Arts

15.05.2013

Call for participants: “Field_Notes – Deep Time”, 15th – 24th September 2013, Kilpisjärvi Biological Station, Lapland/Finland

“Field_Notes – Deep Time” is a week long art&science field laboratory organized by the Finnish Society of Bioart at the Kilpisjärvi Biological Station in Lapland/Finland. Five working groups, hosted by Oron Catts, Antero Kare, Leena Valkeapaa, Tere Vaden, Elisabeth Ellsworth and Jamie Kruse, together with a team of five, will develop, test and evaluate specific interdisciplinary approaches in relation to the “Deep Time” theme.

“Field_Notes – Deep Time” is in search of artistic and scientific responses to the dichotomy between human time-perception and comprehension, and the time of biological, environmental, and geological processes in which we are embedded. The local sub-Arctic nature, ecology, and geology, as well as the scientific environment and infrastructure of the Kilpisjärvi Biological Station will act as a catalyst for the work carried out.

Dates and places:

15th – 22nd September 2013, field laboratory at the Kilpisjärvi
Biological Station
23rd, 24th of September 2013, conference in Helsinki Read more »

By Sacha Kagan

13.05.2013

ufaFabrik’s 2nd Forum: Creative strategies of sustainability

creative-strategies-conf-in9th – 14th of September 2013, ufaFabrik, Berlin (Germany)

Building on the experience of their first event in 2012 (on which we reported on Cultura21′s webmagazine: click here to read our article in German language) this one-week seminar organized by ufaFabrik in Berlin for cultural operators proposes a common reflection and “a time of intense experiences sharing around the potential creative strategies of sustainability”. The participants will get indicators for their own professional backgrounds. This week aims to offer an opportunity for a reflection, discussion and discovery of some practical examples of existing practices. It will be composed by six full-days of activities including: workshops, lectures, exploring sustainable places and projects in Berlin, initiation about straw bale building, artistic expression, social interaction. (The Seminar is organised within the framework of the “Engine Room Europe” project of the European network Trans Europe Halles.)

The number of participants is limited to 20 people. For the participants all travel and accommodation costs will be covered. There might be a small fee for food (related to the financial standards in your home country) and extra costs (upgraded hotel standard).

If you are interested, you can send an email to csos [at] ufafabrik [dot] de or fill in the application form and send it at the latest by 28 May 2013.

By Sacha Kagan

10.05.2013

Beyond the Surface: Environmental Art in Action

A conference investigating relationships between art and the environment

May 31, 2013, 9 am – 5 pm, Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education, Philadelphia (USA)

Bringing artists & arts professionals to Philadelphia to explore ways art can create environmental awareness while restoring ecological systems. With: Lillian Ball, Sam Bower, Jenny Laden, Stacy Levy, Amy Lipton, Eve Mosher, Frances Whitehead.

“No longer content with scratching the surface of environmental problems, these artists want to move beyond the surface to engage audiences in becoming part of the solution.”

5-7 pm: Reception celebrating Rain Yard, the Schuylkill Center’s new permanent environmental artwork by Stacy Levy.

Conference Details & Online Registration: click here

By Sacha Kagan

08.05.2013

Maya Lin: Here and There

Apr 26, 2013 – Jun 22, 2013, at Pace Gallery, in New York (USA)

New work by Maya Lin exploring her longtime interest in environmental issues, including rising currents and climate change, and expanding her engagement with natural and geographic forms. Click here for the gallery’s website

An article on the exhibition was published in the New York Times (on April 25th):
“…in a sense, Hurricane Sandy also woke up Ms. Lin. Soon after the floodwaters receded, she decided she wanted her latest show at Pace — her first conceived specifically for a commercial gallery — to fix on Manhattan and its surrounding landscape, environmental history and waterways.

“I really wanted people to understand more about literally what’s right under their feet,” she said. “I wanted to really focus on revealing aspects of New York, which we might not be thinking about from a natural, topographic, environmental point of view.”
 
Read the full article here, by Carol Kino.

Her website, mentioned below, is well worth visiting:

“…the show’s most unexpected aspect is a space devoted to her Web site What Is Missing? (whatismissing.net), begun in 2011 as part of a larger memorial to vanishing species and habitats worldwide. “I see it as a guerilla artwork,” she said.”

By Sacha Kagan

07.05.2013

CAL FESTIVAL – 20 + 21 June 2013, Utrecht, Holland

Utrecht (the Netherlands) Celebrates Peace with Community Arts – A two?day symposium at which Dutch artists join their colleagues from Afghanistan, Palestine, Guatemala, Peru, Rwanda, Serbia, Northern Ireland and elsewhere to explore what connects them. According to Eugene van Erven (University of Utrecht): “Probably the most complete gathering of artists working in war zones around the world will come to Holland to share their practices, motivations and inspirations for Dutch community arts practitioners and anyone else interested in this kind of work”.

To download the detailed program and find out how to attend: click here

By Sacha Kagan

06.05.2013

Disappearance as work in progress: Approaches to ecological romanticism

maldives-khoj-2013
Part of the Maldives pavilion in Venice Bienniale 2013

Wednesday, 8 May 2013, 6 pm – 9 pm, Khoj Studios terrace, S – 17, Khirki Extension, New Delhi (India)

Khoj International Artists’ Association and Ravi Agarwal present an evening discussion addressing critical artistic practices that can help recover multiple ecologies and rethink ideas of progress.

Participants: Navjot Altaf, Amar Kanwar, Ravi Agarwal, Prof. Vikram Soni, Ravi Sundaram (moderator) and Camilla Boemio (from Rome via Skype)

For more information: www.khojworkshop.org

By Sacha Kagan

04.05.2013

CSPA Quarterly: 10th Issue

The Center for Sustainable Practices in the Arts released the tenth issue of its quarterly online magazine. It contains content from contributors who were part of their first issue, along with a few new perspectives. Click here to read more

By Sacha Kagan

02.05.2013

Exhibition: Trouble the Water

Legion Arts, 1103 Third Street SE Cedar Rapids, IA (USA), May 3 – June 16 2013

Legion Arts presents an exhibit in which a dozen contemporary artists from around the world explore issues related to water: droughts and floods, climate events and climate change, as well as the economics, distribution, uses and scarcity of this incomparable commodity. Trouble the Water is curated by Diane Barber, Houston, Texas.

Featured artists include Janet Biggs (New York), Erika Blumenfeld (Qatar), Maarten Demmink (Netherlands), Chris Turner with Helen Friel & Jess Deacon (UK), Sant Khalsa (California), Mark Klett (Arizona) & Byron Wolfe (California), Nathalie Miebach (Massachusetts), Carlos Montani (Argentina), Yuka Nakajima (Japan), Lori Nix (New York), Susannah Sayler & Edward Morris (New York), Dustin Yager (Minnesota).

Public reception from 5 to 7 pm on Friday May 3. Read more here

By Sacha Kagan

01.05.2013

Internaturalism

Collective exhibition, 8 May – 29 September 2013, and international symposium, 8 May, at PAV (Via Giordano Bruno 31, Torino, Italy)

On Tuesday, 7 May 2013, at 6.30 pm, the PAV will open the collective exhibition Internaturalism, curated by Claudio Cravero. The exhibition aims to investigate some of the research and practice of the branch of contemporary art generally known as “ecological art” or “Bioart”, demonstrating the links and connections to current ecological debates. The works of art on show in Internaturalism assume an essential role as vehicles of social understanding of the world around us, and succeed in constructing concrete meaning from often abstract issues related to the environment and ecological drift (from loss of biodiversity to pollution and global warming). Emerging from the works of the sixteen artists in the exhibition are visions and narratives of nature that coincide with the concept of “internaturalism”, namely the capacity to imagine a hybrid between the different meanings of nature, understood not only as the common good of humanity but of all living beings.

The exhibition

Among the works on display is Perpetual Amazonia, an environmental video installation by Lucy + Jorge Orta. Commissioned in 2010 by the Natural History Museum in London, it is the narration through images and prose of an expedition undertaken in the Peruvian rainforest. The study of nature is also explored from an ethological point of view in the work of Henrik Håkansson, through a video-documentary that examines the behaviour of insects and birds. Read more »

By Sacha Kagan

28.04.2013

Festival IDEAS CITY

New York City, 01/05/2013 – 04/05/2013

The 2013 iteration of IDEAS CITY, the biennial festival created to explore the future city and to effect change, will take place in downtown New York on May 1–4, 2013. Formerly known as the Festival of Ideas for the New City, IDEAS CITY was founded by the New Museum as a major collaboration between dozens of downtown arts, education, and community organizations to harness the power of the creative community and imagine our collective future. This ambitious initiative is built upon the core belief that arts and culture constitute a driving force behind the vitality of urban centers worldwide. Read more »

By Sacha Kagan

25.04.2013

Proposals for creative art+science, participatory and open environmental education in the Gulf of Finland / Baltic Sea Region

On the Pixelache website, Andrew Paterson introduced 6 proposals, first presented at the Gulf of Finland Year Trilateral Environmental Education seminar, Tallinn, 28.2.2013 (http://www.gof2014.fi/en/partners/education/) and part of an ongoing dialogue and cooperation with Russian NGO Friends of the Baltic, based in St. Petersburg (http://baltfriends.ru/).

Find out more here…

By Sacha Kagan

24.04.2013

Call for participants: Case Pyhäjoki – Artistic reflections on nuclear influence

Transdisciplinary expedition, production workshop and events

Location: Pyhäjoki, Finland – Time: 31.7. – 12.8.2013 – For whom: artists, activists, scientists, thinkers and doers + everything or opinion in between.

Deadline to apply: 5.5.2013.

The sixth nuclear power plant of Finland is planned to be built at Hanhikivi Cape in Pyhäjoki. The aim of the project is to explore artistic perspectives on the vast changes planned in Pyhäjoki, through the planning of a nuclear power plant at the site, and this way of considering energy production and consuming in the world.

Case Pyhäjoki -project covers the participants travel, accommodation and per diems.

More details here

By Sacha Kagan

22.04.2013

JALAN JATI (TEAK ROAD)

On show at the John Hope Gallery Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (UK) until July 7th 2013

The results of three years of research and production, the interdisciplinary exhibition from Singapore, Jalan Jati (Teak Road) opened at the Edinburgh Science Festival on 21 March 2013 and runs at the John Hope Gallery Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh until July 2013.
Jalan Jati (Teak Road) traces the material, genetic, historic and poetic journeys of a teak bed found in a Singapore karang guni junk store back to where the original tree may have grown, via photography, woodprint collage, animation and DNA tracking technology.
Read more at Migrant Ecologies.
By Sacha Kagan

21.04.2013

Art, Environment, Sustainability – Call for articles

For an upcoming issue of Antennae

Submission Deadline: 1st of September 2013

“At the forefront of today’s social issues are questions related to the human relationship to nature and the environment, the meaning of a sustainable future and the relationship of environmentalism to modernity and today’s economic structures. While the sciences have, until recently, dominated the debate, the arts are making an increasingly important contribution. Antennae is seeking submissions to an issue focused on Art, Environment, Sustainability. We are seeking contributions that go further than being a mere rehashing of the narrative of environmental activism (the human as destroyer of nature; the dangers of climate change; extinction of species; etc, etc.) to address more fundamental meanings, explore ambiguities and engage with the complex societal questions that arise from the environmental and sustainability debate – and the role of the arts in that debate. We encourage potential contributors to be bold and creative in generating and exploring perspectives that move beyond the apocalyptic and often “preachy” culture of modern environmentalism.”

Academic essays = length 6000-10000 words
Artists’ portfolio = 5/6 images along with 500 words max statement/commentary
Interviews = maximum length 8000 words
Fiction = maximum length 8000 words

www.antennae.org.uk - antennaeproject [at] gmail [dot] com

By Sacha Kagan

20.04.2013

Fish Story Talk and Artmaking Workshop in Memphis, TN (USA)

A pre-opening event for Memphis Social, at Crosstown Arts – Organizer: Aviva Rahmani, ecological artist

Address: 427 N Watkins St, Memphis, TN 38138 (USA) – Date: Monday, May 6, from 6 pm to 7:30 pm

Where do the lives of fish and people meet in Memphis? An evening of talk and artmaking will map the answers! Middle and high school students and community members welcome. The results will become part of a public exhibition at the Memphis College of Art. Please reserve your place. Refreshments will be served. (Suggested donation to cover materials and refreshments: $30.)

Registration details- ghostnets [at] ghostnets [dot] com – More info- www.ghostnets.com – See also the Memphis Social calendar of events: click here

Update from Aviva Rahmani:

  • “Saturday, May 4th I’ll take a canoe trip with project team member Dr. Eugene Turner, down a section of the Wolf River.
  • Tuesday, May 7th, from 6:00-7:30pm at Crosstown Arts, I will lead an evening of participatory talk and performative drawing about Memphis waterways for young people, their families and local environmental activists. Refreshments will be served. Limited space, please RSVP to ghostnets [at] ghostnets [dot] com.
  • Friday, May 10th from 5:00 -8:00pm at 477 South Main, The Hyde Gallery at the Nesin Graduate School Memphis College of Art (Downtown campus), an installation of the assembled insights and documentation from the river trek and workshop will be open to the public.
  • Saturday, May 11th from 2:00-3:00pm at 477 South Main, The Hyde Gallery at the Nesin Graduate School Memphis College of Art (Downtown campus), I will host an open, public webcast comparing bioregional habitat concerns. Webcast participants will include ecological art practitioners: Yvonne Senouf and Corinne Weber of M.E.L.D., curators of shows on global warming and endangered river systems; Amy Lipton, ecological art co-curator with Tricia Watts for ecoartspace; Juliette (Xiaoying) Yuan, Chinese curator of works that can only be experienced on line; artist Eve Andree Laramee who works on radioactivity; artist Ruth Hardinger whose work focuses on fracking; artist Lenore Malin who experienced Sandy in NYC; Fish Story team member Dr. Eugene Turner, wetlands biologist, restorationist and dead zone expert; Fish Story team member Dr. Jim White, a paleoecologist who identified the role of plants in mediating climate change, and Aviva Rahmani. The webcast will be recorded and available for download.”
By Sacha Kagan