Free Third Thursday

Join us for a free evening at MOCA with music by KXCI Community Radio DJs, bites by Muna Food, and drinks by Brick Box Brewery! Don’t miss this lively time to gather with friends and family around art, music, and drinks; all ages are welcome!

Featuring a one-night-only screening of short films by internationally-recognized artists Kader Attia (b. 1970, France) and Luis Camnitzer (b. 1937, Uruguay), introduced by MOCA Executive Director Gabriela Rangel at 7:00pm.

Plus, a curated pop-up market featuring local artisans including: Petra Clay and Metal, Raison Pan, Earthling Jewelry, Gilty Boy, Juvelarto Designs, and Art Over Order.

About the artists

Kader Attia (b. 1970, France) grew up in Algeria and the suburbs of Paris. Drawing from his experience of living within two disparate cultures, he has developed a dynamic practice that examines the intricacies of social, historical, and cultural differences across the globe. Attia’s installations and sculptures offer a poetic yet highly explicit reading of the relationships between Western and non-Western cultures. Through complex investigations of architecture, the human body, literature, and history, Attia demonstrates how individual and cultural identity is constructed within the context of colonial domination and conflict. Using artifacts, discarded quotidian objects, and wartime ephemera, Attia transforms the space of a gallery into one of introspection, allowing the viewer to become aware of the complicated and often inaccurate depiction of our multiple histories. Attia believes that through this type of reappropriation, disparities between superior/inferior, traditional/modern, and exotic/familiar can begin to dissolve.

Attia has received degrees from Ecole Supérieure des Arts Appliqués Duperré, Paris, France in 1993, La Escola Massana Arte i Disseny, Barcelona, Spain in 1994, and Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs, Paris, France in 1998. Solo exhibitions of his work have been organized at Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, Doha, Qatar (2021); BAK – basis voor actuele kunst, Utrecht, Netherlands (2021); Kunsthaus Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland (2020); Sesc Pompeia São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil (2020); Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA), Berkeley, CA (2019); Hayward Gallery, London, United Kingdom (2019); Musée d’Art Contemporain du Val-de-Marne, Vitry-sur-Seine, France (2018); Fundació Joan Miró, Centre d’Estudis d’Art Contemporani, Barcelona, Spain (2018); Power Plant, Toronto, Canada (2018); Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH (2018); Palais de Tokyo, Paris, France (2018); The Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, Australia (2017); Ludwig Museum, Koblenz, Germany (2017); Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum at Washington University, St. Louis, MO (2017); Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst (S.M.A.K.), Ghent, Belgium (2017); Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France (2016); Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt am Main, Germany (2016); Musée Cantonal des Beaux Arts, Lausanne, Switzerland (2015); KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin (2013); Whitechapel Gallery, London (2013); Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (2012); Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA (2007); and Musée d’Art Contemporain de Lyon, France (2006). 

Attia was selected as the curator of the 12th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art (2022),  and  he has participated in numerous biennial exhibitions as an artist, including Sharjah Biennial 15, Sharjah Art Foundation, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates (2023); Aichi Triennale, Nagoya, Japan (2022); the 13th and 12th Gwangju Biennial, Gwangju, South Korea (2020 and 2018); 12th Shanghai Biennale, China (2018); Marrakesh Biennial 4 and 6 (2014 and 2016); 8th and 13th Lyon Biennale (2005 and 2015); dOCUMENTA (13), Kassel, Germany (2012); and the 50th and 54th Venice Biennales (2003 and 2011). His work is in numerous international public and private collections, including Barjeel Art Foundation, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates; Collection Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France; Fondation Louis Vuitton pour la Création, Paris, France; Fond National d’Art Contemporain, France; Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH; Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA; Museo Jumex, Ciudad de México, México; Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, Doha, Qatar; Margulies Collection, Miami, FL; Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden; Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt, Germany; Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; Museum der Moderne, Salzburg, Austria; Sharjah Art Foundation, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates; S.M.A.K. Municipal Museum of Contemporary Art, Ghent, Belgium; Société Générale, Paris, France; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY; Tate Modern, London, United Kingdom; Vehbi Koç Foundation, Istanbul, Turkey; and the Vanmoerkerke Collection, Belgium.

Attia has received several prestigious awards including the 2017 Joan Miró Prize, Fundació Joan Miró, Barcelona, Spain, the 2017 Yanghyun Prize, Seoul, South Korea, and the 2016 Prix Marcel Duchamp, Paris, France.

Luis Camnitzer (b.1937, Germany) is a Uruguayan artist, educator, and writer who moved to New York in 1964. He was at the vanguard of 1960s Conceptualism, working primarily in printmaking, sculpture, and installations. For more than five decades, his practice has been marked by an enduring interrogation of systems of power, the intersection of art and pedagogy, and the deconstruction of language and other familiar frameworks. Language has been a key subject of inquiry for Camnitzer since 1966. Camnitzer’s work frequently beckons the subjectivity of the spectator through discursive, interactive, and participatory propositions that reveal his dedication to pedagogy. As an educator, he has advocated since the 1960s for the need for art to transcend the boundaries of its conventional parameters and establishments. That conviction is the basis of A Museum Is a School, a touring site-specific installation displayed on the exterior of various arts institutions since 2009. By emphatically re-defining the museum, Camnitzer re-contextualizes the work housed inside. Under his proposal, art becomes a dynamic process rather than a product, a means of acquiring and developing knowledge; the museum becomes a forum for exchange; the artist becomes a facilitator rather than an authority. Camnitzer’s commitment to involving the public in this creative process reflects his role as a progenitor of process-oriented art, his abiding commitment to institutional critique, and his lifelong conviction in art’s transformative function.

Retrospectives of Camnitzer’s work have been presented at El Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, Spain (2018); Museo de Arte de la Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá (2012); El Museo del Barrio, New York, NY (2011); Kunsthalle zu Kiel, Germany (2003); and Lehman College Art Gallery, Bronx, NY (1991). The artist’s work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at El Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos, Santiago, Chile (2013); Kemper Art Museum, St. Louis, MO (2011); Daros Latinamerica, Zürich, Switzerland (2010); and El Museo del Barrio, New York, NY (1995), among others. His work has been included in many group exhibitions, including HOME—So Different, So Appealing, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, CA, traveled to Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX (2017); Under the Same Sun: Art from Latin America Today, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY (2014); and Information, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY (1970). He has participated in several international biennials, including documenta 11, Kassel, Germany (2002); Whitney Biennial, New York, NY (2000); and Pavilion of Uruguay, 43rd Venice Biennale, Italy (1988). Camnitzer’s work is represented in the collections of The Art Institute of Chicago, IL; Centre Pompidou, Paris, France; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY; The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; São Paulo Museum of Art, Brazil; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY; Tate Modern, London, United Kingdom; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN; and Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY, among others. His honors include the Guggenheim Fellowship in 1982 and 1961. From 1969–2000, he taught at the State University of New York (SUNY) College at Old Westbury and is professor emeritus.

Monthly Free Thursdays are presented in collaboration with KXCI Community Radio.