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TBA21 Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary

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Wu Tsang. Film MOBY DICK; or, The Whale

February 25 – May 6, 2023

Wu Tsang

Wu Tsang

Past

Programming

On the occasion of the public program related to the exhibition Of Whales, by Wu tsang, the film MOBY DICK; or, The Whale will be screened in the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza's Auditorium. A feature-length silent-film telling of Herman Melville’s great American novel Moby-Dick (1851). This adaptation, written by Sophia Al-Maria and directed by Tsang, is interwoven with “Extracts” by the Sub-Sub-Librarian, a character played by poet Fred Moten, and tackles the novel’s subterranean currents, encountering the resistance of the ship’s hydrarchy, or organizational structure, and collectives of “mariners, renegades, and castaways,” as described by historian CLR James.

The film was originally conceived by Wu Tsang to be accompanied by a live orchestra. Produced by Schauspielhaus Zürich and Moved by the Motion,
TBA21–Academy co-commissioned this work with LUMA Foundation, Superblue, Hartwig Art Foundation, The Shed, DE SINGEL and The Whitney Museum of American Art.

The original version will be presented on February 20 and 21 at the Teatro Fernando de Rojas of the Círculo de Bellas Artes in Madrid, with live music performed by Orquesta Clásica Santa Cecilia and with the support of the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in Madrid.

The film version can be seen from February to June, in several showings on Tuesdays and Saturdays in Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza's Auditorium.

CURATOR

Soledad Gutiérrez

DATES

Saturdays:

February 25, 2023, 7:30 pm
March 4, 2023, 7:30 pm
April 1, 2023, 7:30 pm
May 6, 2023, 7:30 pm

Tuesdays:

March 21, 2023, 5 pm
May 23, 2023, 5 pm
June 6, 2023, 5 pm

Still: Andrea Rossetti, 2016

LOCATION

Auditorium Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid

TICKET

Free entry. Ticket reservation here

LANGUAGE

English with Spanish subtitles

DURATION

75 min

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Wu Tsang. Film MOBY DICK; or, The Whale

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Leaning Horizon (neon clear glass Argon, 2.1 m and 2.25 m), 2015

Susanne Winterling
Glistening Troubles, 2017

Allora & Calzadilla
Blackout, 2017

Teresa Solar
What was left of my body, 2021

Conversation Studio 21: Of Whales

When fate catches us up Desperate actions in the face of the sixth extinction

Wu Tsang Of Whales

Artists

Wu Tsang