Inbar Hagai - Summer 2024 NEW WORK grantee
Inbar Hagai is a multidisciplinary visual artist and filmmaker whose work spans video, virtual reality, sculpture, and experimental documentary filmmaking. Hagai gained her BFA with honors from Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design and her MFA from Carnegie Mellon University. Her video works, films, and media installations have been exhibited internationally in venues and festivals, including Miller ICA (Pittsburgh), The Center for Digital Art (Holon), Hamidrasha Gallery (Tel Aviv), and Manifesta 11 (Zurich).
PROJECT PROPOSAL
My proposed project is a video work that will center around the customs of competitive rabbit breeding in the US. During the past year, I have traveled and filmed rabbit shows in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Kentucky. I’ve been documenting the meticulous practices and skills of breeding and judging rabbits, the relations between the breeders and the rabbits, the culture of the rabbit showrooms, the dynamics of the breeders’ community, and the organization behind it - ARBA, the American Rabbit Breeders Association. By following these aspects of the world of rabbit shows, I wish to trace the backgrounds and motivations behind breeding and showing rabbits, which I find fascinating because of how elusive they are.
Although rabbit shows might be considered a niche phenomenon, ARBA hosts hundreds of yearly shows throughout North America, all focused on domestic rabbits. Among their extensive undertakings, the organization prides itself on its youth educational activities, and on the “ARBA Standard of Perfection”, a printed manual detailing the descriptions and judging standards for all ARBA-recognized breeds of rabbits. Among the shows I already filmed was the 100th Annual ARBA Rabbit Show & Convention that took place in Kentucky this past October and showcased around 20,000 rabbits.
So far I have been working on this project independently, without a budget, in a guerrilla one-person-crew approach. I obtained a substantial amount of footage and edited rough cuts of selected scenes. Most of my footage is observational in nature, but I’m also interested in weaving in a more diaristic approach, incorporating my character as a rabbit pet owner myself, to reflect on the inherent power dynamics and psychological mechanisms of domestication of nonhuman animals and pet ownership.
-Inbar Hagai
Summer 2024 REVIEW COMMITTEE
Stephanie Deumer [2023 NEW WORK focus on Los Angeles grantee] is a Canadian visual artist currently living and working in Los Angeles, California. Her multi-media installations often highlight interrelations between different kinds of reproduction—including biological, visual, mechanical, and social. More particularly, the exploration of feminine constructs is a crucial through-line in Deumer’s practice. Complexities of female identity formation figure prominently, specifically in relation to language, media, science, and technology.
Deumer holds a BA from the University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada, and an MFA from California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, California. She was a fellow at the Whitney Independent Study Program in New York and has been awarded grants from the California Arts Council, Canada Council for the Arts, Foundation for Contemporary Arts, and Robert Rauschenberg Foundation. Her work has been profiled in ArchDaily, Dezeen, and CalArts’ 24700, and featured in The Art Newspaper, Canadian Centre for Architecture, World Architecture, and Creative Boom, among others. She is currently a lecturer at the University of Washington, Seattle Campus, where she teaches digital video and the history, theory, and practice of digital art and new media.
Tatiana Istomina [2023 NEW WORK grantee] is an artist and writer working in New York; her practice includes painting, sculpture, installation, and video. Istomina’s projects have been featured in exhibitions across the US and abroad; venues include the AIR gallery, the Drawing Center, Blue Star Contemporary Art Museum, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, and others. Istomina is a recipient of numerous awards, including Joan Mitchell Foundation grant, the Chenven Foundation grant, the Individual Fellowship from New Jersey State Council on the Arts, etc. She has worked at multiple artists residencies, such as Jan van Eyck Academie (Netherlands), RAVI (Belgium) and Air In-Silo (Austria). Istomina holds a PhD in physics (Yale University) and MFA in visual arts (Parsons New School). Her artist book “Fhilosofhy of the Encounter” was published by Pinsapo Press in 2018.
Jessica Holtaway [2024 Curatorial research fellow] is a writer, curator, and academic based near Bath in the UK. She is interested in how art can help us rethink our relationship with the environment. As a curator, often working in small galleries and community spaces, she focuses on how creative practices can foster a culture of care. She writes about art and social change, exploring radical artworks that challenge viewers to see in new ways, and Hikikomori artists—Japan’s extreme recluses who find creativity and self-discovery in isolation.
Jessica is also part of a research network, Art in the Nuclear Age CIC (AiNA), a platform for artists, researchers, activists, and academics to develop critical and creative discourses relating to the nuclear age. In 2023, she curated an exhibition as part of AiNA titled "Radiant Objects: Encounters in the Nuclear Age." Her work centers around art and climate change and aims to foster spaces for connection and resilience.