Michael Kienzer marks a significant
position in contemporary Austrian art. His work examines and at the same
time looks to break away from accepted viewing habits using a minimalist
inspired sculptural idiom that is taken apart into its tactile, semantic
and communicative elements. Thereby he is dissecting perception into
aspects of description and vision, questioning it through unusual
circumstances that often seem to follow a strange or comical logic. His
work takes the audience on a journey that explores the seemingly
self-evident construction of everyday knowledge.
Following Sol
LeWitt and Pedro Cabrita Reis, Kienzer has created a giant
sculpture for the upper space of the Kunsthaus Graz. Like the line of a
drawing veering out of control, his work opens up the space, surveying and
critically measuring it. In the context of other current works, questions
are raised about the meaning of participation in sculpture, the incomplete
and one’s position with regard to the past and future of art. Beginning with his
preoccupation with different materials and their semantic and social
significance, Kienzer has made works in a wide variety of media:
from graphic design to drawing and sculpture, he deals with categories of
language, space, time, surface, concentration and also with the conditions
of participation. In 2001 he was awarded the Otto Mauer Prize and in 2010
the Recognition Prize for Art in Public Space of the Province of Lower
Austria.
A
catalogue published by Czernin Verlag Vienna accompanies the exhibition
(with texts by Peter Pakesch, Katrin Bucher Trantow, Michael Kienzer, Franz
Thalmair, Nicola Trezzi). Curated by Katrin Bucher Trantow.
ISCP founding director Dennis Elliott recently traveled to Torino, Italy to present ISCP to the students, faculty and guests of IAAD - Istituto d'Arte Applicata e Design - Torino. His lecture was well received by his Italian viewers and was profiled by the Italian newspaper, La Stampa. Click here to view the article.
Société Réaliste: The Fountainhead, video, 1h51, 2010
ISCP alum, Petra Feriancova joins 6 other artists in the exhibition, State of Affairs, curated by Borbála Szalai. The exhibition opened on January 12, 2012 and will run until Feburary 11 at amt_project in Baštová, Bratislava.
The constructed environment itself is the main protagonist in the video realized by the French-Hungarian artist collective, Société Réaliste. The video is based on the 1949 movie, The Fountainhead, that tells the story of a Modernist architect who went on to gain recognition for his revolutionary ideas and his absolute refusal to compromise with a society that resists innovation. Appropriating the footage, Société Réaliste digitally removed all traces of human presence from the movie, spriting away the architect, a hero of Capitalism and modern free markets, as well as all of the other characters of the movie, together with all elements of the plot and the soundtrack, leaving behind nothing but the empty space. Thus the narrative of the 111 minutes long video is reduced to the story of idealized locations of the budding New York Capitalism, engeneering offices opening on painted skylines and mock skypscrapers.
Artists: Cyril Blazo, Radu Comsa, David Raymond Conroy, Milena Dopitova, Petra Feriancova, Tomas Vanek, Martin Vongrej
Birthe Blauth, The Gift, 2011, Interactive 1-channel videoinstallation
ISCP alum Birthe Blauth is currently showing at 532 Gallery Thomas Jaeckel in New York. The gallery will present four new works by Blauth in her first solo show in the US. Blauth's conceptual video works and installations explore the conflict betwen the individual stands and his limitations. Her interest is divided equally between two areas. On the one hand, she focuses on subjective perception. On the other hand, she explores the subjective thinking and effort individuals undertake to relate themselves to their surroundings. Her precise, pared-down works appear simple at first. But as soon as the observer takes the time to open up to them, their complexity and effectiveness unfold. Her works are meditative and "unhurried". Her approach to time or more at home in the cultures of the Far East. Often, the boundaries between fiction and reality, between art and the observer, between art and non-art become dissolved.
The exhibition is currently running and will close on January 21, 2012 at 532 West 25th Street, New York, NY 10001. More information here.
Additionally, Blauth was invited by the German consulate to the United States to participate in an evening "The Red Orchestra and the Art of Resistance" on January 12, 2012. Blauth's audio art installation work, Et si omnes ego non
(Even if all others…I will not) complemented the lecture. With the Latin phrase for its title, the work features the
sentence repeated over and over by different voices- disordered at
first, then slowly uniting into one rhythm. The process is at the same
time visually portrayed through a frequency diagram.
Et si omnes ego non is on display at the German House through January 24. More information here.
Kakyoung Lee, Days in New York - Horizontal, 2011, 5 channel HD moving image, graphite on paper, B/W, sound, 140 minute loop
Mary Ryan Gallery is opening Dance, Dance, Dance,
a solo exhibition of video installations by ISCP artist-in-residence
Kakyoung Lee. This will be Lee's first solo show in New York
and is her most ambitious project to date. Lee's methods are
intentionally time-consuming. She employs repetitive, meticulous
techniques, often making more than 100 prints or drawings per project,
to translate her repetitious daily routine, what she calls "the
monotonous daily ritual." Through the exploration of these most basic
aspects of her life Lee articulates her own identity.
Like much of Lee's recent work, Dance, Dance, Dance
began as a performance of a mundane or everyday action. Lee documents
this initial performance by filming herself with a video camera, and
then using drypoint, she deconstructs her performance into single
moments. These individual elements are then put back together using
animation and the initial action is reconstructed. Brown Circle,
a two-channel video of a drawing made using leftover coffee, will also
be on view.
In addition to her solo show, Lee will be participating in ISCP's upcoming salon on January 24th. Join us at 6:30pm to hear Lee will discuss her work, along with ISCP resident Jean-Michel Ross.
To round off her exciting month, Lee will show her work Walk-2010 in the exhibition, New Prints 2012/Winter a the International Print Center New York. The exhibition runs from January 28th - March 24th with an opening reception held on February 2nd from 6:00pm -8:00pm. Find more information here.
Alexandra Navratil, 2010, Time Lags in Real Time, Wood, mirrors, b/w prints and flourescent tubes, 118" x 118" x 71" each
LIVING DOCUMENT / NAKED REALITY
TOWARDS AN ARCHIVAL CINEMA
The Institute of Contemporary Art's newest exhibition explores cinema's
complex political, formal, and ideological history from the 1910s to
the 1960s through showcasing the work of six international artists including ISCP alum Alexandra Navratil. Her work Sample
Frames, an installation
composed of four carousel slide projectors, showcases a collection of
nitrate film frames produced by the Eastman Kodak Company between
1916 and 1927.
The exhibition will run between January 11 – March 4, 2012 and includes artists Mathieu Kleyebe Abonnenc, Thom Anderson, Yto Barrada. Jacqueline Hoang Nguyen, Maha Maamoun, and Alexandra Navratil.
Etienne Chambaud Pierres (detail) 2010 Stones, steel and concrete, dimensions variable Courtesy of the artist and Bugada & Cargnel, Paris
Isabelle Cornaro Landscape with Poussin and eye witness (i) 2009 Plywood, textile and various objects, 2' by 3.5'
ISCP alumni Isabelle Cornaro and Étienne Chambaud will join 11 artists in the exhibition, Rotary Connection, at the Casey Kaplan Gallery in New York. Curated by Loring Randolph, the exhibition is being hailed as Chelsea's first big group show of 2012. Chambaud's contribution consists of two sculptures and attempts to emphasize the fragile balance of context, representation, and meaning. Cornaro's work focuses on documents and archives belonging to history and culture. She will exhibit three drawings and an etheral spray painting. More information.
The exhibition will open tomorrow and run until February 11th. An opening reception will be held January 5th from 6-8 pm at 525 West 21st Street, New York, NY 10011.
Current resident artist Leif Elggren's public art project, Yellow & Black, opens on Sunday, December 11, 2011, on the sidewalk in front of 102 W 23rd Street (between 6th and 7th Ave.), New York. The project simultaneously continues and spreads out over the city and beyond, including yellow and black images, signs and symbols wherever they are found.The project was initiated in 1977 and has since manifested all over the world in many different shapes and forms.
Current resident Hélène Picard presents Super fragilistic, a performace and ongoing project about immigration and the experience of being a migrant, on Tuesday December 6, 2011, at Caldwell College in New Jersey. Performance is a new medium for the artist, who usually works as a painter, and she will also discuss her creative process for this work. More information.
December 6, 2011- 6-8pm Caldwell College 120 Bloomfield Avenue, Caldwell, New Jersey 07006
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