Artipedia - Arts News

Istanbul Modern

The Adventure of Contemporary Design

Design Cities
23 April 2008 - 10 August 2008

Istanbul Modern
Meclis-i Mebusan Cad.
Liman Isletmeleri Sahası Antrepo No:4
Karaköy - ISTANBUL
Tel :+90 212 334 73 00
Fax : +90 212 243 43 19
info@istanbulmodern.org

http://www.istanbulmodern.org

Organized by Istanbul Modern in association with Design Museum, London the Design Cities exhibition brings together works by leading designers of the world, which reflect the history of design from mid-19th century until today and transform the concept of universal design. The exhibition features a full range of objects from textiles and fashion to industrial pieces, furniture and prints and draws together the key elements of design, mass and individual productions, as well as high technology, new materials and communication in this field. Curated by the Design Museum director Deyan Sudjic, Design Cities exhibition includes 109 works by 64 designers and 12 products of 7 brand names. The exhibition will be open between 23 April and 10 August 2008 at Istanbul Modern and will travel to the Design Museum, London between 5 September 2008 and 14 January 2009.

Design Cities tells the story of contemporary design through the focus of seven key cities, in each case looking at their decisive roles in the development of design. While focusing on how specific moments in the history of cities contributed to the evolution of design, the exhibition investigates the ways in which design has shaped contemporary culture.

The exhibition will feature a full range of objects from textiles and fashion to industrial pieces, furniture and prints. It will include design classics such as chairs by Charles and Ray Eames, as well as work by a spectrum of designers that together will evoke an impacting impression of their era.

7 Cities from 1851 to 2008

The exhibition starts by going back to London in 1851, at the time of the Great Exhibition, the embodiment of high tech, and prefabrication that was both admired, and abhorred in its time. It ends with the London of the present day, a city that is once again a global centre for design of all kinds. Between the two, the exhibition focuses on six cities, Vienna, just before World War One, when the language of modernity first started to take shape, then Dessau, the small town in Germany that built the Bauhaus, the most famous school of design the world has ever seen. Paris in the 1930s was the city that became the capital of visual culture, where both Picasso and Le Corbusier made their homes. In the post war years, Los Angeles, where Charles Eames built his supremely elegant studio and house was the epitome of the American century. In the 1960s, leadership in contemporary design moved to Milan. And in the 1980s Tokyo made its presence felt, moving beyond the moral certainty of
European industrial design, toward a more playful approach. Finally, returning to present day London which is once again the world’s leading centre for design, the base for Ron Arad and Ross Lovegrove, Jasper Morrison and many other leading contemporary designers.

Designers

London; Christopher Dresser, Owen Jones, Willam Morris, Joseph Paxton (1851)
Vienna; Joseph Hoffmann, Adolf Loos, Koloman Moser, Michael Thonet, Janke Urban, Otto
Wagner (1908)
Dessau; Marcel Breuer, Lena Mayer-Bregner, Wilhelm Wagenfeld (1928)
Paris; Le Corbusier, Jeanneret Pierre, Charlotte Perriand, Eileen Gray, René Herbst, Robert Mallet-Stevens, Jean Prouvé, Citroen (1931)
Los Angeles; Saul Bass, Harry Bertoia, Charles Eames, Ray Eames, Isamu Noguchi, Elliot Noyes, Eero Saarinen, Ford (1949)
Milano; Corradino D’Ascanio, Mario Bellini, Achille Castiglioni, Pier Giacomo Castiglioni, Joe Colombo, Perry King, Paolo Lomazzi, Vico Magistretti, Angelo Mangiarotti, Bruno Munari, Marcello Nizzoli, Gionatan De Pas, Giovanni Pintori, Gio Ponti, Richard Sapper, Carla Scolari, Ettore Sottsass, Marco Zanuso, Donato d’Urbino (1957)
Tokyo; Nigel Coates, Shiro Kuramata, Canon, Olympus, Sharp, Sony (1987)
Londra; Ron Arad, Barber Osberby, Hussein Chalayan, David Chipperfield, Tom Dixon, Fernando Guiterrez, Zaha Hadid, Industrial Facility, Ross Lovegrove, Jasper Morrison, Ross Phillips, Peter Saville, Paul Barnes, Smith, Paul Smith, Mini (2008)

MUSEUM HOURS
Tuesday - Sunday: 10.00-18.00
Thursday: 10.00-20.00
Closed on Mondays

Holland Festival

Hans Op de Beeck: “Location (6)”
1-21 June 2008
Preview: 31 May 2008 (by invitation only)

Daily from 12 noon until 10:30 p.m.
Westergasfabriek, Amsterdam, the Netherlands

http://www.hollandfestival.nl

On 31 May 2008, the new installation “Location (6)” by Hans Op de Beeck will premiere as part of the Holland Festival in Amsterdam.

Visual artist Hans Op de Beeck has now created “Location (6)” (2008) – a monumental installation intended for the Westergasfabriek in Amsterdam. The Westergasfabriek is a former gas works that has been turned into a thriving multifunctional cultural center. This installation-art creation draws on Op de Beeck’s interest in manmade vistas, as well as his fascination with melancholic barren spaces devoid of human life.

His new work is a worthy successor to the sculptural installation “Location (5)” (2004). This particular installation was earlier on display in the Municipal Museum in The Hague and the Art Unlimited exhibition in Basel, Switzerland and has now been given a permanent home at the Towada Art Center in Japan. “Location (5)” is a pitch-black “mockup” of a motorway fast-food restaurant looking out on a deserted motorway (highway) in the dead of night.

The new installation “Location (6)” is based on a similar principle: the viewer is inside a building and is looking out at the wider world – in this case, a vast expanse of land stretching out as far as the eye can see. The exterior space has once again been created in the form of a monumental landscape sculpture with an incrementally manipulated perspective (perspectival trompe-l’œil). Visually speaking, however, “Location (6)” is almost the opposite of its predecessor. Through a hallway, the spectator reaches an observatory with a panoramic window offering a view of an imaginary desolate snowy landscape. Everything basks in white light and is shrouded in a fog. The whole place has an ephemeral, almost immaterial feel about it that invites viewer to gaze into the near-nothingness.

Hans Op de Beeck
The multi-disciplinary oeuvre of the Belgian visual artist Hans Op de Beeck (b. 1969) consists of sculptures, sculptural installations, multi-media works, videos, animation films, drawings, photographs, publications and stage designs.

Hans Op de Beeck conceives and builds contemporary fictional urban and household locations and scenes sometimes featuring human characters that viewers feel very familiar with. These include both secluded spots suitable for inner reflection, as well as crowded areas populated by sometimes inept characters shedding light on our own present-day lives; our dreams and ambitions; and how we look upon time, space and each other.

His work has been shown at numerous exhibitions including Reina Sofia (Madrid), Tate Modern (London), Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (Arizona), Towada Art Center (Towada), ZKM (Karlsruhe), MACRO Future (Rome), The Drawing Center (New York), the 6th Shanghai Biennale (Shanghai), Kunstverein Hannover (Hanover), Whitechapel Art Gallery (London) and P.S.1 (New York).

Holland Festival
Since 1947, the Holland Festival has evolved into the leading international festival for the performing arts in the Netherlands. Its strong reputation for innovation and top quality attracts internationally acclaimed productions in the areas of opera, theatre, dance and music. On top of that, each year, the Holland Festival showcases one notable example of installation art created by a prominent artist.

Venue
Westergasfabriek / Haarlemmerweg 6-10 / 1014 BE Amsterdam, the Netherlands

After its presentation in Amsterdam, the installation will travel to the Singapore Biennale (11 Sept. – 16 Nov. 2008). Artistic Director: Fumio Nanjo. Curators: Joselina Cruz and Matthew Ngui.

The artist is represented by Xavier Hufkens, Brussels; Galerie Krinzinger, Vienna; Galleria Continua, San Gimignano and Beijing; as well as Galerie Ron Mandos, Amsterdam and Rotterdam.

For press inquiries, please contact Lidwien van Heun of the Holland Festival at +31 (0)20 788 21 00 or lidwien@hollandfestival.nl

Palais de Tokyo

Copyright: Palais de Tokyo, 2008

SUPERDOME

Show opens Thursday May 29, 2008
From 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.: press visit
From 6 p.m. to midnight: public opening
Opening night musical selection by
Dj Olga and Dr Schnaps
http://www.palaisdetokyo.com

Five solo exhibitions by FABIEN GIRAUD AND RAPHAËL SIBONI, JONATHAN MONK, ARCANGELO SASSOLINO, DANIEL FIRMAN ET CHRISTOPH BÜCHEL

SUPERDOME
The Superdome is a legendary stadium: built in 1975 in New Orleans (Louisiana), it has hosted many Super Bowls (the finals of the American football championship), a concert by the Rolling Stones, Pope John Paul II, the Republican Convention, and refugees from Hurricane Katrina. Paradoxically the Superdome forms a bridge between superlative entertainment, in the form of the Super Bowl, and total distress, in the form of Hurricane Katrina. Drawing inspiration from the additional and schizophrenic logic of “I Can Get No Satisfaction” AND “Our Father, who art in heaven”, Marc-Olivier Wahler presents SUPERDOME, a new session bringing together five solo exhibitions, oscillating between spectacle and conceits, decibels and prayers, high-tech and chaos, continuing the program of exhibitions testing the notion of the work of art’s elasticity, first broached at the Palais de Tokyo with Five billion years.

GEOMETRY OF CHAOS
Clockmakers who dismantle time with painstaking care (Time between spaces by Jonathan Monk)… A missile launcher that pulverizes empty beer bottles at more than 600 km/h (Afasia 1 by Arcangelo Sassolino)… A choir of 350 Darth Vaders fitted with micro-computers that produce the darkest “hit” of all time (Last Manoeuvres in the Dark by Fabien Giraud and Raphael Siboni)… An elephant precariously balancing on its trunk (Würsa by Daniel Firman)… A special project by Christoph Büchel (Dump)… Like a cloche placed over a town or a stretch of countryside – the one in Biosphere II, the Truman Show, or even the one by Buckminster Fuller conjured up by Loris Gréaud in Cellar Door – SUPERDOME hosts activities that bump into one another, and lives that are in fragile equilibrium, outlining a potential geometry
of chaos.

FIRSTS
SUPERDOME is also a collection of “firsts”. The first solo exhibition by Jonathan Monk at a Paris institution… The first time that the Palais de Tokyo and the Musée d’Art Moderne of the City of Paris have collaborated… The first major solo exhibition by Fabien Giraud and Raphaël Siboni as a duo… The first solo exhibition by Arcangelo Sassolino in France … The first glimpse of a large-scale forthcoming project by Christoph Büchel, an artist nominated for the 2008 Hugo Boss Awards… The first time that a real elephant has balanced on its trunk…

MORE OF SUPERDOME…

A SPECIAL MODULE WITH ALEISTER CROWLEY /

THURSDAYS AT SUPERDOME /

Gypsy Sound System
Superdome after-party with Dj Olga and Dr Schnaps.
May 29th, 8 p.m. - 12 p.m.

Kenneth Anger
An exceptional talk with Kenneth Anger on the occasion of the exhibition of new paintings by Aleister Crowley. In partnership with the Centre Pompidou.
June 5th, 7.30 p.m.

Burning Man
Screening footage taken back from the Burning Man Project (Nevada) by Alain Della Negra and
Kaori Kinoshita.
June 12th, 7.30 p.m.

Sonic Warfare
A talk on sound considered as a weapon, with Steve Goodman, author of Sonic Warfare (to be published), Ellen Mara de Wachter, curator of Arsenal: Artists Exploring the Potential of Sound as a Weapon (London, 2006) and Mark Bain, artist.
June 19th, 7.30 p.m.

Yog
Grindcore concert on the occasion of the publication of a special issue of Sang Bleu with the Pavillon and Emmanuelle Antille.
June 26th, 9 p.m.

YouTube Battle 2 no limit
The second edition of Palais de Tokyo’s famous video battle pits the École Nationale Supérieure d’Arts Paris-Cergy against the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts.
July 3rd, 9 p.m.

The Kills
Stage of the Art #4 features The Kills in concert, with the support of Eurostar London Coming.
July 9th, 8 p.m.

PALAIS / Issue 6 - OUT on 29 May 2008

In conjunction with the exhibitions, events, lectures and performances in the Palais de Tokyo programme, every three months PALAIS / outlines the expanding artistic universe that programme reflects. This issue of the magazine PALAIS / is edited and designed around SUPERDOME, with an excerpt of Naomi Klein’s latest book, interviews (Jonathan Monk by Marc-Olivier Wahler, François Girbaud with Giraud & Siboni), portfolios (press images of Superdome, Arcangelo Sassolino), a “making of” (Daniel Firman), and also a guide section.

For further information see: http://www.palaismagazine.com

Crossing at Monroe by Justin Green

The Center for Fine Art Photography call for entries for
Our Environment; the Good, Bad, and the Ugly
Deadline August 18, 2008
$900 in Awards

Our Environment; the Good, Bad and the Ugly, will tell a story of the human foot print left on this earth. This exhibition is for those who consider themselves nature conversationalists and just photographers with a conscience. It’s time to go green. The exhibition is open to all domestic and international, professional and amateur photographers working with digital or traditional photography or combinations of both. Information and online submissions at The Center for Fine Art Photography www.c4fap.org or email questions to cfe@c4fap.org .

Creative Time

Playing the Building
Installation rendering by Danielle Spencer, 2008

Playing the Building:
An Installation by David Byrne
May 31 - August 10, 2008

Opening Reception:
Saturday, May 31, 6 - 8PM

The Battery Maritime Building
10 South Street, NYC
Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays
Noon - 6PM (Free)
http://www.creativetime.org/byrne

DAVID BYRNE TRANSFORMS THE INTERIOR OF THE LANDMARK BATTERY MARITIME BUILDING INTO AN INTERACTIVE SOUND INSTALLATION FOR ALL VISITORS TO PLAY.

Creative Time presents Playing the Building, a 9,000-square-foot, interactive, site-specific installation by renowned artist David Byrne. The artist will transform the interior of the landmark Battery Maritime Building in Lower Manhattan into a massive sound sculpture that all visitors are invited to sit and “play.” The project will consist of a retrofitted antique organ, placed in the center of the building’s cavernous second-floor gallery, that will control a series of devices attached to its structural features—metal beams, plumbing, electrical conduits, and heating and water pipes. These machines will vibrate, strike, and blow across the building’s elements, triggering unique harmonics and producing finely
tuned sounds.

As Byrne explains: “Typical parts of buildings can be used to produce interesting sounds. Everyone is familiar with the fact that if you rap on a metal column, for example, you will hear a ping or a clang, but I wondered if the pipes could be turned into giant flutes, and if a machine could make girders vibrate and produce tones.”

Playing the Building marks the first time in decades that the second floor of the Battery Maritime Building will be accessible to the public. The space will be open and free on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays throughout the summer of 2008. Everyone will be invited to sit at the organ, tap on the keys, and create a unique array of sounds that travel through the space.

“David is most widely known as a musician, but he is an extraordinary writer, visual artist, and director who resists categorization, plays around with grey zones, and favors a life of broad creativity,” says Anne Pasternak, curator of the exhibition and President and Artistic Director at Creative Time. “Playing the Building is deceptive in its simplicity; it’s layered with rich meaning relating to human nature, our contemporary relationship to place and sound, and considerations of shifts in culture at large.” Pasternak’s interview with Byrne is available on http://www.creativetime.org

David Byrne and Creative Time will invite guest musicians to challenge the project through a series of performances. A schedule of performances and artist talks will be available by the end of May at http://www.creativetime.org/byrne

Playing the Building was originally presented and commissioned by Färgfabriken, Stockholm in 2005.

Special thanks to the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC), The Governors Island Preservation and Education Corporation, and The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. Additional promotional support provided by The River to River Festival.

Creative Time is funded through the generous support of corporations, foundations, government agencies, and individuals. Additional funding provided by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs; the New York State Council on the Arts, a State agency; and New York City Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn.