08.06.2007 to 19.08.2007
Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart
An exhibition of the Berlin Artists' Programme / DAAD in cooperation with the National Gallery at the Hamburger Bahnhof - Museum für Gegenwart - Berlin
Matthew Buckingham's art is dedicated to the historic research of names and their genesis. The film "Muhheakantuck - Everything Has a Name" addresses the question of how the Hudson River came by its name. During a helicopter flight along the river shores from Manhattan to Sleepy Hollow and back, a voice-over tells the story of the name of the Hudson River. Pictures, text and individual biography each play a part in the subject matter, their interplay representing a characteristic means of visual expression in Matthew Buckingham's work.
This also applies to his latest work, entitled "Everything I Need" and dedicated to the biography of the Jewish doctor and psychologist Charlotte Wolff. Having left Berlin as an émigré in 1933 and thereafter having worked in Paris and London, in August 1978 Wolff once more returned to Berlin. By opposing texts and pictures of an empty airliner from the 1970s, Matthew Buckingham comments on the stations in the life of Charlotte Wolff.
The third large video piece presented in the Hamburger Bahnhof, conceived in 2006 for the Liverpool Biennial, deals with two literary works by Herman Melville: the short story "Daniel Orme" and the novel "Redburn". Shown in a wave-shaped cinema construction, this film carries the title "Obscure Moorings".
The subject of travelling, the narration of historic facts by means of symbolic images, can be regarded as a guiding theme in Matthew Buckingham's work. Following this idea, the exhibition in the Hamburger Bahnhof guides visitors to a variety of sites and landscapes, both urban and rural. Insights into the history of names correspond with images which interpret the idea of travelling in two ways: as an outing to the places and as paths into our cultural history.
Matthew Buckingham was born 1963 in Nevada, Iowa. He lives and works in New York. He has been exhibiting in international group shows since the late 1990s. The Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig in Vienna (2003) and the Westfälisches Landesmuseum in Münster (2005) have shown his work in comprehensive individual exhibitions. Until 1st July 2007, Matthew Buckingham will be showing a selection of his latest works at the Camden Arts Centre in London, under the title "Play the Story".
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