Omer Fast - Opening reception

Saturday, June 6 marks the start of the Summer Exhibition, which will feature two films by internationally renowned artist Omer Fast: De Oylem iz a Goylem and The Invisible Hand. Both works are based on and revolve around encounters with the inexplicable—and the uncomfortable questions that follow: guilt, the hidden, darkness, and mystery.

Fast works experimentally with digital technologies and virtual reality, and his films are often shown as spatial installations that make the experience physical and present. The audience becomes more than just spectators; they are drawn into the work – as co-players, sometimes almost as protagonists.

In De Oylem iz a Goylem, we follow a lonely skier in the mountains near Salzburg who has an eerie encounter. The film takes place on a chairlift high above a snow-covered ski slope in the Austrian Alps and was commissioned by the Salzburger Kunstverein in 2019.

In The Invisible Hand, a family encounters a ghost in the Pearl River Delta in China. The film was commissioned by the Guangdong Times Museum, shot in Guangzhou in 2018, and premiered the same year—but was banned after only a few days. The official reason was that ghosts no longer exist since the founding of the People's Republic of China, and that the film therefore could not be shown.

The exhibition marks the first time the two films are being shown in Denmark.

Omer Fast (born 1972 in Jerusalem) studied in Boston and New York and has had solo exhibitions at venues including the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich, Martin Gropius Bau in Berlin, and the Whitney Museum in New York. He has participated in major international exhibitions such as dOCUMENTA13 and the Venice Biennale, and his works are included in collections such as Tate Modern, Guggenheim, and Centre Pompidou.

The exhibition runs from June 6 to August 23.