Artipedia - Arts News

Norwegian Opera House

OFFICIAL INAUGURATION
THE ART PROJECTS IN THE NEW NORWEGIAN OPERA HOUSE
OSLO, MONDAY 7th APRIL

http://www.operautsmykking.no

The new Norwegian Opera House, designed by internationally acclaimed Snoarc Architects, opens to the public 12th April. An exclusive presentation of the art works and the artists behind them will take place 7th April.

The projects differ widely – some are completely integrated into the structure of the building, and the artists have worked very closely with the architects. Some are partly integrated into the building, and others are completely autonomous art works, sited outside the building itself.

Contributing artists:

Kristian Blystad, Jorunn Sannes, Kalle Grude (Norway) – Outer reception area and roof: The project has consisted of working with the Opera’s marble surface as a sculptural form, as a visual interaction, and looking at it in terms of activity and function in close collaboration with the architects.

Lövaas & Wagle (Norway) - Metal facades and stage tower: In collaboration with the architects the artists designed 6000 square metres of aluminium cladding. Stamped concave and convex points create a pattern based upon a woven structure. Eight different panels form a repeat pattern that covers the production area of the Opera House.

Ludvig Löfgren and Linus Elmes (Sweden) – Foundation stone: Hyperoverture – Overtures from 13 operas laid over one another and condensed digitally into a hyperoverture lasting for one minute and forty two seconds. The sound was transmitted through a specially constructed loudspeaker which was directed at a block of wet cement. The impression made by the music upon the wet cement has been integrated into the floor of the public foyer.

Olafur Eliasson (Iceland/Denmark) – Wardrobe volumes: The other wall
consists of 340 square metres of geometric, three-dimensional, pierced panels installed in front of 3 detached cement volumes in the public foyer. The installation includes two lighting systems operating in relationship to one another – when the frontal lighting is increases, the rear lighting dims.

Nina Witoszek FitzPatrick (Poland), Marte Aas, Gerd Tinglum, Tom Sandberg, Talleiv Taro Manum (Norway) – Artist book: SITE SEEING
The construction site was the starting point for the artists, who focused on the themes of time, place and gaze. The project lasted from 2004 – 2008, resulting in a 340 page book with photographs
and texts.

SITE SEEING is for sale in the Opera House, or may be ordered from: http://www.operaen.no

Pae White (USA) – Stage curtain: Metafoil
A photograph of light-sensitive foil was transferred to a loom by using digital technology and woven in matte cotton. An illusion of reflections and forms has been created through the use of colour. From close quarters the surface has a rich texture – from a distance a spatial, metallic composition
is revealed.

Bodil Furu and Trine Lise Nedreaas (Norway) – Film/video
The idea behind the project was a wish to capture something of the atmosphere of the old Norwegian Opera. The works will be presented in the context of an art space not directly linked to the new Opera House itself.

Bodil Furu’s film OPERA focuses on the work that goes on backstage, as well as the architecture of the old Opera.

Trine Lise Nedreaas’ video SWELL follows a playful ballerina as she takes us backstage, into the wings, through the corridors and practice rooms of the old Opera.

Monica Bonvicini (Italy) – Water project: Hun ligger/She lies:
An autonomous, sculptural artwork that will be placed in the harbour basin outside the Opera during the spring of 2009. With reference to Caspar David Friedrich’s painting Das Eismeer from 1823-1824, the sculpture will be an open steel construction, partly covered with reflective, semi-transparent diagonal panels. Weather and lighting conditions will change the sculpture, and simultaneously become part of it.

Some of the artists were engaged directly by the Art Committee for the New Opera House, whilst others were chosen via international pre-qualifying selection processes and competitions. Commissioned by Public Art Norway (KORO).

Press contact:
Hilde Herming, Public Art Norway (KORO)/Head of Communications
hh@koro.no
http://www.koro.no

April 18th at Gibsone Jessop Gallery in Toronto

The Rising Tide investigates China’s meteoric march toward the future through the work of some of its most talented emerging artists, whose work reflects the country’s rising influence as an economic, political and cultural force in the global arena.

www.therisingtidefilm.com

http://www.bettermail.ca/m/133/14760/63fd9228dca46903f947274b900ace78

Although artists in rapidly developing China enjoy more freedom than they ever have before, they also face problems they never anticipated. In Robert Adanto’s documentary The Rising Tide, performance and video artist Chen Quilin, anime-inspired video artist Cao Fei, conceptual photographer Wang Qingsong, and a wide array of other Chinese artists speak of the spiritual and intellectual dilemmas they face in a society where almost everything is in constant flux. Adanto’s surprisingly grim film highlights both the vitality and urgency of China’s burgeoning new culture while allowing its subjects to speak of the darker and more painful aspects of change. [Info Source]

– Gerry Mak for Flavorpill

ITYS

Vangelis Vlahos
Images to influence the reading of Greece’s
interests in Eastern Europe and the Balkans today, 2008
Dimensions variable, photographs and magazine cuttings under glass
Courtesy of the Artist

Selective Knowledge
2 April - 20 July 2008

Organized by ITYS

Hosted by:

The National Bank of Greece Cultural Foundation/MIET
Eynard Mansion
Agiou Konstantinou 20 & Menandrou Streets
10431 Athens

Tue-Fri 10 a.m.-2 p.m. & 6-8 p.m.
Sat/Sun 10 a.m.-2 p.m.

http://www.itys.org

When faced with a library, an archive or simply any large databank, the artist must be clear about his/her purpose before starting the quest for the ultimate documentation or representation. Any enquiry into the nature, focus, and inspiration of research results in as many individual responses as there are respondents. Some artists follow self-imposed methods, others lean on far more emotional and intuitive processes. Artists sift through historical information with a social, economic, or political content to construct identities and gain understanding while relying on a subjective approach which does not necessarily provide answers; it reveals. It is not concerned with the exact nature of reality or truth but rather with our perception of it.

Artists constantly challenge received knowledge with alternative histories based on personal memory and experience. Artists make choices not according to a certain methodology or by intuition, but following a path with its own inner logic. The next picture has to add to the context of the whole. It is not a random process, it is a guided one that ultimately tries and creates a level of recognition.

If partial knowledge accepts that we need to solve a problem on the basis of facts that are not entirely complete, then selective knowledge talks about the conscious choice to reject, select, and accept on the basis of need, desire, and expectation, until a story unfolds.

Rather than starting from large systems and accepted truths from which political, economic, and social developments are analyzed, the artists in the exhibition adapt the synthesizing character of the curiosity cabinet. Many bits and pieces allow for associations and interpretations.

The extent to which the academic world, more and more intent on drawing in the arts institutions, can respond to this changing and often conflicting approach to knowledge is part of the broader debate around the present state of education.

Participating Artists:
Mark Dion, Apostolos Karastergiou, George Hadjimichalis, Mark O’Kelly, Christian Boltanski, Pietro Roccasalva, Albert Oehlen, Candida Höfer, Nina Fischer & Maroan El Sani, Armin Linke, Henrik Olesen, Allen Ruppersberg, Eirene Efstathiou, Ivan Grubanov, Sam Durant, Vangelis Vlahos.

The show makes reference to Alain Resnais’ Toute la Memoire du Monde’, besides a display of books and documents by Hans-Peter Feldmann, Mark Dion, Patrick Van Caeckenbergh, Peter Piller, Sarah Seager, George Hadjimihalis, Mariana Castillo Deball, and Mark O’Kelly.

Exhibition Concept and Co-Ordination: Els Hanappe.
Exhibition in cooperation with M.I.E.T., National Bank of Greece Cultural Foundation.
Joint Publication: Selective Knowledge.

ITYS, or Institute for Contemporary Art and Thought, is a newly established non-profit organization based in Athens, Greece. Selective Knowledge is its first major public event.

Tate Modern

Juan Muñoz
Two Seated on the Wall, 2000
Private collection
Copyright: The Estate of Juan Muñoz

Juan Muñoz A Retrospective
Until 27 April 2008

Tate Modern
Bankside
London SE1 9TG
Nearest tube: Southwark

http://www.tate.org.uk/modern

Spanish artist Juan Muñoz (1953-2001) came to international prominence in the mid 1980s with dramatic sculptural installations that placed the human figure in specific architectural environments. His reputation was built on his power to create an intriguing tension between the illusory and the real, the contrasting acts of looking and receiving, and the poignant isolation of the individual amongst a crowd. This exhibition includes well-known sculptures such as Many Times (1999), The Prompter (1988) and Conversation Piece (1996), the “raincoat drawings”, and important pieces with sound, light and mechanical elements. This is the first major solo retrospective of Juan Muñoz in the UK since Double Bind, 2001, his remarkable installation for the Turbine Hall, the second in the Unilever Series at Tate Modern. There will also be a three-gallery focussed display of Juan Muñoz’s work on Level 3 until 20 April 2008. Several performances will occur during the exhibition, which
are the result of Muñoz’s collaborations with well-known composers, writers and filmmakers.