Bettina Hutschek, Haus 209 (still)
Our invited international artist this year is Bettina Hutschek.
Bettina is a visual artist and filmmaker, who works between Germany and Malta and has been selected to represent Malta at the Venice Biennale in 2017 after an absence of 17 years.
The Maltese Pavilion forms part of the Cultural programme of the Maltese Presidency of the Council of the European Union in 2017 and will bridge with the contemporary art programme of Valletta as European Capital of Culture in 2018.
For such a historic occasion, competition was intense and involved a prestigious international selection panel.
SSA Council Member Deirdre Robertson, former Chief Operating Officer at Tate, was part of a team that pitched Bettina and was delighted when she, along with artist/ curator Raphel Vella, was successful.
“Bettina’s work greatly impressed us on many levels,” Deirdre reflects. “We selected her after an in-depth review of the Maltese art scene – partly because of the international calibre of her work – it is poetic and deals with strong philosophical, international themes. We were also greatly impressed by the influence she has had on other artists, through her work as an artist/ curator, inviting a steady stream of international artists to FRAGMENTA. As an artist /curator she is a perfect fit with the SSA, and a natural development to our selection of Scotland’s Venice representative, Graham Fagan, as invited artist in 2014.”
Bettina is showing a range of work, including Haus 209 – the story of a woman used in a dystopian experiment. It is a film constructed from stills and found 1950s footage, made in homage and reference to Marker’s , “La Jetée”. The title references the clinic Berlin – Buch where cancer patients are given radioactive therapy.
– Deirdre Robertson, SSA Council