2014- ongoing
Sasha Huber’s Shooting Stars series is dedicated to victims of gunshot assassinations and killing perpetrated for political, ethnic, hate crime, ideological or economic reasons.
It portrays historical figures, among them: African-American Civil Rights Movement leader Martin Luther King (1925-1965); leader of the Indian Independence Movement Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948); Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme (1927-1986); and less well-known victims, such as the Brazilian trade union leader and environmentalist Chico Mendes (1944-1988). The series also includes a member of the artist’s own family: ex-army officer Henri Perpignand (1914-1958), who returned to Haiti from exile in Miami in 1958 and was shot during an attempted coup against the dictator François Duvalier.
The series also highlights two resounding tragedies: the politically and ideologically motivated massacre of 77 members of the “Worker's Youth League” in Norway in 2011; and the killing of the young Iranian asylum seeker Reza Barati, who was shot during a demonstration in Australia's detention center on Manus Island, Papua New Guinea, in 2014.
One of the underlying messages of the series is that in the USA African-Americans still live in danger on a daily basis, facing racial profiling by the authorities, security forces, or self-appointed vigilantes, who single-handedly carry out the modern-day equivalent of lynchings.
The ongoing Shooting Stars series includes a portrait of the assassination-attempt survivor Malala Yousafzai (1997-), who in 2014 became the youngest ever recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. Her cause is the age-old, worldwide struggle for equality and for children’s right to education. The portrait also pays homage to those who have accepted perpetual life-threatening danger in order to pursue their cause.
The staple gun that Sasha Huber uses to make her works echoes the gunshots that have rung out again and again when “icons” of the struggle for human rights and justice have been brutally murdered. With her works, Huber asks: What would the world be like if all these people had not been killed? One week before his murder, Thomas Sankara – the socialist revolutionary from Burkina Faso who became “Africa’s Che Guevara” – declared: “While revolutionaries as individuals can be murdered, you cannot kill their ideas.”
Like meteors, the men and women that Sasha Huber portrays have flashed, and still flash, across the sky above us, momentarily lighting up the metaphorical darkness of horror and injustice that surrounds us. Like meteors – traditionally wished upon in many cultures – they allow us to formulate our longings and to project our desires. And they leave us wondering whether shooting stars might turn into much-needed guiding stars.
Thank you to Hans Fässler, Hakim Adi, Maria Helena P.T. Machado, Taieb Ingher and Kari Honka.replica watches
The exhibition is supported by The Finnish Cultural Foundation.
Video documentation
Portaits of:
Mona Abdinur (1993, Norway–2011, Norway)
Student and Norwegian Worker's Youth League member
Reza Barati (1991, Iran– 2014, Papua New Guinea)
Asylum seeker and Australian detention centre protester on Manus Island, Papua New Guinea
Michael Brown Jr. (1996, USA–2014, USA)
Graduate from Normandy High School, St. Louis
Amílcar Cabral (1924, Portuguese Guinea–1973, Guinea)
Independence leader of Cape Verde and Guinea-Bissau
Jean Chenet (1918, Haiti–1963, Haiti)
Street muralist and jewelry designer from Port-au-Prince,
victim of the Tonton Macoute death squads
Berkin Elvan (1999, Turkey–2014, Turkey)
Teenage boy
Diane Fossey (1932, USA–1985, Rwanda)
Zoologist, primatologist, and anthropologist
Indira Gandhi (1917, India–1984, India)
3rd Prime Minister of India 1980-1984
Mahatma Gandhi (1869, British Indian Empire–1948, India)
Pre-eminent leader of Indian independence movement in British-ruled India
Ernesto “Che” Guevara (1928, Argentina–1967, Bolivia)
Marxist revolutionary, physician, author, guerrilla leader, diplomat, and military theorist
Dag Hammarskjöld (1905, Sweden–1961, Rhodesia and Nyasaland)
2nd Secretary-General of the United Nations 1953-1961
Martin Luther King (1929, USA–1968, United States)
Pastor, activist, humanitarian and civil rights movement leader
Patrice Lumumba (1925, Belgian Congo–1961, State of Katanga)
Independence leader and first democratically elected Prime Minister of the Republic of the Congo
Rosa Luxemburg (1871, Russia–1919, Germany)
Marxist theorist, philosopher, economist and revolutionary socialist
Malcolm X (1925, USA–1965, USA)
Muslim minister, human and civil rights activist
Renisha McBride (1994, USA–2013, USA)
Young African American Woman (occupation unknown)
Dorothy Mae Stang (1931, USA–2005, Brazil)
Member of the Congregation of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, environmentalist and Amazon activist
Trayvon Martin (1995, USA–2012, USA)
High school student
Chico Mendes (1944, Brazil–1988, Brazil)
Rubber tapper, trade union leader and environmentalist
Eduardo Mondlane (1920, Mozambique–1969, Tanzania)
Independence leader and president of the Mozambican Liberation Front
Noxolo Nogwaza (1987, South Africa–2011, South Africa)
Lesbian rights activist and member of the Ekurhuleni Pride Organising Committee
Anna Politkovskaja (1958, USA–2006, Russia)
Journalist, writer, and human rights activist
Olof Palme (1927, Sweden–1986, Sweden)
Social-Democratic politician, Swedish Prime Minister 1982-1986, supporter of third-world liberation movements
Henri Perpignand (1916, Haiti–1958, Haiti)
Army officer under Paul Magloire, 35th President of Haiti, and co-organizer of the 1958 coup d'état against Haitian dictator François Duvalier
José Cláudio Ribeiro da Silva (1959, Brazil–2011, Brazil)
Maria do Espirito Santo (1960, Brazil–2011, Brazil)
Conservationists, environmentalists and Amazon activists
Aung San (1915, British Burma–1947, British Burma)
Revolutionary, father of modern-day Burma and Deputy Chairman of the Executive Council of Burma 1946–1947
Augusto César Sandino (1895, Nicaragua–1934, Nicaragua)
Revolutionary and leader of a rebellion 1927-1933 against US military occupation of Nicaragua
Thomas Sankara (1949, French Upper Volta, French West Africa–1987, Burkina Faso)
Socialist revolutionary, pan-African theorist and 5th President of Upper Volta / Burkina Faso
Sandra Lee Scheuer (1949, USA–970, USA)
Student at Kent State University and Anti-Vietnam war protester
Sitting Bull (1831, USA–1890, USA)
Hunkpapa Lakota holy man and leader
Elisabeth Tronnes Lie (1995, Norway–2011, Norway)
Student and Worker's Youth League member, Norway
Malala Yousafzai (1997, Pakistan–)
Activist for female education, assassination attempted in 2012,
youngest-ever Nobel Prize recipient
Shooting Stars installation at Korjaamo Gallery, Helsinki, Finland. Photograph by Jussi Tiainen. Artwork photographs below by Kai Kuusisto.
Mona Abdinur (1993, Norway–2011, Norway)
Student and Norwegian Workers Youth League
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
27 x 32 x 4 cm
2014
Reza Barati (1990, Iran–2014, Papua New Guinea)
Asylum seeker and Australian detention centre protester on Manus Island, Papua New Guinea
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
27 x 32 x 4 cm
2014
Michael Brown, Jr. (1996, USA–2014, USA)
Graduate from Normandy High School, St. Louis
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
27 x 32 x 4 cm
2014
Amílcar Cabral (1924, Portuguese Guinea–1973, Guinea)
Independence leader of Cape Verde and Guinea-Bissau
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
27 x 32 x 4 cm
2014
Martin Luther King Jr. (1929, USA–1968, USA)
Pastor, activist, humanitarian and civil rights movement leader
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
27 x 32 x 4 cm
2014
Jean Chenet (1918, Haiti–1963, Haiti)
Street muralist and jewelry designer from Port-au-Prince, victim of the Tonton Macoute death squads and artists mothers godfather
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
27 x 32 x 4 cm
2014
José Cláudio Ribeiro da Silva (1959, Brazil–2011, Brazil)
Maria do Espirito Santo (1960, Brazil–2011, Brazil)
Conservationists, environmentalists and Amazon activists
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
110 x 80 cm
2014
Berkin Elvan (1999, Turkey–2014, Turkey)
Teenage boy, Taksim Gezi protest bystander
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
27 x 32 x 4 cm
2014
Patrice Lumumba (1925, Belgian Congo–1961, State of Katanga)
Independence leader and first democratically elected Prime Minister of the Republic of the Congo
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
27 x 32 x 4 cm
2014
Rosa Luxemburg (1871, Russia–1919, Germany)
Marxist theorist, philosopher, economist and revolutionary socialist
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
27 x 32 x 4 cm
2014
Malcolm X (1925, USA–1965, USA)
Muslim minister, human and civil rights activist
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
27 x 32 x 4 cm
2014
Malala Yousafzai (1997, Pakistan–)
Activist for female education, assassination attempted in 2012, youngest-ever Nobel Prize recipient
Leaf silver on metal staples and larch wood
80 x 110 cm
2014
Gwen Carr holding her son Eric Garner (1970, USA–2014, USA)
Horticulturist at the New York City Parks
Leaf white gold on metal staples and larch wood
27 x 32 x 4 cm
25.3.–17.9.2017
DNA of Water
Curated by Sasha Dees
Newhouse Centre for Contemporary Art, Staten Island, US