Michael Rakowitz

Michael Rakowitz is an Iraqi American artist, best known for his conceptual art displayed in non-gallery contexts. He is an associate professor at Northwestern University and is represented by in New York by Lombard Freid Gallery.

Rakowitz's conceptual art is deeply political and focuses mostly on the Middle East namely Iraq which is where his family fled from.

Projects

In Rakowitz's project return he reopens his grandfather's import and export business. The company initially functioned as a drop box. In 2005 it became a packaging center and sorting facility. Members of the Iraqi diaspora community and interested citizens were invited to send things to be shipped free of charge to recipients in Iraq. Rakowitz also wanted to explore the possibility of importing things clearly labeled "Product of Iraq"; he chose dates which were legendary in Iraq, with a yield of over 600 varieties. The first batch he tried to ship died in Syria but the second made its way through different nations and different customs; the dates became a representative for an Iraq refugee traveling to a new life.When they finally made it to Brooklyn there people were eager to try them, this fruit that caused so many problems to get there asked questions and brought up memories.

One of his more notable projects is Enemy Kitchen. The project began in 2004; in it Rakowitz compiles Baghdad recipes with the help of his mother and then teaches them to public audiences. The first time this project was performed was with students who lived in Chelsea and went to the Hudson Guild Community Center. With the project in cooking and eating the food, it opens up the lines of communication allowing in this case the students to attach the word Iraq to food as a representative of culture and discuss it. The students discussed the war and compare it to their own lives. Later this project also included a food truck that roamed around Chicago. The food truck itself gives home to the Iraqi ex-pat community and is another way of bring art down to a level that involves and interacts with people. Rakowitz says, "I see the truck as a potentially healing gesture, not that it has to be. I don't have delusions that it will perform the hard work of healing traumas. I do believe there can be an aesthetic of good intentions, but I'm leery of saying what those are. No, I'm not going to tell anyone it's art."

Rakowitz about how he sees his art: "As an artistic gesture I try to make an unlikely thing happen, and the impossible becomes possible. It's art because it's impossible for this to exist in the world."

External links

• Squarespace - Website Expired

• New York Times Art Beat