all about him project

ALL ABOUT HIM project

A-A-H! Campaign 2008
(ALL ABOUT HIM Project)

Project of : Goethe-institut Bulgarien & “39 grama” Newspaper

Project initiated and curated by: Ventsislav Zankov
+359 878 466211
Contact point for contest materials:
materials@a-a-h.info
Project website
http://a-a-h.info

A-A-H! (ALL ABOUT HIM) is a campaign targeting the status of the not-so-fair sex to reveal truth as it is.
A-A-H! (ALL ABOUT HIM) is a deeper look into men and male roots, into male psychology, presence and absence
A-A-H! (ALL ABOUT HIM) won’t fuel the battle of the sexes, and won’t lend a feminine appearance or character to men
A-A-H! (ALL ABOUT HIM) reaches out to men in their prime – fascinating men with character who exude confidence and inner strength
In a nutshell A-A-H! Is all about real men…Stay tuned…

Campaign Highlights:

OUTDOOR
(Sofia downtown area): an outdoor campaign of billboard visions, interpreting the lifestyle of ‘regular’ men today: men that are not the end result of frenzy branding strategies, reality show programmes or Hollywood-style action movies. But rather men in their mid lives, who succeed to live their won ‘brands’ and stay close to their credos. Men who show character, and can make friends with their doubts and weaknesses, men who feel at home with their dreams and disappointments, their success stories and failure paths. Men who know well that strength lurks in weak moments and can bring out the beauty in the conflicting character of male presence.

10 Billboards about men, who don’t relate easily to:
• Gay aesthetics
• Uni & Metrosexuality

10 Billboards about men, who are:
• neither ‘popular’
• nor politicians, football players or sports stars

10 Billboards about men, who are:
• neither health-conscious nor exercise maniacs
• neither ‘fresh’ nor ‘famous’

and still you know they are men when you meet them

10 Billboards, designed in an effort to grasp the existential appeal of male presence: the feel of the lone road and the sadness that keeps men company as they walk through their male lives.

A-A-H! (ALL ABOUT HIM):
Eligibility Requirements and Selection of works for an open-air exhibition, a project catalogue and a billboard campaign.

The contest for the top 10 billboard vision to be produced in the fall of 2008 in the public spaces of Sofia’s downtown area features the following stages

a. application form:[deadline 15april] to be posted and available online on the project website and/or upon request via e-mail (to be confirmed). The application form will include
• artists’ name and family name
• brief Bio data
• artists’ concept outline
• agreement to the remise of authors’ copyright throughout this project’s duration
• Up to 3/tree billboard visuals focused on the A-A-H! theme
a. Preview format specifications: resolution 800х600 pixels, landscape 72 dpi RGB jpg format -
b. Titles and date (year) of artistic work

b. short-list selection: first selection of applicants whose works will be included in the catalogue and the exhibition, planned under this project. format specifications for short-listed billboard visions to be printed: jpg RGB 30х40cm landscape 300 dpi.

c. top 10 selection: the selection of the top 10 billboard visions to be produced and exhibited as A-A-H! Billboards in Sofia’s downtown area
• format specifications for the top 10 billboard visions to be printed: jpg RGB 30х40cm, landscape 720 dpi.

d. A-A-H! Awards:
• The ‘Pedestrian’ award (through online voting to be hosted by the project website):
500 euro
• ‘Ventsislav Zankov’ Grand Jury Award for visual work: 1000 euro

GAMeC

Yan Pei-Ming with Yan Pei-Ming
curated by Giacinto Di Pietrantonio
19 march - 27 JULY 2008

Luca Vitone. at home everywhere
curated by Giacinto Di Pietrantonio, Enrico Lunghi, Martin Sturm
19 march - 18 may 2007

ELDORADO.
Victor Man. On relative loneliness
curated by Alessandro Rabottini
19 march - 18 may 2007

Donations to the Permanent Collection in the New Millennium
19 march - 27 JULY 2008

GAMeC – Galleria d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Bergamo
via S. Tomaso, 53
24121 Bergamo (Italy)
http://www.gamec.it

Opening:
Tuesday 18 March 2008, 6.30 pm
GAMeC, Bergamo

On 18th March GAMeC will present three solo shows dedicated to: Yan Pei-Ming, Luca Vitone and Victor Man the last one is part of Eldorado series GAMeC conceived for the most exciting international emerging artists.

Yan Pei-Ming with Yan Pei-Ming

GAMeC presents the first solo exhibition in an Italian museum dedicated to Yan Pei-Ming.

Twenty large format works - oils and many watercolours - most of them will be shown for the first time to offer the public a chance to see Pei-Ming’s work in an exhibition created around a theme selected by the artist and the curator organized into four sections: Self-portrait with Landscape, Self-portrait with Religion, Self-portrait with Relatives and Self-portrait with Life and Death.

The title suggests the central subject of the exhibition the self-portrait, that is present in each room and is in continuous dialogue with the other subjects displayed. This choice follows from the consideration that every work is in some way a self-portrait of the artist even when it does not directly depict him.

The exhibition underlines the technique the artist uses: painting, as well. In particular his painting makes heavy use of matter and it’s produced with violent brushwork, thus representing a bridge between the East, his origin and the West, his cultural homeland. These two areas are represented by the large oil canvases on the one hand and his watercolours on the other hand. However his painting never makes reference to a precise geographical setting but becomes synonymous with atemporality and non-place: East and West combined in a mixture of styles, elements and subjects. The use of watercolours is important to the artist, he uses it to paint the series of children the life in its early stages and the skulls and self-portrait as a hanged man, and therefore the end of existence.

The show will be accompanied by a bilingual catalogue published by Electa (Milan), with a text by Giacinto Di Pietrantonio.

Luca Vitone. at home everywhere

GAMeC will hold the At Home Everywhere solo exhibition of Luca Vitone, the last stage of a three-part tour planned by GAMeC, the Casino Luxembourg and the O.K. Centrum für Gegenwartskunst in Linz.

The exhibition offers an overview of Vitone’s work since the 1980s from three different angles in each of the three sites it is shown and illustrates the variety of the means he uses: video, installations, photography, sound and performance. Thirteen works investigate the idea of belonging in all its aspects: from the standpoints of geography, culture and identity. The concept of place has always been at the centre of Vitone’s poetics and continues to be the object of his analysis that brings together conceptual rigour, poetry, folklore and history.

For GAMeC Vitone conceived also a sound installation for the public spaces in Bergamo – on show during the last week of the exhibition – and realized with the collaboration of GAMeC’s Mediatori Museali.

A monograph in three languages (English, German and Italian) will accompany the exhibition, with texts by Jimena Blázquez, Stefano Boeri, Emanuela De Cecco, Luca Lo Pinto, Roberto Pinto, Alessandro Rabottini, Astrid Wege, as well as by the three curators, and a conversation between Luca Vitone and Andrea Lissoni.

ELDORADO
Victor Man. On relative loneliness

GAMeC presents the first solo show within an institutional framework dedicated to Victor Man. For the exhibition, the artist has created three new installations in which painting, sculpture, light box, photography and objets trouvés generate a powerfully suggestive experience.

The exhibition is an account told in subtle tones on the senses of loss and death, obsession, desire and fetishism. As in all his exhibitions, in this one too the poetry of the contents has a dual sense: parallel to the sphere of the subjects of the works, Man creates a formal alphabet through which he gives a discourse on the ciphers of pictorial representation and the possibility of visual communication. Each work is part of a wider architecture of meanings and symbols, within which the subtle relationship between objects and images provides a sort of “cinematic” rhythm while still remaining unclear.

The exhibition will have a monographic catalogue that will document a large portion of his artistic output. Published by JRP I Ringier as part of the series “First Monograph”, it contains texts by Yilmaz Dziewior - Director of the Kunstverein in Hamburg, Tom Morton - critic and independent curator, Alessandro Rabottini - Curator at GAMeC and a conversation between Victor Man and Hans Ulrich Obrist - Co-Director of the Serpentine Gallery in London.

Donations to the Permanent Collection in the New Millennium
On the same occasion the public was shown the donations of contemporary works that have enriched the museum’s Permanent Collection since 2000. 29 works by important international artists line the rooms of the second floor: Fabre, Beecroft, Cucchi, Alviani, Basilico, vedovamazzei, Xhafa, Paci, Garutti, Coffin, Cytter, Thomson, Wolfson.

Hours:

Tuesday to Sunday: 10 am -7 pm
Thursday: 10 am -10 pm
Closed Monday

For information:
GAMeC - Galleria d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea
Via San Tomaso, 53
24121 Bergamo_tel. +39 035 270272
fax +39 035 236962
http://www.gamec.it

Press Office
CLP Relazioni Pubbliche
tel. +39 02 433403
http://www.clponline.it
e-mail: info@clponline.it

Images Above:

IMAGE ON THE LEFT:
Yan Pei-Ming
Mao, 2005
oil on canvas
300 x 300 cm
MAXXI Arte Collection, MAXXI Museo nazionale delle arti del XXI secolo
photo: André Morin

IMAGE IN THE MIDDLE :
Luca Vitone
Nulla da dire solo da essere, 2004
21 flags
130×180 cm each
installation view, detail: Galleria Emi Fontana, Milan, 2004
photo: Roberto Marossi
Courtesy Galleria Emi Fontana, Milan

IMAGE ON THE RIGHT:
Victor Man
Untitled (Wolf), 2007
mixed media
47×40x24 cm
installation view Wessen Geschichte, Kunstverein, Hamburg
photo: Fred Dott, Hamburg
Courtesy Galerie Johnen + Schöttle, Köln