Yael Eban

yael_eban

The Browser (2014)

Statement:
General Assembly is the examination of a space that exists between the public and private archives that represent my family history. The lingering online presence of my late grandparents is the anchor for my research. My grandfather was an Israeli diplomat and my grandmother an avid art collector. My role in this project is tripartite: I create as artist, archivist, and curator. The body of work itself is the convergence of these three roles—a series of photographic collages that vacillate between dualities or contradictions: the public and private, the rational and emotional, and the documentary and interpretive.

I search for specific images and objects that relate to the lives of my grandparents, and I follow their trajectory from the home to the Internet, or vice-versa. All types of images in this project are legitimate: a snapshot, a fine art photograph, a screenshot from eBay. I am investigating the consolidation of various modes of representations, and the impact these different forms have on the historical narrative they describe. I ask the viewer to reflect on the new experience and parameters of the archive, and the lives of photographs as objects in a digital age.

Bio:
Yael Eban is a Brooklyn based artist who was born in Israel and raised in Indiana. She has a bachelor’s degree from Indiana University in Art History and is a recent MFA graduate at the School of Visual Art’s Photography, Video & Related Media program in New York City. Most recently her work was featured in Ain’t-Bad Magazine, Paper Journal, Selektor Magazine, and the group exhibitions Exhibition Narrative (Toronto), Der Greif: A Process (Germany) and Come Together: Surviving Sandy (New York).

Artist’s Website: yaeleban.com