Omer Fast (; born in

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

, 1972) is an Israeli contemporary artist.

Early life and education

Born and raised in

, Fast spent much of his teenage years in

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

. He received his BFA from a dual-degree program at

Tufts University Tufts University is a private research university in Medford and Somerville, Massachusetts, United States, with additional facilities in Boston and Grafton, as well as Talloires, France. Tufts also has several Doctor of Physical Therapy p ...

and the

School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston The School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University (Museum School, SMFA at Tufts, or SMFA; formerly the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston) is a dedicated art school within Tufts University, a private research university in Mass ...

in 1995, majoring in English and

painting Painting is a Visual arts, visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called "matrix" or "Support (art), support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with ...

, and an MFA from

Hunter College Hunter College is a public university in New York City, United States. It is one of the constituent colleges of the City University of New York and offers studies in more than one hundred undergraduate and postgraduate fields across five schools ...

in 2000. He subsequently got a job doing magazine layout before moving to Berlin in 2001.

Exhibitions

Fast has had

solo exhibition A solo show or solo exhibition is an art exhibition, exhibition of the work of only one artist. Rather than a group of artists who collaborate to form an exhibition. The artwork may be paintings, drawings, etchings, collage, sculpture, or photogr ...

s at the Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich (2020), Guangdong Times Art Museum (2018), Martin Gropius Bau, Berlin (2016), Jeu de Paume, Paris (2015),

Wexner Center for the Arts The Wexner Center for the Arts is the Ohio State University's "multidisciplinary, international laboratory for the exploration and advancement of contemporary art." The Wexner Center is a lab and public gallery, but not an art museum, as it doe ...

, Columbus (2012),

Whitney Museum of American Art The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is a Modern art, modern and Contemporary art, contemporary American art museum located in the Meatpacking District, Manhattan, Meatpacking District and West Village neighbor ...

, New York (2010),

Berkeley Art Museum The Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA, formerly abbreviated as BAM/PFA) are a combined art museum, repertory movie theater, and film archive associated with the University of California, Berkeley. Lawrence Rinder was Director ...

(2009),

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...

, Vienna (2007), Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh (2005),

Midway Contemporary Art Midway Contemporary Art is a non-profit arts organization located in the Sheridan neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota Minnesota ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by the Canad ...

, Minneapolis (2005),

Pinakothek der Moderne The Pinakothek der Moderne (, '' Pinakothek of the Modern'') is a modern art museum, situated in central Munich's '' Kunstareal''. The building Designed by German architect Stephan Braunfels, the Pinakothek der Moderne was inaugurated in Se ...

, Munich (2004), and the

Frankfurter Kunstverein The Frankfurter Kunstverein e. V. in Frankfurt am Main is a non-profit organisation dedicated to the promotion of contemporary art and culture. It is one of the oldest German art associations. History The Frankfurter Kunstverein was founded in ...

, Frankfurt (2003). His work has also been featured in

dOCUMENTA (13) Documenta 13 (stylised as dOCUMENTA (13)) was the thirteenth edition of the German contemporary art exhibition Documenta. It took place between 9 June until 16 September 2012 in Kassel, Germany. The exhibition was held under the theme "collap ...

(2012),

Performa The Macintosh Performa is a family of personal computers designed, manufactured and sold by Apple Computer, Inc. from 1992 to 1997. The Performa brand re-used models from Apple's Quadra, Centris, LC, Classic, and Power Macintosh families ...

(2009), and the 54th Venice Biennale. In 2016 the

Martin-Gropius-Bau Martin-Gropius-Bau, commonly known as Gropius Bau, is an important exhibition space in Berlin, Germany. Originally a museum of applied arts, the building has been a listed historical monument since 1966. It is located at 7 Niederkirchnerstraße ...

in Berlin presented the exhibition "Omer Fast. Talking is not always the solution". His work has been exhibited in the United States and internationally. In October 2015, a monographic exhibition of Fast’s work titled ''Present Continuous'' opened at the

Jeu de Paume ''Jeu de paume'' (, ; originally spelled ; ), nowadays known as real tennis, (US) court tennis or (in France) ''courte paume'', is a ball-and-court game that originated in France. It was an indoor precursor of tennis played without racquets, ...

, Paris, and subsequently travelled to the Baltic Center of Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK, and the KUNSTEN Museum of Modern Art,

Aalborg, Denmark Aalborg or Ålborg ( , , ) is Denmark's List of cities and towns in Denmark, fourth largest urban settlement (behind Copenhagen, Aarhus, and Odense) with a population of 119,862 (1 July 2022) in the town proper and an Urban area, urban populati ...

. He has been the subject of solo exhibitions at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, the Netherlands; Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden; Le Caixa, Madrid, Spain; Musée d’Art Contemporain, Montréal, Canada; Museum of Contemporary Art, Krakow, Poland; STUK Leuven, Belgium; Dallas Museum of Art, TX; Cleveland Museum of Art, OH; the Art Institute of Chicago, IL; the Minneapolis Institute of Art, MN; and the

, NY. His work was featured in dOCUMENTA (13), the 54th Venice Biennale, and the 2002 and 2008 Whitney Biennials. He received a BFA from Tufts University and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and an MFA from Hunter College in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. Fast lives and works in Berlin.

Feature films

Fast wrote and directed his debut feature film ''

Remainder In mathematics, the remainder is the amount "left over" after performing some computation. In arithmetic, the remainder is the integer "left over" after dividing one integer by another to produce an integer quotient ( integer division). In a ...

'' in 2015, based on the 2005 novel of the same name by Tom McCarthy. It stars Tom Sturrdige and

Cush Jumbo Cush Jumbo (born 23 September 1985) is a British actress and writer. She is best known for her leading role as attorney Lucca Quinn in the CBS drama series ''The Good Wife'' (2015–2016) and the Paramount Plus spin-off series ''The Good Figh ...

. Lorena Muñoz-Alonso of

Artnet Artnet.com is an art market website. It is operated by Artnet Worldwide Corporation, which has headquarters in New York City. It is owned by Artnet AG, a German publicly-traded company based in Berlin that is listed on the Frankfurt Stock Ex ...

compared Fast's avant-garde style to that of

Steve McQueen Terrence Stephen McQueen (March 24, 1930November 7, 1980) was an American actor. His antihero persona, emphasized during the height of counterculture of the 1960s, 1960s counterculture, made him a top box office draw for his films of the late ...

and

Sam Taylor-Johnson Samantha Louise Taylor-Johnson ( Taylor-Wood; born 1967) is a British filmmaker. Her directorial feature film debut was 2009's ''Nowhere Boy'', a film based on the childhood experiences of the Beatles' singer and songwriter John Lennon. She is ...

, urging audiences to not "expect an easily consumable feature." Fast had said that he was inspired to make the film after being introduced to the book by a journalist colleague. The film was generally well received by critics.

Awards and collections

Fast was the recipient of the 2009 Preis der Nationalgalerie für Junge Kunst and the 2008

Bucksbaum Award The Bucksbaum Award was established in 2000 by the Bucksbaum Family Foundation and the Whitney Museum of American Art. It is awarded biannually "to honor an artist, living and working in the United States, whose work demonstrates a singular combinat ...

from the

. Fast's work is in the collections of the

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, often referred to as The Guggenheim, is an art museum at 1071 Fifth Avenue between 88th and 89th Street (Manhattan), 89th Streets on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City. It hosts a permanent coll ...

Hamburger Bahnhof Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart is the former Train station#Terminus, terminus of the Berlin–Hamburg Railway in Berlin, Germany, on Invalidenstrasse in the Moabit district opposite the Charité hospital. Today it serves as ...

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an Encyclopedic museum, encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the List of largest museums, third-largest museum in the world and the List of larg ...

, the

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden is an art museum beside the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. The museum was initially endowed during the 1960s with the permanent art collection of Joseph H. Hirshhorn. It was designed ...

, and the

, Vienna.

Bibliography

*Sabine Schaschl (ed.): "Omer Fast. In Memorry / Zur Erinnerung", Berlin (The Green Box) 2010. (English/German) *“The Casting” (Monograph) Published by Museum of Modern Art, Vienna and Walter König Verlag, 2008 *Astrid Wege, "Cologne, Omer Fast,

Kölnischer Kunstverein The Kölnischer Kunstverein is an art museum in Cologne, North Rhine-Westphalia state, Germany. It is named after the historical art society of the same name. The ''Kölnischer Kunstverein'' was a " Kunstverein" established in Cologne in 1839 ...

", Artforum, Feb 2012 *Barbara Pollack, "True Lies?", ART News,February 2010 *Andreas Schlaegel, "Nothing But the Truth", Programma Magazine, Spring 2010 *Mark Godfrey, TJ Demos, Eyal Weizman, Ayesha Hammed, "Rights of Passage", Tate Etc., Issue # 19, 2010 *Nav Haq, "Foresight into the New African Century", Kaleidoscope #5, Feb 2010 *Holland Cotter, "Is It Reality or Fantasy?" New York Times, January 7, 201

*Elisabeth Lebovici / Maria Muhle, Omer Fast, Afterall, March 2009 *Chen Tamir, "Omer fast, New Magic Realism", Flash Art, Issue #114, October 2008 *Tom Holert, "Attention Span", Artforum, February 2008 *Mark Godfrey, "Making History", Frieze, March/April 2006 *Nav Haq, "Omer Fast, Godville", Bidoun, 200

*Jennifer Allen, "Openings: Omer Fast", Artforum, September 200

*Chris Chang, "Vision: Omer Fast", Film Comment, July/August 200

*Marcus Verhagen, ‘Pleasure and Pain: Omer Fast Interviewed’ in ''Art Monthly'' Issue 330, October 2009 Brittania Art Publications LTD. Pp 1-4 *"Omer Fast: Back to the Present" in Displayer. February 2009. pp 113-118 *Omer Fast et al., ''The Death of the Artist'' (New York: Cabinet Magazine, Cabinet Books, 2019).

References

External links

*
Bucksbaum Awardgb agency, Paris
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fast, Omer 1972 births Living people Israeli video artists Hunter College alumni Artists from Jerusalem Jewish Israeli artists Tufts University alumni People from Jericho, New York Israeli contemporary artists Academic staff of the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design