MICHAEL RAKOWITZ

The exhibition presents key works that Michael Rakowitz has been dedicated to for more than 20 years since the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq. Rakowitz has been continuously reappearing and returning the lost cultural heritage of Iraq in both autobiographical and historical registers: Rakowitz's own family history of from Iraq to the US due to their Jewish faith, and Mesopotamian relics that were destroyed or have gone missing in the aftermath of the War. From humble food packaging to ancient Assyrian stone reliefs, Rakowitz listens to the stories of all the objects that have disappeared along with the humans displaced by force and puts forth practical methods of healing from the trauma rendered invisible.

The invisible enemy should not exist (Northwest Palace of Kalhu, Room F, Southeast Entrance; Room S, SouthwestEntrance) is the title of the exhibition as well as the premiering installation that stretches across the first floor. 'Theinvisible enemy should not exist' is the translation of Aj-ibur-shapu, the name of the Processional Way into the cityof Babylon past the Ishtar Gate, built circa BCE 575 under King Nebuchadnezzar II.

_The invisible enemy should not exist (Northwest Palace of Kalhu, Room F, Southeast

Entrance; Room S, Southwest Entrance)_ (2023)

The invisible enemy should not exist (Northwest Palace of Kalhu) (2018–ongoing) is a chapter of The invisible enemyshould not exist (2007–ongoing), which reappears the artifacts in the National Museum of Iraq looted after the IraqWar broke out. The invisible enemy should not exist (Northwest Palace of Kalhu) reappears the Northwest Palace ofKalhu (current-day Nimrud, Iraq) commissioned by Neo-Assyrian King Ashurnasirpal II (883–859 BCE) was devastatedby ISIS or Daesh in 2015.

The invisible enemy should not exist (Northwest Palace of Kalhu, Room F, Southeast Entrance; Room S, SouthwestEntrance) instructs the exact locations of the Palace that the artist with his studio team has reappeared: the five stonecarved panels that used to line the right wall and the southeast entrance of Room S, and two panels on each side of thesouthwest entrance of Room F. Rooms S and F are the main entrances to the courtyard in the center of the Palace, used tohost esteemed guests. Using Arabic-English newspapers and Middle Eastern food packaging readily found in Chicago, thepanels and their once brilliantly painted surface are reconstructed in papier-mâché technique. The reliefs depict apkallu,the winged demi-gods either human or bird-headed, surrounded by the sacred trees and the 'Standard Inscription' running across the center of each panel unit. The installation of the panels corresponds to the original architecturalfootprint, with missing pieces of the original panels and spaces marked with labels indicating the archaeologicaldisplacement or looting already in situ before the destruction by ISIS. The labels note that most of the missing pieces arein the collection of Western institutions, and the extractions of these artifacts had already, in fact, begun much earlier.

The Ballad of Special Ops Cody (2017)

Michael Rakowitz's representative video work, The Ballad of Special Ops Cody (2017) is a stop-motion film portraying Cody,a GI action figure sympathizing with the Mesopotamian votive sculptures displayed at the Oriental Institute, University ofChicago. Cody offers the Mesopotamian votive statues locked in vitrines an accomplice in escape. Cody receives a silent,petrified stare as an answer, and eventually, he meekly stations next to the Sumerian figurines, encased.

Special Ops Cody made a media appearance in 2005 when it was revealed that the photo of a US soldier named 'JohnAdam' held hostage by the Mujahideen group in Iraq was in fact, the photo of Cody. Only sold at the American militarybases in Iraq and Kuwait, Cody was often sent to the children back in the US as a surrogate for their soldier fathers whocould not promise the exact return date. Similarly, the votive statues of Sumeria were surrogates of worshipers inthe wish to extend their devotion and faith. And through the voice-over of Cody by retired Sergeant Gin McGill-Pratherwho was deployed to Iraq in 2004, Cody becomes another proxy in bridging the gap between the ancient and present,object and real human experience. In the oddly similar circumstance that both Cody and the relics are put in, Rakowitzdraws out the manifold identities and provenance displaced by political contexts. Furthermore, through McGillPrather's description of her own experience in the War, The Ballad of Special Ops Cody explicates the ambivalence inwhich US soldiers as individuals may also be victims rather than perpetrators.

RETURN (2004–ongoing)

Video installation RETURN (2004–ongoing), presented on the second floor of the gallery, diverts the unspokenrepression of Iraq through the artist's own autobiographical heritage. Born in Great Neck, New York, Michael Rakowitzgrew up in his maternal grandparents' house surrounded by the most intricate 'installation art': a total assemblageof things, music, and food from Iraq that filled the young artist's senses with the idea of the country. His grandfather,Nissim Isaac David (1899–1975), an Iraqi Jew, fled from Iraq with his family in 1946 to escape the suppression inflamedby Iraqi nationalists with Nazi Germany and eventually settled in Long Island, US. Although Michael Rakowitz has neverbeen to Iraq and perhaps never will, the longing coupled with the vivid memories handed down to him possibly allowedmore space to construct an evocative concept of home, piece by piece.

After settling in the US, his grandfather resumed his import and export company, Davisons & Co., a very successfultrading company in the Middle East, and operated it until the 1960s. In 2004, Michael Rakowitz reopened the businessas a part of the project RETURN (2004–ongoing), initially in the form of a drop box, and then slowly expanding it asa center that provides free shipping for items sent to Iraq. In 2006, it was officially launched as a storefront at 529Atlantic Avenue, Brooklyn. Here, Rakowitz launched what seemed to be an impossible business. After running into acan of Iraqi dates labeled as a product of Lebanon despite the UN sanctions against Iraq (1990–2003) being lifted, hewas determined to import the Iraqi dates into the US. The video component of RETURN documents the entire longwinded process, from the bureaucratic handling to ardent debates at numerous immigration checkpoints.

The timeline of RETURN denotes a record of dates dating back to 50,000 years ago in Iraq, ranging to its significance tothe recent socioeconomic activities of the Iraqi people as the second largest export after oil. Spanning long stretchesof time as both an emblem and part of everyday life, the dates themselves have become an intermediary or a 'dropbox,' through which many Iraqi people's lives were shared and nurtured. And when the wars broke out consecutivelyand those very lives were wounded and killed, so did the dates.

Within a month after the US-led coalition invaded Iraq, the looting of the National Museum of Iraq began. MichaelRakowitz's ongoing effort The invisible enemy should not exist to reappear these stolen artifacts, unfortunately,evolved—including his initiation of conversations about restitution and repatriation with Western institutions—as thecalamities continued. As The invisible enemy should not exist (Northwest Palace of Kalhu) implicates, artifacts and theirorigins that gave pertinent agencies to the individuals living alongside them were upheaved by imperial excavations towars. Their original form or context can never be reconstructed.

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the 2003 Iraq War. And unfortunately, the continuous displacement of peoplesand cultural heritage is not unique to Iraq. How do you move forward without denying the past? Like the scope oftime laid out in RETURN— from 50,000 BC and his grandparents' generation to the present—Rakowitz looks at theobjects that lived alongside people, what looks like the peoples themselves, and brings them to the current as notfrom an archaeological perspective, but to circle it back to the people who were also separated from their homes and legacies. Michael Rakowitz with his studio gave them the shells and skins commonly accessible from everyday life,and the brilliant colours like the blood is flowing through the veins again. Rakowitz has been calling this 'haunting theWest,' not restoration. Between the physical displacement and amnesia, it is through the memories, the ideas of themaccompanied by the immediate context of material culture that they manifest once again, and they are back to haunt.And they are haunting because they were taken away by force, and Rakowitz brings them back to resuscitate what wasotherwise imperceptible.