The Undertaker

The Contemporary Dayton is honored to present Yael Bartana’s The Undertaker. Bartana’s films and installations explore the imagery of identity and the politics of memory. Her starting point is the national consciousness propagated by her native country of Israel and the meanings implied by terms like “Homeland”, “Return” and “Belonging”.

The Undertaker chronicles an enigmatic leader and her followers during a choreographed procession and burial of weapons. Philadelphia, the birthplace of American democracy, plays a prominent role as this group of dancers, war veterans, and activists move across the city’s historical landscape. Their procession and slow, deliberate gestures are grounded in the movements of Israeli dance composer Noa Eshkol, particularly her 1953 ceremonial performance in remembrance of the Holocaust.

Bartana’s work has been featured in exhibitions at the Philadelphia Museum of Art; the Jewish Museum Berlin; Tel Aviv Museum of Art; MoMA PS1, New York; and The São Paulo Art Biennial, among many others. She has works in the permanent collections of Tate Modern, London; The Jewish Museum, New York; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw, and The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, among others.

Yael Bartana, film still from The Undertaker, 2019. Courtesy of the artist and Petzel Gallery, NY.