Abstract
This book chapter explores the cultural phenomenon of historical re-enactment practices, and their role in the remediation of cultural memory through the gallery-based filmic installations of contemporary artist Omer Fast. I analyse a number of Fast's early artworks, which involve the artist either interviewing people who had participated in high-profile re-enactments, or works in which the artist stages his own re-enactments of his subjects' experiences. In doing so, Fast is not interested in seeking historical "truth", because re-enactments often work to confuse the boundaries between reality and representation. Fast further amplifies such confusions, producing videos and installations that reveal the difficulty of distinguishing between past and present, memory and fantasy, reality and fiction.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | The Memory Effect: The remediation of memory in literature and film |
| Editors | Russell J Kilbourn and Eleanor Ty |
| Place of Publication | Waterloo, Canada |
| Publisher | Wilfred Laurier University Press |
| Pages | 287-305 |
| Volume | 1 |
| Edition | 1st |
| ISBN (Print) | 9781554589142 |
| Publication status | Published - 2013 |