Artipedia - Arts News

Guerra de la Paz, The Kiss (from the GI Joe Series), digital print, 2006

Jakob Boeskov, Margot Herster, Tessa Hughes-Freeland, Fawad Khan, Ellen Lake, Rebecca Loyche, Guerra de la Paz, Francesco Simeti, Nick Waplington

Exit Art wants to tell you war stories through the vision of nine international artists. Love/War/Sex considers memory, history, weapons and personal stories. As a cultural center, it is our mission to reflect what is going on in our society. We want to respond to current global conflicts by presenting this exhibition, Love/War/Sex, a comment on our culture’s fascination with, and addiction to, war. The title itself demonstrates the paradox of what war is, a combination of emotions, passions and idealistic convictions. Love/War/Sex considers the conflation of those basic human instincts—a toxic combination manifested in images and stories coming out of Iraq. This exhibition connects longing with violence and love with war, imagining the business of war in all its sensual manifestations. War, love and sex demand the same thing - commitment, and the purpose of this exhibition is to tell the story of these relationships.

Exit Art is known for its unique exhibitions and installation designs that heighten the concepts of the shows. The installation of Love/War/Sex, conceived by Papo Colo, is an innovation in exhibition design and presentation, in part for its inclusion of real weapons of war. Choosing these objects, these “readymades”, and applying their historical contexts to the exhibition, creates an environment that provokes, surprises, assaults and confronts you with the real tools of war. They are not simply objects on display; they were intended to kill people in battle. Hearkening back to Leonardo da Vinci, who designed weapons for a living, by exhibiting the weapons as art one can experience both the extraordinary craftsmanship and design of these killing machines.

Another installation approach was to wallpaper the exhibition space with texts of personal experiences of the war. This allows the viewer/reader to evoke images from the text. Here, the force of the narrative replaces the object and gives the viewer another kind of visual imagination, creating a sacred space for meditation. Taken from newspapers, magazines and soldiers’ blogs, these chronicles make one think of war in terms of intimate personal stories.

The juxtaposition of these weapons and the wall papered texts creates a stage for the exhibition and the public. The exhibition incorporates video, sculpture, wallpaper, and a selection of weapons and military vehicles on loan from the Military Museum of Southern New England in Danbury, CT.

ARTISTS
Jakob Boeskov’s apocalyptic video War Wizard depicts lustful soldiers and their “wizard” enemy as they invade a little boy’s dreams. The “wizard”, who embodies at once Jesus, Osama bin Laden and an Iraqi prisoner, is tortured with sex and violence by dancing soldiers. Margot Herster presents an insider view of Guantanamo politics with This is an introduction tape, a video of the families of detainees telling their relatives to trust the lawyers representing them. Referencing sports and porn as stimulants, Tessa Hughes-Freeland’s ‘educational’ video Watch Out! explains how explicit films can warp the minds of young men. Fawad Khan fuses car culture with war imagery to create a sexy but violent wall painting that evokes the chaos of a suicide bombing. Ellen Lake’s short film Betty + Johnny combines digital video and home movies shot in the 1930s and 40s to tell the story of a love lost during World War II. Rebecca Loyche’s three-channel video installatio!
n,
All’s Fair in Love and War, is a disturbing portrait of a weapons specialist who teaches military personnel how to kill. The unnamed subject of the short videos describes in detail the tools and methods employed to kill during combat. Guerra de la Paz presents Crawl, a cloth sculpture of a dying soldier, and The Kiss, an intimate photograph of toy army men in an embrace. Francesco Simeti’s Watching the War combines explosion clouds and images of the war in Afghanistan to create deceptively ornate wallpaper. Nick Waplington’s photographs juxtapose images of war and the Iraqi landscape with keg parties and families in America to offer a telling glimpse into life at the war front and back at home.

Curated by Jeanette Ingberman and Papo Colo.

ABOUT EXIT ART
Exit Art is an independent vision of contemporary culture. We are prepared to react immediately to important issues that affect our lives. We do experimental, historical and unique presentations of aesthetic, social, political and environmental issues. We absorb cultural differences that become prototype exhibitions. We are a center for multiple disciplines. Exit Art is a 25 year old cultural center in New York City founded by Directors Jeanette Ingberman and Papo Colo, that has grown from a pioneering alternative art space, into a model artistic center for the 21st century committed to supporting artists whose quality of work reflects the transformations of our culture. Exit Art is internationally recognized for its unmatched spirit of inventiveness and consistent ability to anticipate the newest trends in the culture. With a substantial reputation for curatorial innovation and depth of programming in diverse media, Exit Art is always on the verge of change.

EXHIBITION SUPPORT
General exhibition support provided by Carnegie Corporation, Jerome Foundation, New York State Council on the Arts, Starry Night Fund at The Tides Foundation, Exit Art’s Board of Trustees and our members. Public programs support provided by The New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. Special thanks to Sam Johnson and the Military Museum of Southern New England in Danbury, Connecticut.

GENERAL INFORMATION
Exit Art is located at 475 Tenth Avenue, corner of 36th Street. Exit Art is open each Tuesday through Thursday, 10 am – 6 pm; Friday, 10 am – 8 pm; Saturday, noon – 8 pm.
Closed Sunday and Monday. There is a suggested donation of $5.

For more information please call 212-966-7745 or visit http://www.exitart.org

Las Vegas Diaspora

http://www.lasvegasartmuseum.org/exhibitions.shtml

The Las Vegas Art Museum (LVAM) celebrates the arts in Las Vegas with the exhibition Las Vegas Diaspora: The Emergence of Contemporary Art from the Neon Homeland. The exhibition features artists who have been recognized for artistic achievement after earning degrees in studio art at UNLV (the University of Nevada, Las Vegas). Organized by Las Vegas critic and curator Dave Hickey, the exhibition will showcase a selection of artworks by 26 artists who work in a variety of media. All of the featured artists studied with Hickey between 1990 and 2001, when Hickey taught art theory and criticism in the Department of Art at UNLV. Hickey now serves in the English Department at UNLV as Schaeffer Professor of Modern Letters.
According to LVAM Director Libby Lumpkin, many of the artists included in the exhibition are highly accomplished: “The Museum of Modern Art in New York has acquired works by two of the artists for its permanent collection. Other Diaspora artists have had solo exhibitions at major museums, including the Tate Modern in London, the Los Angeles County Museum, Kemper Museum, UCLA’s Hammer Museum, and the Cue Foundation in New York. Most Diaspora artists exhibit their works in established galleries in New York or Los Angeles. Many show regularly in Paris, London, Cologne, Milan, Tokyo, and other international art centers.” Lumpkin adds, “Dave Hickey gave many of the artists their start by including them in exhibitions he organized around the country. He was the logical choice to organize the exhibition.”

The exhibition is accompanied by a catalog published by The Las Vegas Art Museum and BrightCity Books. The fully illustrated catalog features an essay by Dave Hickey, and individual artist entries.

The exhibition is made possible by LVAM’s Joyce Mack Exhibitions Fund and James and Michelle Zeiter Exhibitions Fund. Patron support is provided by Wally Goodman and Patrick Duffy, Robin and Danny Greenspun, Thomas and Bonnie Lawyer, Dana and Greg Lee - Eureka Casinos, Joyce Mack, Manpower of Southern Nevada, Inc., Blanche and Phil Meisel, Jim and Beverly Rogers, and Jim and Michelle Zeiter.

Casco. Office for Art,
Design and Theory

Casco Publications 2007/2008
Casco
Office for Art, Design and Theory
Nieuwekade 213-215
3511 RW Utrecht
The Netherlands

http://www.cascoprojects.org

Casco Issues X: The Great Method
This issue of Casco’s annual magazine addresses the question of methodology in artistic practice, focusing on the presence or absence of methods, their ideological connotations and historical backgrounds, in order to examine some of the conditions that surround contemporary art production.

Edited by Peio Aguirre and Emily Pethick
Contributions by Peio Aguirre, Stuart Bailey, Richardo Basbaum, Martin Beck, Copenhagen Free University, Stephan Dillemuth, Falke Pisano, Florian Pumhösl, Wendelien van Oldenborgh, Stephen Willats and Haegue Yang

Designed by Julia Born and Laurenz Brunner

Co-published by Casco and Revolver, Frankfurt http://www.revolverlag.de
ISBN 978-3-86588-407-7

The so-called utopia of the centre beaubourg — An interpretation
Luca Frei
Appearing in 1976 under the pseudonym Gustave Affeulpin, and coinciding with the inauguration of the Centre Beaubourg in Paris, Albert Meister’s fictional text imagines a radical libertarian space submerged beneath the newly erected centerpiece of French culture. This is the first translation and publication of the text in English, a project undertaken by the artist Luca Frei in order to revitalise a significant
cultural treatise.

Designed by Luca Frei

Co-published by Casco and Book Works, London http://www.bookworks.org.uk
ISBN 978 1 870699 99 0

About the Relative Size of Things in the Universe
Martin Beck
A document of Martin Beck’s video work of the same title showing the assembly and disassembly of the seminal 1948 Struc-Tube exhibition system by the American Designer George Nelson. The book contextualises the work within contemporary artistic practice and elaborate on aspects of sovereignty and control in modern exhibition history.

Texts by Martin Beck, Bill Horrigan and Emily Pethick

Designed by Martin Beck

Co-published by Casco and Four Corners Books, London http://www.fourcornersbooks.co.uk
ISBN: 978-0-9545025-5-3

COMING IN 2008

What’s Left to it’s own Devices (on reclamation)
Dave Hullfish Bailey
Using non-linear heuristic methods and experimental webs of information to draw links between the cities of Utrecht, and Slab City, California, USA, this book brings together speculative proposals that ask basic questions about public space, conceived as a physical and conversational sphere; thinking about how they are produced? To what ends might they be colonized? How they intersect the realization of personal freedoms? And how might ambiguous or unstable positions be opened up between them and ‘private’ spheres of thought or deed?

Texts by Lars Bang Larsen, Jan Tumlir and Emily Pethick

Designed by Stuart Bailey

Co-published by Casco and Sternberg Press, New York/Berlin http://www.sternbergpress.com
ISBN: 978-1-933128-36-8

Hidden Curriculum
Annette Krauss
A document of Annette Krauss’ project ‘Hidden Curriculum’ that looks at the unrecognized and unintended knowledge, values and beliefs that are part of the learning process in schools. Produced in collaboration with two groups of 15-17 year old students, it focuses on actions that go beyond existing norms and show creative and productive ways of navigating through everyday life in high school.

Texts by Thomas Alkemeyer, Celine Condorelli, Fiona Parry, and a conversation between Annette Krauss, Marina Vishmidt and Emily Pethick

Designed by Julia Born and Laurenz Brunner

Co-published by Casco and Episode Publishers, Rotterdam http://www.episode-publishers.nl
ISBN: 978-90-5973-088-5

Orders can be made through the above-mentioned publishers

Casco’s publications have been supported by the America Center Foundation, Arts Council England, Bunderministerium für Kunst und Kultur, Fentener van Vlissingen Fonds, Fonds voor Amateur en Podiumkunsten, Gemeente Utrecht, Land Vorarlberg, Mondriaan Foundation, Prins
Bernhard Cultuurfonds

Mudam Luxembourg

João Tabarra, Moon Watcher’s defeat, 2007.
Video projection, Stereo sound.
Galeria Graçao Brandão-Porto-Lisboa

PORTUGAL AGORA — À propos des lieux d’origine
16 December 2007 to 7 April 2008
Musée d’Art Moderne
Grand-Duc Jean
Mudam Luxembourg
3, Park Dräi Eechelen
L-1499 Luxembourg
t. +352 45 37 85 1
info@mudam.lu

http://www.mudam.lu

Since the Carnation Revolution in 1974 which marked the end of an authoritarian regime that had been in place for more than forty years, artistic creation in Portugal has not ceased to evolve and accelerate. If migration was an essential condition to exist for the outstanding figures of the art scene of the 60s and 70s, things started to change in the 80s. Those years saw the emergence of tutelary figures who managed to break into the international scene without having to become exiles. Today, this reality continues to be stated through the singular identity of artists capable of constantly reinventing their own models. The necessity of settling elsewhere to exist has mutated into an active participation in contemporary debate, and if, henceforth, certain artists live in London, Berlin or Paris, they are no longer exiles but are integrated into a global artistic community.

The exhibition PORTUGAL AGORA — À propos des lieux d’origine provides an outside view of the contemporary scene of a country. The Portuguese community represents a significant proportion of the population of Luxembourg and greatly contributes to the dynamism of the Grand Duchy. However, it remains culturally under-represented and its contemporary production is too often ignored. Consequently, the creation of PORTUGAL AGORA seemed to be an obvious step as the quality, dynamism and diversity of current artistic production deserves more exposure. The guiding principle of this project, that brings together 38 artists, is about meeting, exchanging and the idea of opening. The exhibition offers a voyage through the work of artists from different generations and hailing from a variety of horizons. It proposes a succession of views that are critical, inspired, difficult or out of step but which are always pertinent and conscious of the issues that drive the contemporary world.

A catalogue created by Marco Godinho, a Portuguese artist who lives and works in Luxembourg, is being published for the exhibition. In this publication, conceived as a sketchbook, Godinho poses questions concerning place and origin, delocalisation and ties and establishes a cartography of artists participating in Portugal Agora. The book also includes texts by Natxo Checa, Oscar Faria, João Fernandes.

Exhibition curated by: Clément Minighetti, Marie-Claude Beaud, Björn Dahlström

Artists: Helena Almeida, Felipe Oliveira Baptista, Miguel Branco, Fernando Brízio, Pedro Cabrita Reis, Isabel Carvalho, Filipa César, Gil Heitor Cortesão, Pedro Costa, José Pedro Croft, Luísa Cunha, Alexandre Estrela, João Paulo Feliciano, Marco Godinho, Margarida Gouveia, João Maria Gusmão & Pedro Paiva, Ricardo Jacinto, Rui Moreira, Paulo Nozolino, João Onofre, Bruno Pacheco, Miguel Palma, João Penalva, João Queiroz, Jorge Queiroz, Paula Rego, Rigo 23, Miguel Ângelo Rocha, Mafalda Santos, Sancho Silva, Ângelo de Sousa, Pedro Sousa Vieira, João Tabarra, Rui Toscano, Franciso Tropa, João Pedro Vale, Joana Vasconcelos

With the support of Fondation Calouste Gulbenkian, TAP PORTUGAL and Instituto Camões Portugal.

Mudam thanks all the donors and sponsors, and particularly the Banque de Luxembourg, the Leir Foundation, Inc., KBL European Private Bankers and Cargolux for their generosity.

Opening hours
from 11am to 6pm
Wednesday from 11am to 8pm
closed Tuesday

Press contact
presse@mudam.lu

49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine

Patrick Neu, Ailes de cire, 2007
Collection of the artist.
Copyright: Patrick Neu
Photo : Rémi Villaggi.

The moment that never ends
December 8, 2007 - March 9, 2008
49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine
1bis rue des Trinitaires, F-57000 Metz.
Tel : +0033 (0)3 87 74 20 02
info@fraclorraine.org

http://www.fraclorraine.org

“One must learn to love the irreversible,” or at least enjoy it. What is existence if not an attempt to seize the moment, to subvert the flow of time, to defy it, or, in a word, to appropriate its ineluctable passing? Some, more than others, have developed an acute consciousness of time and offer us a sensory experience of it: to try to inhabit a moment by recording it, to translate through writing the time as it passes–day, month, year, hour, minute, second–in order to touch eternity with one’s finger as does Jean-Christophe Norman, or to fix on fragile supports (crystal, butterfly wings) silhouettes and figures that may vanish at any moment, as does Patrick Neu. If–in the tradition of vanitas–absence, trace, disappearance, finitude are recurrent themes in the work of these two artists, their evocation of the ephemeral offers above all a glimpse onto the infinite and the sublime, a unique and intense experience of the present. With poetry and subversion their works
take on their own fragility and their own
possible disappearance.

The slow and elusive trickling of the sand in Paul Kos’s hourglass, which represents the length of the exhibition; Éric Poitevin’s and Hiroshi Sugimoto’s enigmatic images set the rhythm to the journey through the exhibition and extend an invitation to meditation and exploration of the moment.

Featured artists:
Patrick Neu
Jean-Christophe Norman
Including works from the Frac Lorraine Collection by: Paul Kos, Eric Poitevin, Hiroshi Sugimoto

Partner: Patrick Neu’s works are displayed in partnership with CEAAC (Centre européen d’actions artistiques contemporaines) in Strasbourg.
http://www.ceaac.org

OPENING HOURS //
Wednesday through Sunday, 12-7pm and Thursday 1-8pm.
Admission free.
Guided tours available free of charge Thursdays from 7 to 8pm and Sundays 5 to 6pm.
Group visits are available by appointment. Call 00 33(0)3 87 74 55 00.

SPRING 2008 //
Edition of a monograph dedicated to Patrick Neu
Bilingual French/English

Texts: Didier Semin, art historian, teacher in ENSBA, Paris, (National School for Fine Arts)
Edition: Frac Lorraine with the collaboration of CEAAC, Strasbourg