YOSHUA OKÓN

For Gaza Stripper, Okón was invited to produce a site specific piece in Israel. During the preliminary trip, Israel was disengaging from Gaza. Even though the original idea was to avoid all references to this conflict, the degree of intensity caused by the opposition to such disengagement was impossible to avoid. Through the introduction of absurd humor, the piece sets to dislocate the usual political speech around a higly charged conflict.

The result is a video-installation based on a performance done at the Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art. A volunteer stripper - the only respondent to a classified ad - performs a dance to music from his headphones, sporting only an orange ribbon (worn by opponents to Israel's withdrawal from the Gaza Strip) tied to his penis. A wooden stage/sculpture including 8 monitors, 8 cameras, and disco lights was built. After the opening night performance, the structure remained in the gallery displaying the videofootage of the performance with no sound. Later, a single channel version, including a metal table dance pole, a flat screen and digital disco lights, was created. This new version emulates the shape of a national flag.