Three exhibitions
dal 3/12/2009 al 13/3/2010
Segnalato da
3/12/2009
Three exhibitions
S.M.A.K. - Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst, Ghent
In the context of europalia.china the museum will be holding the "Seeing One's Own Eyes" exhibition by the artists' collective MadeIn. Although the focus here is on contemporary art in the Middle East, most of all, the show reveals the paradox of 'looking' at other cultures. A comprehensive exhibition is dedicated to the first international artist's texts magazine Gagarin the Artists in their Own Words, it bring together the entire Gagarin oeuvre with a selection of works by the same artists from the museum collection. Ben Benaouisse will present a re-enactment of Jan Fabre's Bic-Art Room; the performance lasting 72 hours in which the artist had himself locked up in a white room lit by artificial lighting.
December 4, 2009 - March 14, 2010
Gagarin the Artists in their Own Words
The first Decade
GAGARIN is pleased to announce that the Museum of Contemporary Art S.M.A.K in Ghent (B) opens a comprehensive exhibition, entirely dedicated to the first international artist's texts magazine GAGARIN the Artists in their Own Words. This unique exhibit will bring together the entire GAGARIN oeuvre with a selection of works by the same artists from the museum collection and special loans.
GAGARIN the Artists in their Own Words, The first Decade, includes contributions by Juan Muñoz, Maria Serebriakova, Guy Rombouts, Marlene Dumas, Stephan Balkenhol, Manfredu Schu, Bili Bidjocka, Li Yongbin, Joe Scanlan, Miroslaw Balka, Sila Blume, Wim Delvoye, Henk Visch, Willem Boshoff, Giuseppe Penone, Bhupen Khakar, Stan Douglas, Tsuyoshi Ozawa, Anri Sala, Michel François, Willem Oorebeek, Simon Patterson, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Fiona Tan, Raoul De Keyser, Andy Leleisi'oau, Luchezar Boyadjiev, Anette Messager, Bernd Lohaus, Marie José Burki, Tariq Alvi, Patrick Van Caeckenbergh, Sophie Calle, Berend Strik, Liam Gillick, Jürgen Partenheimer, Trinh T. Minh-Ha, Lefevre Jean Claude, Kurasi Kusolwong, Patrick Corillon, Christoph Fink, Mark Manders, Ken Lum, Nedko Solakov, Ayşe Erkmen, Olaf Probst, Kirsten Pieroth, Frédéric Bruly Bouabré, Jimmie Durham, Anne Daems, Paolo Canevari, Eija Liisa Ahtila, Jonathan Monk, Bodys Isek Kingelez, Ernst Caramelle, Nina Papaonstantinou, Pieter Laurens Mol, Orla Barry, Panamarenko, Joseph Grigely, Guillaume Bijl, Roman Ondák, Tomas Schmit, Lois Weinberger, Gabriel Kuri, Peter Downsbrough, Honoré d'O, Antoli Osmolovski, Agnese Bule, Liang Yue, Vito Acconci, Yoëlle Tuerlinckx, John Körmeling, Maurizio Nannucci, Sergei Bratkov, Mark Lewis, Lawrence Weiner, Minerva Cuevas, David Shrigley, Boris Achour, Joost Conijn, Zineb Sedira, Rosemarie Castoro, Anne-Mie Van Kerckhoven, Peter Regli, Lida Abdul, Marcel Odenbach, Loulou Cherinet, Jennifer Tee, Hans Op de Beeck, Alfredo Jaar, Thomas Hirschhorn, Capitaine Longchamp, Santiago Sierra, Ilona Ruegg, Suchan Kinoshita, Nico Dockx, Artur Barrio, Thomas Huber, Kader Attia, Bernard Villers, Carla Zaccagnini , Olivier Foulon, Elina Saloranta, Matt Mullican, Agnès Geoffray, John Baldessari, Philippe Van Snick, Paola Pivi, Qiu Zhijie, Richard Serra, Sislej Xhafa, Dora Garcia, Nathalie Djurberg, Ria Pacquée, Krist Gruijthuijsen, Douglas Park, Cerith Wyn Evans, Fernanda Gomes, Adrian Paci, Job Koelewijn, Erwin Wurm, Marilou van Lierop, Paul McCarthy, Ugo Rondinone, Aleksandra Mir, Lee Bul, Philip Metten, Afif Saâdane, Adam Chodzko, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Peter Friedl, Dahn Vo, Philippe Parreno, Annabel Daou, Ghada Amer, Runa Islam, Edith Dekyndt, Kati Heck, Michael Curran, Harmony Korine, Ed Ruscha, IngridMwangiRobertHutter, Petrit Halilaj, Paul Chan, Ermias Kifleyesus, Pierre Bismuth, Danny Devos, David Maroto, Helen Mirra, Jota Castro, Jill Magid, Jonas Mekas, Allora & Calzadilla, Michaël Borremans, Olaf Nicolai, Falke Pisano…
On January 9th, the Museum of Contemporary Art S.M.A.K. will also organize a special GAGARIN night with a/o readings by GAGARIN artists, a performance of his Voodoo-Faust (Crash Opera) by Manfredu Schu and a panel discussion with Simon Deakin, University of Leeds (UK), who is actually writing a PhD on GAGARIN, dr. J.D. Asja Szafraniec, author of the book 'Beckett, Derrida and the Event of Literature, Olaf Nicolai, artist, and Dr Jonathan Lehay Dronsfield, Reader in Theory & Philisophy of Art at the University of Reading (UK).
GAGARIN is published twice a year by
GAGA vzw
Oosterweelsteenweg 3 / Royersbrug B-2030 Antwerp Belgium gagarin@skynet.be - http://www.gagarin.be
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4.12.2009 - 7.02.2010
MadeIn
In the context of europalia.china S.M.A.K. will be holding the "Seeing One's Own Eyes" exhibition by the artists’ collective MadeIn. Although the focus here is on contemporary art in the Middle East, most of all, the exhibition reveals the paradox of ‘looking’ at other cultures.
MadeIn was established early in 2009 in Shanghai with the aim of stimulating the creation, support and dissemination of contemporary art. The founder of the collective is Xu Zhen (b. 1977, Shanghai), one of the most important conceptual artists who, since the 90s, has been active in a contemporary China that is rapidly evolving. Xu Zhen is dedicated to studying social, public and political processes, which he incorporates into his work in a way that is both theatrical and humoristic. In 8848 – 1.86 (2005) for example, the artist has made a valiant attempt to remove the top of Mount Everest and exhibit it as an archaeological object. More recently, Xu created an international fuss with The Starving of Sudan (2008), a reconstruction of the distressing situation the photographer Kevin Carter encountered in the Sudan in 1994, and which won him the Pullizer Prize. The visitor is given the opportunity to photograph the vulture and the dying child with his own camera. In "Seeing One's Own Eyes" the artist presents himself as the invisible brain behind the exhibition. Xu Zhen uses an extensive underground strategy to come with a project that breaks through cliché expectations of the contemporary art circuit, as the view of the Middel East and China is disrupted.
"Seeing One's Own Eyes" focuses on contemporary art from the Middle East. It offers a sample of what the Middle East aims to present in the field of contemporary art. This is expressed in a collection of space-filling installations, objects, sculptures, photos, paintings and video. The West mainly associates the Middle East with death and violence, human suffering and a continuing political and religious deadlock. Madeln’s aim is to counter this negative perception with an exhibition that focuses on a rich and flourishing art scene from this region. It presents us with surprising work, which remarkably extends beyond the context from which it originates. We see, for example, Perfect Volume, a circle made up of the tips of combat shoes. The shoes are silent; their owners have been killed. Another (two-dimensional work) DAH…DAH…DAH…DAH was cut out of a rusty sheet like a sound wave. Although it appears innocent, we see depicted the sounding board of speeches made by Middle East politicians – which leave the spectator ignorant about the persons in question let alone the message they are proclaiming.
MadeIn’s aim is not only to point a finger at social or political wrongs. It also reflects on the mechanism of the global contemporary art scene. "Seeing One's Own Eyes" portrays the paradox of ‘looking’ at other cultures but also denounces the frenetic search for originality.
http://www.europalia.eu
With the support of Cattecontainers
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4.12.2009 - 7.02.2010
Ben Benaouisse
Ben Benaouisse (b. 1971, Familleureux) is a dancer, performer, visual artist and especially difficult to place precisely under one of the abovementioned categories. In S.M.A.K. he will present the performance Jan Fabre revisited, a re-enactment of Fabre’s Bic-Art Room in 1981.
The Bic-Art Room by Fabre was a performance lasting 72 hours in which the artist had himself locked up in a white room lit by artificial lighting. Closed off from the outside world he was surrounded by white walls, a white ceiling and floor, white furniture, and white sheets on a white mattress. His only diversion was a blue Bic pen and the surrounding area served as a page. Words, sentences, scribbling, stripes, and slogans covered the space and killed time. A camera recorded the activities, boredom, hunger and sleep.
More than a quarter of a century later Ben Benaouisse re-enacts this performance in S.M.A.K.. Under exactly the same conditions – a white room, without daylight in which the artist is isolated for 72 hours with only a blue Bic ballpoint for diversion – the artist aims to re-experience Fabre’s experience. Although the sterile context provides him with no sensory stimulation Benaouisse regards this as a condition for exploring the limitations and possibilities of his creativity from scratch. The "drawing" is a way of killing time and the primary activity of an energetic being. Scribbling and writing are used as a survival strategy
Image: Simon Patterson, Manned Flight
Press contact
Eline Verbauwhede e-mail eline.verbauwhede@gent.be, tel: +32 (0)9 2407660
S.M.A.K.
Museum of Contemporary Art
Citadelpark 9000 Ghent – Belgium
Hours: daily 10am – 6pm
closed Mondays – December 24, 25, 31, 2009 – January 1, 2010
Entrance fees
€ 6: individual visitor
€ 4: groups from 15 persons, under-25s, over-60s, students
€ 1: young people under the age of 26