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DAK'ART 2014

May 9 - June 8

The International Exhibition of African and African diaspora artists is the main event of the Biennale. The selection is entrusted to the curators of Dak’art 2014: Elise Atangana for selecting the diaspora, Abdelkader Damani for North Africa and Smooth Ugochukwu Nzewi for sub-Saharan Africa. The selection is the combined result of artists invited by the curators, eight for each curator, and artists selected on the basis of portfolios provided by the artists or their representatives. For the 2014 edition, the International Exhibition gathers 61 artists.

Producing the common

" All over the world biennial exhibitions multiply with the aim of creating a global image. Some might see it as a clear manifestation of globalization, a most exasperated expression, and a repetition of contemporary art exhibitions in a never-ending quest for novelty. For others, including us, the multitude of art biennials is an attempt to find “globality” and a common desire to produce a feeling of a singular world (Tout-Monde) in each place, a term coined by Édouard Glissant. What Glissant calls the "Whole-World,” is "our universe that is ever changing yet remains the same, and the vision that we have of it."

“Producing the common” is our central theme for Dak’Art 2014. With this theme, we seek to link politics and aesthetics in a vigorous and engaged way. Is the encounter of works of art in a specific place, the art exhibition, not an attempt to instantly produce the public space which people seek through movement and protests?

Most contemporary artists see politics as the prism through which they receive and interpret existential reality. They engage reality in their works and consequently involve their work in reality. Aesthetics is shaped by a wealth of forms and approaches used by artists to make their work legible. Thus, if politics is a way of communicating in the public space, is art therefore the base?

Art, more than any other domain, creates a chain of relations between men and women, but also the interplay between humanity, nature and the Universe. Artists’ creations must possess the vital force in order to command the attention of audiences. Art should be able to take into account common aspirations, fears, hopes and daily struggles with the utmost sincerity. That is why we think of the exhibition as the “distribution of the sensible,” to draw from Jacques Rancière. It is why we share his point of view of linking politics to art and aesthetics.

Our framework, “to produce the common”, is a conscious act of engaging what is collectively shared, and to take into account what affects everyone, the “Whole-World”. For Dak’Art 2014, we are interested in new modes of address used by contemporary artists (from Africa and elsewhere) in thinking critically about art and the artistic process as a public vocation, and as part of the whole.

A timetable for video screening and cinema, as well as interventions in public spaces, completes this program for Dak’Art 2014, anchored in both reality and the imaginary. We hope this ensemble will provide a space and time to think about art, politics, and affirm that being together is the only horizon for human creation. "

By the curators: Elise Atangana, Abdelkader Damani, Smooth Ugochukwu Nzewi.

Website: http://www.dakart.org

Venue: Village of the Biennale, Route de Rufisque.

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8th Berlin Biennale

May 29 - August 3, 2014

The 8th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art will bring together a range of local and international artistic positions that explore the intersection between larger historical narratives and individuals’ lives.

Juan A. Gaitán, curator of the 8th Berlin Biennale, has invited Tarek Atoui, Natasha Ginwala, Catalina Lozano, Mariana Munguía, Olaf Nicolai, and Danh Vo to collaborate with him as core members and advisors in his artistic team.

‘The research for the 8th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art is structured along three speculative approaches toward the city of Berlin: in narratives exposed through its built environment, in its relationship to the formation of citizenship and as figured against current forces of tourism, and finally in its relations between historical and contemporary configurations of labor. The upcoming edition will travel beyond Berlin-Mitte to areas that have become relatively “minor” within the divided as well as reunified realities of the city. Through this expanded cartography the Berlin Biennale will also engage with how the Berlin of the 18th and 19th centuries is contemplated within our current cultural landscape. The artistic team of the Berlin Biennale will be developing its research with a focus on historical forms of movement and fixity, as the two main categories of modern subjectivity. Over different exhibition venues, this Berlin Biennale will bring together a range of local and international artistic positions that explore the intersection between these larger historical narratives and individuals’ lives, counterpoising the empirical and the authoritative approaches to history and historical becoming.’

(From the statement of Juan A. Gaitán, Curator of the 8th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art )

The 8th Berlin Biennale will take place from May 29 to August 3, 2014 and will open its doors to the public at all venues on Wednesday, May 28, 2014, from 7 to 10 pm.

VENUES, OPENING HOURS AND SUGGESTED ROUTE

1. → Haus am Waldsee
(Argentinische Allee 30, 14163 Berlin, Tue–Fri 10 am–6 pm, Sat–Sun 11 am–6 pm)
U3 to Krumme Lanke (direction Krumme Lanke), 1 minute walk.
Alternatively S1 to Mexikoplatz (direction Potsdam HBF), 8 minutes walk.

2. Haus am Waldsee → Museen Dahlem – Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
(Lansstraße 8, 14195 Berlin, Tue–Fri 10 am–6 pm, Sat–Sun 11 am–6 pm)
U3 – Krumme Lanke (direction Nollendorfplatz) to Dahlem Dorf,
2 minutes walk.

3. Museen Dahlem → KW Institute for Contemporary Art + Crash Pad
(KW: Auguststraße 69, 10117 Berlin, Tue–Sun 12–10 pm
Crash Pad c/o KW: front house, 1st floor, from 26.1.–26.5.2014 Sat–Sun 2–6 pm,
from 29.5.–3.8.2014 Tue–Sun 12–10 pm)
U3 – Dahlem Dorf (direction Nollendorfplatz) to Wittenbergplatz.
U2 – Wittenbergplatz (direction Pankow) to Alexanderplatz.
S5/S7/S75 – Alexanderplatz (directions Spandau/Wannsee/Westkreuz)
to Hackescher Markt, 5 minutes walk.

All venues are closed on Mondays.

DriveNow
Use the offer from our car sharing partner DriveNow: Visitors of the 8th Berlin Biennale can travel easily and comfortably with BMW’s or MINI’s between all exhibition venues. DriveNow offers you more than 900 cars in Berlin for one-way trips without any stationary return locations. Save the registration fee of 29 Euros and use the voucher OSMBOJYCZR at: de.drive-now.com/art. Then pick up your DriveNow-ID anytime at one of the Sixt registration branches or from May 29 to June 1, 2014 at KW Institute for Contemporary Art. Don’t forget to bring your driver’s license, ID, and bank details or credit card.

ADMISSION
Tickets are avilable at all venues and online.They authorize for one single entry to each venue of the 8th Berlin Biennale and are valid troughout the whole duration of the exhibition.

16 €, reduced 10 €
Groups of 10 or more: 14 €, reduced 8 €

Special Offer Ticket + Guidebook: 25 €, reduced 20 €
Available at all venues.

GUIDEBOOK
The guidebook of the 8th Berlin Biennale with introductory texts and comments on the artistic works is available for 12 Euros at all venues and online.

GUIDED TOURS
Guided tours are organized by art:berlin. Public tours in German can be attended without advance reservation.
Guided tours for groups and school classes in German, English, French, Italian and Spanish are available upon request.
Information on guided tours can be found here.

Website:

www.berlinbiennale.de

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Bienal Internacional de Cuenca 12

Ir para volver/ Leave to return

March 28 - June 27, 2014

The 12th Bienal de Cuenca is conceived as an open thought process, in which the artworks form different thematic constellations by emphasizing a set of independent, yet equally interrelated concepts. The Bienal's conceptual nuclei have to do with issues that are not only relevant for contemporary artistic production, but also for society as a whole, particularly in the historically and culturally stimulating context of Ecuador and of Cuenca, more specifically.

Poet, essayist and novelist Édouard Glissant (Martinica, 1928 – Paris, 2011) described with the concept of ‘creolization’ a world in constant transformation, covered by infinite roads circulating people, things, and ideas in violent, yet also pacific, colonizing and even fertilizing ways. Informed by Glissant's understanding of knowledge as stemming from movement and relation, the first nucleus of the Bienal addresses the suspension of the privileged condition of the artist. In some cases, this results in nomadic artworks, not only because of their physical movement, but also through the outsourcing of creative production to the point of following an almost industrial modus operandi. In other cases, artists recuperate traditional know-how, by working with craftsmen or rescuing fables and forgotten stories, or they reinterpret already existing works and even collaborate with spirits and other-than-human beings. The dissolution of the border between the conceptual and the physical author undermines the bases of economic, geographic and political status quos, often referring in more or less direct ways, to Post-colonial debates and the need to undermine market logic.

In problematizing those issues, the 12th Bienal will also gather artists and artworks that question the validity of standard and universal measurements of time and space, and point to the impossibility of reducing the world to uniform criteria. The need to grasp the world in a direct, lived, and unmediated way leads artists to create their own logic, resulting in personal ways of imagining the passing of time, the length of a path, or the limits of a country or city. Similarly, other artists revisit moments of historical importance by reassessing their symbolic value and using them as tools for the understanding of the present.

Most of the artists included in the 12th Bienal have, at one point in their practice, dealt directly with many of the issues described above. Building bridges to other cultures or into their own; collaborating with unknown people in remote places to create a sense of proximity, and to make the world unique and authentically theirs; re-imagining time, space and history; "Planting unknown plants in dilated soil, making mountains come together", as Glissant once wrote. Everything connects in the unending plot of this show. Every artwork reveals infinite meanings that sprout both from its own poetics and from the relation with its surroundings.

The title of the exhibition is based on the Ecuadorian expression "ir para volver" ("leaving to return"), which describes a physical and temporary absence (frequently even without a definite duration). While highlighting the state of movement as the key aspect of many artworks and practices included in the exhibition, this expression also situates the 12th Bienal de Cuenca in the undefined field of speech, emphasizing the importance of dialogue and of the mixture of apparently distant, disparate, and even opposed forms of knowledge. Leaving to Return signals an ongoing dialogue that takes place far away from the rigidity of strict and polished discourses and ultimately delves into life itself.

Organizer:

Fundación Municipal Bienal de Cuenca

Simón Bolívar 13 - 89 y Estévez de Toral
Cuenca
Ecuador

Tel.: [593] (07) 2831778

Email: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Website: bienaldecuenca.org

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Manif d'art 7 - The Québec City Biennial

Resistance – And Then, We Built New Forms

May 3 - June 1

From May 3 to June 1, the public is invited to view the exhibits and take part in the many activities organized under the theme of Resistance – And Then, We Built New Forms. The Quebec City biennial will gather over 120 artists whose works will be displayed at 35 venues in Quebec City, Lévis and Wendake. To make sure biennial participants get the whole experience of this event, four walking tours of the exhibit venues have been laid out. The extensive event program comprises nearly 50 activities, such as special events, workshops, meetings with the artists and guided tours.

The guidelines for Manif d’art 7 were defined by Curator Vicky Chainey Gagnon and focus on the theme of resistance. This biennial underscores the critical role played by the visual and media arts in the documentation of conflicts and manifestations of resistance. The Curator develops the theme by addressing the many tactics and strategies on which are based current radical practices. The political role of art, film, video and performance in association with resistance is examined and discussed.

For the first time at a Manif d’art biennial, the theoretical piece produced following a reflection on the theme will be unveiled at the Manif d’art 7 Benefit Premiere Event on Friday, May 2, 2014. The catalogue for Resistance – And Then, We Built New Forms comprises all of the theoretical texts on resistance and a colour portfolio of the 36 artists chosen by the Curator.

Artists selected by the Curator

Abbas Akhavan (Toronto, Canada); Gisele Amantea (Calgary, Canada); Mathieu Beauséjour (Montreal, Canada); Rebecca Belmore (Winnipeg, Canada); Ron Benner (London, Canada); Dominique Blain (Montreal, Canada); Mark Boulos (Amsterdam, Netherlands / Geneva, Switzerland); Martin Bureau (Quebec City, Canada); Jarod Charzewski (Charleston, United States); Geneviève Chevalier (Eastman, Canada); Chto Delat? (St. Petersburg, Russia); Claire Fontaine (Paris, France); Carole Condé + Karl Beveridge (Toronto, Canada); Marc-Antoine Côté (Quebec City, Canada); Jean-Robert Drouillard (Quebec City, Canada); Jean-Maxime Dufresne & Virginie Laganière (Montreal, Canada); Les Fermière Obsédées (Quebec City / Montreal, Canada); Regina José Galindo (Guatemala City, Guatemala); Groupe d’action en cinéma Épopée (Montreal, Canada); Jamelie Hassan (London, Canada); Richard Ibghy & Marilou Lemmens (Montreal / Durham-Sud, Canada); Justseeds Artists’ Cooperative (United States / Canada / Mexico); Thomas Kneubühler (Montreal, Canada); Justin A. Langlois (Vancouver, Canada); Marie-France Légaré (Montreal, Canada); Richard Martel (Quebec City, Canada); Michael McCormack (Halifax, Canada); Nadia Myre (Montreal, Canada); Clint Neufeld (Osler, Canada); Jacqueline Hoang Nguyen (Brooklyn, United States / Stockholm, Sweden); Juan Ortiz-Apuy (Montreal, Canada); Oliver Ressler (Vienna, Austria); Alain-Martin Richard (Quebec City, Canada); Julie Andrée T. (Sagard, Canada); Guillermo Trejo (Mexico City, Mexico); Giorgia Volpe (Quebec City, Canada).

Venues

The work of the artists selected by the Curator will be presented at Espace 400e Bell, the primary venue for Manif d’art 7, as well as at 16 associated sites. Outdoor works will also be on display day and night at several locations in downtown Quebec City. Special partnerships have been established with cultural organizations in Quebec City and Wendake to hold activities related to the theme of the event. Sixteen Quebec City and Montreal organizations will host stimulating exhibits and satellite activities with their own interpretation of resistance.

Associated venues: Antitube in association with Les Productions Recto-Verso (videos screened at Studio d’essai), Avatar, Engramme, Galerie des arts visuels, Grand Théâtre de Québec, La Bande Vidéo, LA CHAMBRE BLANCHE, Le Lieu, L’Œil de Poisson, MATERIA, Musée de la civilisation, Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, Regart, Vidéo Femmes (videos screened at Le Cercle) and VU PHOTO.

Outdoor works: on two RTC bus shelters (one near the Grand Théâtre de Québec, the other beside the Fabrique Building), in the Faubourg elevator, at Carré Lépine and on one of the outside walls of the Gabrielle-Roy Public Library.

Special partners: Maison Hamel-Bruneau, Huron-Wendat Museum, Le Cercle and Bibliothèque de Québec (at the Gabrielle-Roy, Saint-Jean-Baptiste, Aliette-Marchand and Collège-des-Jésuites public libraries).

Organizer:

Manif d’art

600, côte d'Abraham
Québec G1R 1A1
Canada
Website / Email

Claude Bélanger
General and Artistic Director

Patrick Fournier
Communications Director
418 524-1917
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Mary-Pierre Belzile
Communications assistant
418 524-1917
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