Biography
For the 9th Sharjah Biennial Sophie Ernst created a video installation as part of a long-term project called HOME that investigates the notion of an 'ideal place' that lives as a memory from the recent or more distant past. In the first stage of this project in 2006, she explored how Indians and Pakistanis remembered the physical spaces they had left behind during the Partition of 1947. For her work in the Sharjah Biennial, Ernst focused on the architectural memories of Palestinians in Ramallah.
Ernst received the Golden Cube for best installation at the Kasseler DocFest, Germany (2009). She has had solo presentations at Babush Project Space, Berlin (2009) and Abguss Sammlung Antiker Plastik, Berlin (2005), and group presentations including at the Sharjah Biennial (2009), the Royal Geographical Society, London (2008), Pakistan Pavilion, Dubai (2008), National Art Gallery, Islamabad (2007) and Apeejay Media Gallery, New Delhi (2004).
Ernst trained as an industrial mechanic at BMW before graduating from the Rijksakademie voor Beeldende Kunst, Amsterdam, in 2000. She has been Assistant Professor at the School of Visual Arts, Beaconhouse National University, Lahore, Pakistan for several years and is currently a doctoral candidate at Leiden University, Amsterdam. Since receiving a grant from the Prince Bernhard Cultural Foundation for travel to Pakistan in 2003, Ernst has lived and worked between Europe and Asia.
October 2010
This person was part of Sharjah Biennial 9
