Becoming-Father/Becoming-Infant        
July 23 – October 3, 2004

Becoming-Father/Becoming-Infant isa video exhibition that departs from the philosophers Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari's concept of "Becoming": how the process of becoming father involves becoming infant to some extent and vice versa. Guy Ben-ner's video work, House Hold (2001), for instance, could be seen as a parody of Sigmund Freud's conception of father-son rivalry. In the opening scene, his wife Nava lowers the crib gate to pick up their baby Amir, accidentally trapping Guy underneath the crib and symbolically flipping the father-son hierarchy. The father's ensuing attempts to escape this domestic mishap escalate into an epic tale of survival.  

The exhibition also challenges gender clichés by presenting male perspectives on the traditionally female world of birth and child rearing. Like a powerful whisper, Fontanel (2001) is Tom Downs' sublime vision of his unborn son's journey to birth, composed with fragments of the artist's poetry and video footage as well as of historical films and music. To make Free (2003), Rudy Shepherd added a psychedelic jazz soundtrack to a video his wife Amy filmed of their son, Rhys Douglass, while breastfeeding, conveying the quasi-magic properties of mother's milk, the ultimate elixir.  

The seven artists in Becoming-Father/Becoming-Infant offer unexpected and complementary approaches to this universal subject. Dennis Oppenheim's 2 Stage Transfer Drawing (1971) is an experiment in nonverbal communication: as the artist draws on his son's back, his son reproduces the drawing on a wall. Nam June Paik and Shigeko Kubota's Allan 'n' Allen's Complaint (1982) is a playful and poignant portrait of beat poet Allen Ginsberg and performance artist Allan Kaprow, focusing on their rocky relationships with their fathers. In Papapapá (1995), Alex Rivera interweaves the parallel sagas of his father's and the potato's immigration from their native Peru. To make What Happened? (2000), Bert Rodríguez appropriated his father's Super 8 film of his birth in Miami in 1975. 

Addressing father-child relationships may seem unusual in the context of an art museum. To say that Virgin and Child paintings outnumber Joseph and Child paintings is an understatement. But this topic may be even more surprising to find in museums dedicated to contemporary art. Many contemporary artists steer clear of sentimentality, unless it is the subject of ridicule. But while conceptual art may appear to be cold or hyper-rational by definition, imbuing conceptualism with emotionalism is as natural as life itself. Neurobiologists say that human emotions and the intellect function interdependently. Artists who shun all things "touchy-feely" may do well to remember the fundamental avant-garde tenet of connecting art and life. Thankfully post-conceptualism allows for the coexistence of rigor and pleasure. These artists have created remarkably tender experiences for an audience of critical thinkers. They are also interested in stimulating, through art, new dynamics of belonging among strangers in public spaces. Sharing the experience of watching videos about a fundamental human relationship may promote a sense of interconnectedness among Museum visitors.

Becoming-Father/Becoming-Infant is made possible in part by the generous in-kind support of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs and The Caspian Corporation.