'1972' by Artist Sarah Morris opens at SMU's Pollock Gallery

The Pollock Gallery of the Division of Art at SMU’s Meadows School of the Arts will present 1972, a film and exhibit by Sarah Morris, from October 10 to November 8, 2014.

In her 38-minute film 1972, produced in 2008, Morris gathers together picturesque views of the land and cityscapes of Munich, archival photographs, the empty Olympic stadium, and interior spaces such as offices and screening rooms and interweaves them with documentary-style interview footage of Georg Sieber, the psychologist and consultant who was hired by the National Olympic Committee (NOC) to lead the security team for the fateful 1972 Olympiad.  Recounting the security training and preparations undertaken by the NOC in preparation for the 1972 Summer Olympics through to the eventual hostage crisis during which 11 Israeli athletes were kidnapped and murdered by the Palestinian terrorist group who called themselves Black September, Sieber presents a convincing case for faith in procedure, rehearsal and systemic structures and at the same time shows their failure. 

“The narrative is disrupted and undermined by Sieber himself, for his own words reveal his biases, his resentment toward the burden of the political history of his motherland and the fact that, despite his attempts to present an objective account of a politically charged and significant moment, the version of the truth that he presents can only ultimately be yet another subjective perception,” says curator Sally Frater. 

A selection from Morris’s Timecodes series of silkscreen prints will be exhibited alongside the film, as well as three of the Pinnell Collection’s original posters from the Munich Olympics, which were designed by Otl Aicher.

About Sarah Morris:

Since the mid-1990s, Sarah Morris has been making complex abstract paintings and films. These works, based on different cities, are derived from close inspection of architectural details combined with a critical sensitivity to the psychology of a city and its key protagonists.

Morris was born in 1967 in the UK and grew up in Providence, Rhode Island. She lives and works in New York and London. 

Morris has participated in many important exhibitions including 4th Site Santa Fe Biennial (2001), 25th São Paolo Biennial (2002) and Days Like These Tate Triennial (2003). Solo exhibitions include Nationalgalerie im Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin (2001); Kunstforeningen, Copenhagen (2004); Moderna Museet, Stockholm (2005); Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2005); Kestnergesellschaft, Hannover (2005); Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam (2006); Fondation Beyeler (2008); Lenbachhaus, Munich (2008); MAMbo, Bologna (2009); MMK Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt (2009); and MCA Chicago (2013).

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