Premio Combat Prize

Structured like a Hollywood trailer with rhythmical editing and multiple effects, Shahar Marcus’s video piece depicts a curator’s ”rise to power” with a measure of grotesqueness, sketching a map of the art world, with the curator reigning supreme. Mapping external signs and cultural codes, Marcus traces the activity of the curator and his multiple functions, ponders over the skills required for this coveted position, and analyzes the mechanism of self-glorification which makes the conductor of art’s orchestra tick. In passing, he also criticizes the superficiality and pretense in the art world, the ”celeb” culture which crowns objects of admiration and imitation, and the yearning of patrons—powerful tycoons—to establish their high status by means of art works and artists. The film offers a ”behind-the-scenes” peek into this impulse-ridden world, often perceived as a detached, elitist bubble, thereby shedding light on one of the aspects of contemporary culture.