Introducing
Title: "The Beloved Daughter"
Year: 2012
Artist: Hemya Moran
Size: 70 x 90 cm
Edition: 1/5
THE BELOVED DAUGHTER from the ongoing series "Intimate Strangers".
The movie "Buffalo 66", written and directed by Vincent Gallo, tells the story of a released convict that kidnaps a teenage student on the way to visit his parents, in order to present her to them as his girlfriend. He forces her to pretend they're in a loving and intimate relationship. In my work titled "intimate strangers" I suggest randomly chosen strangers to have an intimate acquaintance. I take photographs with them in their private space; their living rooms, bedrooms, bathrooms, back yards, and any place that's scorched with their personal memory. I request that they look at me, think about me, and remember me. The encounter is singular and short, and harbors a sensation of its infinite possibilities, a unique and magical moment overpowering the everyday stale and automated existence. In every encounter I stage an intimate moment, an artificial acquaintance. I'm looking for affection in estranged environments, occupying a contradicting position both distant and involved, repulsed and attracted, feeling a sense of belonging and of loneliness all at once, affection experiencing both empathy and a struggle of domination.
During the course of my work I was able to produce these intimate moments in various environments, situations and with different individuals, to create privacy everywhere and closeness with anyone. In a relative short period of time I've managed to create an industry of intimacy. In this acquaintance I am the beloved daughter: for a moment I could be a girl receiving her mother's warmth or a girl that admires her mother's femininity as we wear make-up together. I tried to create intimacy with her through the gestures of the body and legs.
HEMYA MORAN was born in Israel in 1985. After the completion of her BFA in the photography department of Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Jerusalem in 2010; and her graduation from the Masters at the Royal College of Art in London (with distinction), she received a grant from the Lepsien Art Foundation, to live and work in a studio based in Dusseldorf, Germany; currently she is based in Paris, France. She has exhibited her work in several solo and exhibitions, including the Tate Britain, London as well as in several international galleries. Her work has been published in magazines and art sites including the Time and the British Journal of Photography.