11/9/2007
Tina.b
Different venues, Prague
The prague contemporary art - second edition
The prague contemporary art - second edition
Prague, September 13, 2007 – Tina B. – The Prague Contemporary Art Festival, organised by Prague’s Galerie Vernon, has launched its first major exhibition entitled PROJECT LAPIDÁRIUM. Co-presented by Fortis Bank, the opening celebration was attended by a number of Prague’s important figures of public life, culture and business. In her opening speech, Festival Director Monika Burian stressed the importance of blending the historical and the contemporary, as well as the worlds of art and business.
In its second edition, Tina B. once again aims to bring art and the general public together in surprising locations in the Czech Republic’s vibrant capital, piercing the aura of the conventional and marginalized art space. Tina B. strives to combine the creative energy of the cultural scene in Central and Eastern Europe with emerging talents and trends from around the world. The next major event will be the launch of the second major exhibition in Prague’s Old Water Treatment Works, taking place from September 27 until October 20, 2007. Special Events Week will run from October 2 until October 8.This year’s main Tina B. event will take place from September 12 until October 20, 2007. Tina B. is held under the auspices and with the support of the Czech Ministry of Culture and the City of Prague.
Specially designed for the contextually challenging milieu of the Czech National Museum's Lapidárium, which houses a permanent collection of Bohemian stone sculpture from the 11th to the 19th century, PROJECT LAPIDÁRIUM is a site-specific installation by Czech and Italian artists is a confrontation of contemporary art and classical sculpture and is divided into two sections.
The section ISLANDS UNDER THREAT, curated by Rosa Anna Musumeci, brings the works of six Italian artists to Prague – five of them hailing from Sicily and one from Rome. Although the works use different media, including photography, video, objects and meta-objects, they have one theme in common – Time. The exhibition includes work by Claudia Gambadoro, Franco Angeloni, Giuliana Lo Porto, Loredana Longo and Rita Casdia.
Also in the Lapidárium, SCULPTURE IN DIALOGUE, curated by Marcela Czsena and Grey Zone, is a direct and highly site-specific confrontation of the contemporary art object and classical sculpture. The central motif of the installation is provided by the work of two Czech artists belonging to different generations – Kurt Gebauer and Daniel Hanzlík. The show also includes work by Enrico Tommaso De Paris, Federico Maddalozzo and Martin Kocourek.
Opening on September 27 and running until October 17, this year’s focal exhibition location is the remarkable industrial space of the Old Water Treatment Works, known as the Eco-technical Museum, near the Vltava river in Prague 6. Dating from the start of the twentieth century and designed by British architect William Heerlein Lindley, this gem of industrial architecture provides an exciting setting for new media art, imbuing the exhibition with spatial, temporal and cultural contrasts and synergies. CITY FABLES, the key section in the location, is curated by Heechung Chung and Minseong Kim and will present single channel video and interactive digital installations by 10 artists from the Republic of Korea. Other sections include SOUNDS LIKE ART, which focuses on the often somewhat marginalized world of sound and radio art, NEWS DISPATCH, a selection of three more Korean videos and TIME STRICTLY PERSONAL, presenting two videos by artists represented by the Yvon Lambert Gallery.
Importantly, this year Tina B. is taking art beyond the confines of the exhibition space into some of Prague’s most prestigious and intriguing locations. Curated by New York-based Italian curator Micaela Giovannotti, the performance art section entitled WITNESSING THE MOMENT will become the focal point of the main festival event, concentrating art, audiences and the media at prime locations in the Czech capital. Starting on October 3, the section will take art to Prague’s interiors and exteriors, including such venues as the Laterna Magika theatre, the Vinohradské divadlo theatre, Hotel Carlo IV and two of Prague’s most central Metro stations. A number of established and emerging artists will be taking part in the section, including Italian artists Nico Vascellari, Marcella Vanzo and Sissi, renowned Korean artist Kimsooja, American artists Janine Antoni and Adam Pendleton, extravagant Argentine performance artist Daniel Gonzalez and the legendary Czech artist Jiří Kovanda.
Among this year’s Tina B.’s many standalone Special Projects, Simona Tagliaferri’s exhibition entitled ILLUSIONS AND DREAMS will be held at Museum Kampa, one of Central Europe’s most prestigious art locations, from September 26 until October 5. Simona Tagliaferri studied architecture and design and has worked with some of the world’s major fashion designers. Her exhibition investigates the borders between art, design and fashion, challenging the ways we perceive objects produced by these fields of creative endeavour.
Prague will also witness what should be an extraordinary light, sound and pyrotechnics art spectacular. Also one of Tina B.’s special projects, this explosive and highly site-specific art show at the location where the Stalin monument once stood combines work by Magdalena Jetelová, Kurt Gebauer and Jan Vlček.
Last but not least, the festival is pleased to include the latest work in the extraordinary series of video-collages by Jakub Nepraš, who was awarded the main prize at this year’s Artefiera Art First art fair in Bologna, presented as a site-specific projection at the Laterna Magika theatre.
Different venues
Prague