Riddles for the Road@Brodac Gallery

Riddles for the Road — Nour Hassan & Alex Close Expanding from their usual ways of working, this exhibition presents Alex and Nour's experimental audio pieces, a video, and a hand-drawn animation. The pieces toy with the notion of eliminating value from things or situations by extracting them from one context and re-introducing them into another to manipulate meaning. The thing or situation becomes an abstract entity waiting in limbo to be placed/rooted/grounded. The audio pieces weave moments captured intentionally or unknowingly from a certain time and place, then edited and planted in a gallery setting for a different audience. The artists thought about different ways of communicating with people, the physical environment, and themselves. They drew from personal experiences of adaptation, reflecting on their own process of removing themselves from a certain set of communication norms and into another, only to find that what they assume to know does not translate correctly in other contexts. For Alex and Nour, their mixed upbringing resulted in a weak sense of cultural identity. This shaped their abstract world, void of values appearing much more like a game of pinball. In their work, the duo question values, perception, and re-constructed memories. What meaning and value can something hold/carry when it is un-placed? When interacting with familiar and unfamiliar places, we shift and reconstruct our identities – our faces change in public and private spaces, and when we feel like an insider vs. an outsider. We develop hopes and fears, superstitions and habits, attaching meaning to objects or places that can change the way we act. The pieces in the exhibition highlight the barrier between the self and external environment (e.g. obstacle/comfort & safety), emotions in a state of navigation, and mediation between known and unknown environments. From uncanny unexpected meetings to finding materials in odd corners of town, this collaboration was a journey of discovery on divergent paths with a tight timeframe and limited resources. While Nour worked virtually from New Zealand, Alex put together the physical exhibition, using makeshift Bosnian adapted from what she knows of Macedonian to find materials across Sarajevo. The obstacles the pair encountered throughout their journey took on a life of their own, informing and supporting their exhibited material. The pieces they created not only reflected their own working relationship but also encompassed the entire experience from their initial meeting in '22 at Tesla Pub on Muvekita Street to the final installation. BIOS: Nour Hassan is a visual artist of Iraqi/Iranian heritage raised in New Zealand/Aotearoa. Her interest in representational art is driven by her fascination with how one chooses to reveal themselves to another, specifically in the relationship between the model and artist. Nour is undergoing her Master's in Arts (History) at Massey University, New Zealand, after graduating with her Post Graduate Diploma in Arts (History) in 2022. She graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 2011. Website: nourhassan.co.nz Alex Close is a visual artist born in Canada with a Macedonian heritage. Guided by her unrealistic desire to hold together memories in hyperreal clarity, she is concerned with the relationship between certainty and unreachable or irretrievable data. Alex graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from OCADU (2015), a Master of Fine Art Practice (MLitt) supported by the Mackendrick scholarship at the Glasgow School of Art (2017), and a Master of Design in Design Research at Carleton University (2020). Website: a-close.com