International contemporary artists produce unique works for Istanbul

NEW MEDIA ART FESTIVAL INSTALLATION

Akbank art centre, Istanbul continues with its exhibition “The Rhythm of Istanbul“, in collaboration with the Akbank Jazz festival. Marking the twentieth anniversary of this world renowned music festival, it will feature installations by six internationally acclaimed artists working in sound and new media.

Julian Opie, 'Rod and Verity Walking', 2010, lightbox installation. Image courtesy of Akbank Art Centre.

Curator Gisela Winkelhofer is using the commission to approach the use of sound and rhythm and to explore how movement combines with the architectural spaces of the festival, shedding new light on the confrontation between mass media and the individual.

Angela Bulloch, 'Progression of 8 Peverted Pixels', 2008, 7 DMX modules, 1 black box module. plexiglas, printed aluminium panels, DMX cables, 1 RGB lighting system DMX controller, size 52 x 52 x 52 to 62 x 70 x 62 cm. Image courtesy of Akbank Art Centre.

Accordingly, artists with a reputation for transforming the spatial encounter will be present. Canadian-born Berlin-based Angela Bulloch is showing her Progression of 8 Perverted Pixels (2008), taking the light transmitted from ordinary TV programmes, abstracting them beyond recognition and projecting them as shape-changing beams.

Specially commissioned by the festival, Tony Oursler‘s new work also evokes the spectator’s virtual relation to their surroundings. Both movement within the work and the transgression of different media takes central place in the exhibition. Another new work Rod and Verity Walking (2010) by Julian Opie positions itself on the fringes of two distinct mediums, in this case film and drawing.

Tony Oursler, 'Marlboro, Camel, Winston, Parliament, Salem, Marlboro Light, American Spirit', 2009, PVC tubes, video projection, dimensions varied. Image courtesy of Akbank Art Centre.

HG/KN/HH

Related Topics: festival, installation, sound art, crossover art

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Russian-born Lena Liv captures Moscow’s socialist subways in Tel Aviv museum show

PHOTOGRAPHY INSTALLATION LIGHT BOXES MUSEUM SHOWS RUSSIA ISRAEL ITALY

Artist Lena Liv takes her shots in the early morning, capturing various Moscow subway stations before people crowd the architecture. Her interest in these Stalin-era “palaces for the Proletariat” may stem from a need to capture examples of the city’s “show architecture”, remnants of a building style that once mirrored state ideologies.

Russian-born, Liv has returned to her homeland after many years living and working in Italy and Israel. Her photographic installations, capturing as they do the extraordinary in the everyday, are now on show at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art in an exhibition titled “Cathedrals for the Masses | Lena Liv: Moscow Metro“.

Lena Liv, 'Taganskaya', 2006-2009, transparency on glass, fluorescent light, wood and metal construction. This station was opened on 1 January, 1950 and is themed on medieval architecture. Image courtesy of Tel Aviv Museum of Art.

The museum summarises the exhibition on its website:

“Lena Liv’s lens exposes a paradox in the metro’s heroic building work: on the one hand, the buildings were meant to contain within their monumental dimensions a human body in search of domestication; on the other hand, this is building whose far-reaching ideology sought to turn Moscow from an ancient capital to the center of world Proletariat—to sow the “seeds of the new, socialist Moscow,” in the words of the journalists of the time. Above all, it seems that Lena Liv’s works testify that this show architecture was the first sprouts of a city that never materialized.”

Cathedrals for the Masses | Lena Liv: Moscow Metro is curated by Prof. Mordechai Omer and runs in collaboration with Centro per l’arte contemporanea Luigi Pecci, Prato, Italy. The exhibition runs until 9 October this year.

Lena Liv 'Grand Mayakovskaya', 2006-2009, transparency on glass, fluorescent light, wood and metal construction. This station was opened on 11 September, 1938 and is considered a masterpiece of Soviet Art Deco. It won the 1939 Grand Prize at the New York World's Fair. Image courtesy of Tel Aviv Museum of Art.

Lena Liv, 'Elektrovodskaya 1 and 2', 2005-2006, transparency on glass, fluorescent light, wood and metal construction. This station was opened on 15 May, 1944 and is themed on the home front struggle of the Great Patriotic War. It was the winner of the 1946 Stalin Prize. Image courtesy of Tel Aviv Museum of Art.

Lena Liv, 'Novokuznetskaya', 2006-2009, transparency on glass, fluorescent light, wood and metal construction. This station was opened on 20 November, 1943 and is themed on WWII. It was built as a monument to Soviet military valor. Image courtesy of Tel Aviv Museum of Art.

KN/HH

Related Topics: Russian artists, Israeli artists, European artists, photography, light art, museum shows

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International artists reflect on controversial New Delhi face-lift

POLITICAL ART SOCIAL ART EXHIBITIONS INDIA RESIDENCIES SPORT EVENT

As so often happens when cities are granted the right to host a major sporting event, New Dehli is undergoing a sometimes controversial face-lift in preparation for the Commonwealth Games. New Delhi artists, as recently reported in The Washington Post, have entered the debate currently raging among lawmakers, the media, activists and sports figures over some aspects of the city’s planning and construction for the event.

A government commission recently issued a report critical of the city’s new construction. Human rights activists say thousands of slums have been demolished, and they warn that the games are creating deep social divisions. The Washington Post

Work by resident artist Becky Brown, part of Religare Arts.i's "The Transforming State. Image courtesy of Religare Arts.i.

The article details the work of three of the sixteen Indian and international artists whose artworks appear in a Religare Arts.i exhibition titled “The Transforming State“, the culmination of a two-month residency programme. It also contains comments from members of the public and arts professionals involved in organisation of the exhibition.

“The white-columned colonial architecture was built to impose order on the city during the British rule. Over the years, it yellowed, grayed and changed with use. It had the look of a natural, inhabited place,” said Malik, adjusting his retro-spectacles. “I find it odd that they are now restoring it to its original whiteness for the games.” Jitesh Malik, as quoted in The Washington Post

“The whole city is a work in progress. We are told to bear with the mess for the sake of the beauty that will come during the games. Now that mess has come into the art gallery,” Umesh Kumar, who attended the program’s preview, said with a wry smile. “The artists have spoken, but their message does not bring much comfort.” The Washington Post

Artists who participated in the residency and exhibition include Becky Brown, Brad Biancardi, Garima Jayadevan, Greg Jones, Jitesh Malik, Kavita Singh Kale, Kustav Nag, Megha Katyal, Nidhi Khurana, Onishi Yasuaki, Purnna Behera, Raffaella Della Olga and Rajesh KR Singh.

Read the full article here.

KN

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This is Hong Kong: video art exhibition highlights differences between Hong Kong and the mainland

HONG KONG VIDEO ART MOVING IMAGE

Hong Kong’s identity revealed through moving image

Hong Kong: a Chinese city, a territory, a post-colonial state. Since China regained sovereignty of the area from Britain in 1997, Hong Kong has been struggling to define its identity. In the internationally touring video programme, This is Hong Kong, participating artists have used moving image to provide a visual portrait of today’s political, social and architectural Hong Kong.

Kingsley Ng, Record Light, 2008

Hong Kong’s recent history has been very different to that of mainland China; from the mid-1800s to 1997 it was under British rule. Now returned to Chinese control, the territory is struggling with issues of identity common to many postcolonial states. It is in a unique position, as China has continued to allow the “special administrative region” cultural and economic freedoms that are not available on the mainland.

Chilai Howard Cheng, Doors, 2008

This is Hong Kong aims to show just how different the area is from the mainland and sees moving image as the medium with which to do it. It showcases 16 video works by 15 contemporary Hong Kong artists; these renowned artists are Chow Chun Fai, S.T. Choi Sai Ho, Silas Fong, Ip Yuk-Yiu, Linda Lai, Leung Mee Ping, MAP Office, Adrian Wong, Kacey Wong, Woo Ling ling, Ban Zhang, Kingsley Ng, Hung Keung, Leung Chi Wo and Chilai Howard Cheng. The four sections of the exhibition, (Transitional) Architecture, Diaries, Fictions and Tactile Positions, each deal with a different side of the city, and represent the different strategies developed by the artists.

Images of traditional neighbourhoods, unique architecture, underground communities, postcolonial identity and “life in the big city” all combine in videos with strong, compelling soundtracks. This is Hong Kong helps the viewer to build an overall picture of what it’s like to live in one of the most important economic and cultural metropolises in the world.

Silas Fong, When The Door Opens, 2008

This is Hong Kong is supported by Hong Kong-based Para/Site Art Space, a non-profit art organization headed by Executive Director and Curator, Alvaro Rodriguez Fominaya. Fominaya is also the curator of the exhibition and believes it “is a great opportunity to show at an international level the vibrant art scene of Hong Kong”.

After being successfully shown at LOOP Festival in Barcelona, Spain, the programme made its way to LOOP Alternative Space in Seoul, Korea, Hamburg’s Subvision Festival, EastSide Projects, Birmingham, and IFA Gallery, Berlin.

This is Hong Kong is currently showing at the Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts in Taipei, Taiwan, and will conclude at Kunsthalle Wien, Austria, in March this year.

Visit the exhibition page on the Para/Site Art Space website for more details on individual videos. Curator Alvaro Rodriguez Fominaya can be contacted directly through this site. Fominaya also writes his own informative blog – visit it here.

KN/KCE

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