is the side-effect of it. Capitalism is the religion of our time and the wealthier you are, the closer you are to God. Greed is a virtue in the world of Mammon.
The Jews have long been successfull and diligent in gaining wealth. They’ve been prominent in the business-world and it has been said the they control the economy of America and therefore probably the whole world.
Like we all know, the state of Israel was founded a few years after the nazi Holocaust. The Jewish people had the sympathy of the world, and still have, because of the holocaust. But now they treat their neighbours to the same injustice that they’ve had to suffer from trough the ages. Are the Jews now participants in a holocaust against the Arabs with the backup of American economy?
The American thinker Noam Chomsky says that every country with a successfull economy is somewhere close to fascism in the sense that they protect the private sector. Governments and economic powers work against the interest of the public.
The victims of war are innocents citizens and war is only fought out of greed for power and capitalism.
The United Nations are paralized because of the United States’ veto power, but we artists will use our freedom of speach and say: “Enough is enough!”
by Snorri Asmundsson
God´s chosen people
"Some people like the Jews, and some do not. But no thoughtful man can’t deny the fact that they are, beyond any question, the most formidable and the most remarkable race which has appeared in the world."
-Winston Churchill
The Jews are as different and varied as any other people. But as a nation or a group their history has been a blood stained path. The Egyptians enslave the Jews, and the God of the Jews slaughters the Egyptians firstborns. The karma of the victim becoming the victimizer has always been in place. Through history the Jews have faced prejudice, oppression and massacres. And they still meet prejudice and violence. But today the Children of Israel are both victims and victimizers when it comes to prejudice, oppression and violence. Many people are outraged, but all dialogue is based on extremes. You are either with or against. The world is just black or white. Hippocracy speaks with the voice of peace, but thinks and acts with the arms of violance. But where do we Icelanders stand? We don’t have much history of Jews but we have a secret history of anti-semetism. A group of Jews lives in Iceland but they don’t have a registered religious organization, no visible community. When the media speaks with the various religious groups in Iceland, the Jews rarely have a spokesperson, and if they do, that person appears under anonymity. The Jews are an invisible group in Iceland, Eve’s dirty children. We know Israel only from the news and Jews from stereotypes in movies. But does this distance from Israel and the Jews put us in a better or a worse place to discourse on them? Are we the un-biased voice free of extremes or are we stained by the prejudice created by our ignorance? Can we discourse on the Jews without dividing into teams?
In the exhibition God’s chosen people, a varied group of artists with different opinions comes together and with free hands works with the title of the exhibition. People who are with, people who are against, people in between and people with no opinion at all exhibits under the same roof without walls of separation, exremes or violance. The artists work with their views, knowledge, bias or conscience. There can’t be a taboo in art, because with silence comes ignorance and ignorance breeds prejudice.
Markús Efraím
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Grandagarður 20 - 101 Reykjavík
kob@this.is |
