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The Museum of Modern Art, New York

Projects 85: Dan Perjovschi
WHAT HAPPENED TO US?

May 2–August 27, 2007

Exhibition organized by Roxana Marcoci, Curator, Department of Photography

For his first solo museum exhibition in the United States, the Romanian artist Dan Perjovschi was invited to create a large-scale drawing installation at The Museum of Modern Art, New York, executed over a period of two weeks directly onto the wall of The Donald B. and Catherine C. Marron Atrium. Inspired by current events reported on television and in newspaper and tabloid headlines, Perjovschi explores political topics, including the Middle East conflict and the recent extension of the European Union. Through concise phrases and wordplay, his sketches and skits portray reality with a sense of criticality and pointed humor. The work’s rhetorical title, WHAT HAPPENED TO US?, offers a textual pun, in which US may refer either to the subjective pronoun “us” or to the proper noun “United States of America.”

Perjovschi’s drawings have been widely disseminated—from the walls of museums to the pages of newspapers. Since 1990, following the demise of Communism in Eastern Europe and the dismantling of the Berlin Wall, the artist has contributed hundreds of witty and incisive observations to literary and political journals, such as Contrapunct and 22. The latter was the first independent oppositional weekly published in Romania in the aftermath of the Democratic Revolution. Taking its name from the date December 22, 1989, the historic day on which Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu was ousted from power, 22 is the brainchild of the Group of Social Dialogue, a think tank of dissident writers, artists, and philosophers who endorse freedom of expression and human rights. As an illustrator for 22, and as its former art director, Perjovschi has transformed drawing into a medium of information and political commentary. Expressing complex ideas in rapidly executed, off-the-cuff drawings, Pe
rjovschi’s installation proposes that art can be engaged without being moralistic.

To read an interview with Dan Perjovschi, please visit the Museum’s Web site at http://www.moma.org/projects .

The exhibition is accompanied by a free newspaper created by the artist.

The Projects series is made possible by the Elaine Dannheisser Projects Endowment Fund and by The Junior Associates of The Museum of Modern Art and the JA Endowment Committee.

Special thanks to the Romanian Cultural Institute, New York

For press inquiries, please contact Kim Donica at 212.708.9752 or kim_donica@moma.org

For more information go to: http://www.moma.org/projects

Portuguese Pavilion at the 52nd Venice Biennial

Ângela Ferreira
MAISON TROPICALE

curated by Jürgen Bock

10 June – 21 November 2007
Fondaco Marcello (Grand Canal)

official opening reception:
8 June 2007 from 6 to 8 p.m.

http://www.iartes.pt/veneza2007

Ângela Ferreira will present a new work especially developed for the Portuguese Pavilion at the Venice Biennial 2007. The exhibition is curated by Jürgen Bock.

Maison Tropicale consists of a large-scale installation, which includes sculptural and documentary elements alluding to colonial history and to contemporary colonial phenomena.

Ângela Ferreira’s oeuvre can be situated conceptually between the failure of modernism in the so-called centres, and the conflicting impact of colonizers attempting to implement modernism across Africa. The critical proposition of her objects is not upfront, but simmers subtly below the surface of her aesthetically compelling sculptures, offering a space between the ‘object and the political’, a space for the viewer to occupy.

Born in the then Portuguese colony of Mozambique in 1958, Ângela Ferreira studied in apartheid South Africa and has lived in Portugal and South Africa since the early 1990s. This complexity constitutes the root of all her work. Her ‘in between’ status – inherent to the identity of many Portuguese – drives her intense exploration of different universes in centres and peripheries, highlighting the importance of perspective.

The Portuguese Pavilion is located at the Fondaco Marcello on the banks of the Grand Canal, a two-minute walk from the Palazzo Grassi between the Accademia and Rialto bridges.

A bi-lingual publication will be launched at the opening of the Pavilion. The catalogue offers extensive documentation on Ângela Ferreira’s Maison Tropicale and will contain essays by Jürgen Bock, Manthia Diawara, Andrew Renton and Gertrud Sandqvist.

Mali born film-maker and Professor at New York University Manthia Diawara is directing a documentary film around the project Maison Tropicale. The film is co-financed by the Ministry of Culture / Institute of the Arts and will be premiered in Spring 2008.

The Portuguese Pavilion is organised and financed by the Portuguese Ministry of Culture / Institute of the Arts.

Portuguese Pavilion
Fondaco Marcello
San Marco 3415 (Calle dei Garzoni), 30124 Venezia
Vaporetto 1 Sant’ Angelo; Vaporetto 82 San Samuele;
Traghetto from San Tomà to the pier next to Pavilion;
Direct water taxi landing at the terrace of the Pavilion.

For further information please contact the International Press Office of the Portuguese Pavilion:
European Art Projects
Anne Maier
T. +49 30 30 38 18 37
F. +49 30 69 81 94 15
E: portuguese.pavilion@european-art-projects.eu
http://www.iartes.pt/veneza2007

For more information go to: http://www.iartes.pt/veneza2007

Tate Modern

THIS DAY: Recent Film and Video from the Middle East
4 – 13 May 2007
Tate Modern

This Day is a series of short films and video works by international artists whose work responds to the cultural, social, historical and political contexts of the Middle East.

Nine screenings will present work by more than forty artists from Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Palestine and Syria, in addition to artists from Europe and the United States whose work relates to the Middle East. Featured highlights include an opening performance by Rabih Mroué and a survey of work by Akram Zaatari.

The ongoing events in the Middle East produce a flow of images that often represent war, destruction and conflict. Channelled through television and the internet, this imagery constructs and distorts the global understanding of the region, facilitating stereotypes and contaminating efforts to reconstruct a collective memory left in ruins. This Day hopes to challenge these representations by showing moving image work that offers new critical viewpoints onto the region’s rich visual culture. More than ever before, film and video-making from the Middle East interrogates cineamtic and photographic images to consider fundamental ethical and political problems and to question the limits of freedom.

Curated by Predrag Pajdic & Samar Martha.

Supported by Arts Council England, The Henry Moore Foundation, the British Council, Visiting Arts, and the Arts Club

For full programme details visit http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/eventseducation/film/thisdayformerlyinfocus.htm

Rabih Mroué: Make me Stop Smoking
Friday 4 May 2007, 19.00
This Day opens with a live performance by renowned Lebanese artist Rabih Mroué.

Play
Saturday 5 May 2007, 15.00
Experimental video works by artists Abdullatif Abdul Hamid, Yasmeen Al Awadi, Mounira Al Solh, Anthony Abu Khalife and Khaled Hafez.

Travellers’ Tales: Programme One
Saturday 5 May 2007, 17.00
A programme about travelling, migration, borders and checkpoints including work by Rowan Al Faqih, Maja Bejevic, Annemarie Jacir & Nassim Amouche, Hala ElKoussy, Ayreen Anastas, Sameh Zobi and Enas Muthafar.

Travellers’ Tales: Programme Two
Saturday 5 May 2007, 19.00

Breaking News
Sunday 6 May 2007, 17.00
A programme about conflict, war and loss, featuring Ali Cheri, Shadi Habib Allah, Mohamad Hjoeij, Hicham Jaber, Diane Nerwen, Jackie Saloum and Annemarie Jacir.

Reality Check
Friday 11 May 2007, 19.00
Taking stock of everyday concerns and behaviours: love, seduction, social manners and gossip. Artists include Akram Ashqar, Mohammed Hammad, Larissa Sansour, Sharif Waked, Ahmed Khaled and Nisreen Khodr.

Akram Zaatari: Programme One
Saturday 12 May 2007, 17.00
Retrospective presenting short films and videos by Akram Zaatari, an artist and curator based in Beirut, whose work examines the conflicts, images and documents that have shaped the Lebanese condition.

Akram Zaatari: Programme Two
Saturday 12 May 2007, 19.00

Replay
Sunday 13 May 2007, 19.00
Programme examining the nature of memory and knowledge with work by artists Shady El Noshokaty, Mereille Astore, Lamia Joreige, Nadim Kufi, Rabih Mroueh, Lina Saneh, Mario Rizzi, and Omar Amiralay.

All Programmes will take place in the Starr Auditorium, Tate Modern.

Tate Modern
Bankside
London SE1 9TG
http://www.tate.org.uk

Book tickets online, or call +44 (0)20 7887 8888

For more information go to: http://www.tate.org.uk