Jananne Al-Ani’s The Visit consists of two distinct but related elements. In her large-scale projection piece, Muse, a smart-suited man emerges from a desert heat-haze and proceeds to walk restlessly back and forth along the same strip of barren earth. The camera returns to this view on seven different occasions; the passage of time marked by changes in the light and a shift in the lengthening, deepening shadows. A companion work, Echo, is a multi-screen installation, in which four women discuss an absent figure — an unnamed visitor whose recent re-appearance has both sharpened their feelings toward him and illuminated the extent to which he passes in and out of their lives. The relationship between the two elements – and the people found within them – is never resolved, but rather is left to shimmer on the horizon, like a mirage.
The Visit
Jananne Al-Ani
2004
Project Overview
Project details
Exhibition dates
Norwich Gallery
10 November—17 December 2004
Tate Britain, London
4 February—10 April 2005
Ab-Anbar Gallery, London
10 October—11 November 2023
More information
Commissioned by Film and Video Umbrella and Norwich Gallery. Supported by Arts Council England.
Media
Audio