About the Work
This piece is a still from Elia – a story of an ostrich chick (2003), a video Ben-Ner produced while attending Columbia University's MFA program. Shot at Riverside Park near Columbia's campus, the work narrates the coming of age story of Elia, a baby ostrich, who is played by actors wearing costumes constructed from mop handles, vacuum hoses, and papier-mâché. The calm, Discovery Channel-style voice-over narrates Elia's coming of age story and her relationship and brief separation from her mother, father, and brother.
Like many filmmakers, Ben-Ner storyboards his projects. This work features a drawing he made in preparation for the shoot on the left and a still from the finished video on the right. It makes the connection between an idea conceived by Ben-Ner’s hand on paper, and its fruition as a moving image, thereby highlighting the holistic process involved in creating a work of art.
About the Artist
Guy Ben-Ner’s videos, while playful on the surface, are brimming with references to sophisticated literary and cinematic sources such as the humanist films of François Truffaut, the physical comedies of Buster Keaton, and Herman Melville's Moby Dick. Many of Ben-Ner's films examine the idea of domestic life, as he uses himself, his children, and their routines as material to construct narratives that examine his ambivalence, anxiety, and delight at balancing work and family.
In 2005, Ben-Ner represented Israel at the Venice Biennale and was selected by New York Magazine as an "artist on the verge of a breakthrough” after being featured at the Greater New York exhibition at MoMA P.S. 1. In 2007, Ben-Ner was awarded a prestigious DAAD fellowship. He is currently a Lecturer at the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Jerusalem.
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