Keren Cytter

Keren Cytter (b.1977) is a writer, filmmaker, diary-writer and illustrator, and visual artist who, according to herself, studied art in order to move to New York an do the dishes. She fuse elements of theater, literature, and cinema with “awkward acting,” the work results in artifical emotions of an alienated confusion.

habitat extends an invitation to Cytter due to the destabilizing nature of her narratives, where the uncanny forcefully comes comfortable.

Keren Cytter (b. 1977) creates films, performances, drawings and photographs on topics of social alienation, language representation, and the function of individuals in predetermined cultural systems through experimental modes of storytelling and human perception. Mostly characterised by a non-linear, cyclical logic Cytter’s films consist of multiple layers of images; conversation; monologue, and narration systematically composed to undermine linguistic conventions and traditional interpretation schemata. Recalling amateur home movies and video diaries, these montages of impressions, memories, and imaginings are poetic and self-referential in composition. The artist creates intensified scenes drawn from everyday life in which the overwhelmingly artificial nature of the situations portrayed is echoed by the very means of their production.

Cytter was awarded the Joseph Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship (2021), Absolut Art Award, Stockholm (2009), Ars Viva Prize, Kulturkreis der Deutschen Wirtschaft, Berlin (2008) and the Bâloise Art Prize at Art Basel (2006).

Recent solo exhibitions include Hot Lava Night, Kunsthalle Bielefeld, Bielefeld, Germany (2023); Double Standard, LLS Paleis, Antwerp, Belgium (2023). Cytter’s work was showcased in a major survey exhibition at the Ludwig Forum Aachen (2022), featuring: films, soap operas, plays, sculptures, drawings, novels, zines, life coaching guides, children’s books and a festival. Cytter’s videos were shown in solo exhibitions at Winterthur Kunstmuseum, Winterthur (2020); Centre for Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv (2019); Museion Bolzano, Bolzano (2019), Künstlerhaus – Halle für Kunst & Medien, Graz (2016); Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (2015), Kunsthal Charlottenborg, Copenhagen (2014); State of Concept, Athens (2014), Tate Modern, London (2012), Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (2011); München Kunstverein (2011); Kunsthaus Baselland, Basel (2010); Moderna Museet, Stockholm (2010); Hammer Museum, Los Angeles (2010); X Initiative, New York (2009); Le Plateau Paris, Paris (2009), Witte de With, Rotterdam (2008), MUMOK Vienna, Vienna (2007); Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt (2005); Kunsthalle Zurich, Zurich (2005) and Kunst-Werke Berlin, Berlin (2006).

Excerpt via Pilar Corrias