[7P]
[7] Places [7] Precarious Fields
6th Fotofestival Mannheim-Ludwigshafen-Heidelberg
18 September–15 November 2015
Opening: 17 September
Fotofestival Mannheim-Ludwigshafen-Heidelberg
E4.6
68159 Mannheim
Germany
T +49 621 1227312
info [at] fotofestival.info
The topic for the Festival’s upcoming edition has been decided!
Urs Stahel, Curator of the 6th Fotofestival Mannheim-Ludwigshafen-Heidelberg, has drawn up an exciting exhibition concept under the title, [7] Places [7] Precarious Fields!
The exhibitions install, in [7] museums and art venues, [7] precarious fields of our society today and discuss them on the basis of chiefly contemporary photographic and video works. In a blend of documentary and artistic works, of murals, projections, installations, showcase works, films and videos, a discursive climate that is also optically visible is to be generated, a climate that meets the requirements for dealing with these themes. The exhibitions deal with uprooting, delocalization, alienation, with high-tech production and social control, with real and virtual migration; with aggrandized self-images, highly strung psyches, rapacity, with narcissism and loss of self-control, and finally with violence, surveillance and punishment. And, of course, communication and control through photographic images will likewise be a central focus of the project.
Via the works of photographers and artists, the [7] exhibitions intend to stare these real situations unblinkingly in the face. Even if every reflection on the real always contains something fictive at the same time: Photography (by photographers and artists) has always dealt particularly intensively, in recent decades, with social and economic relationships in today’s world. The crucial point of the exhibitions will be that it will not be classic photographic thinking that is brought to bear (pointing its finger, this thinking believes it can name the world’s problems and, through naming, solve them), but contemporary and videographic positions that get to work in these critical, precarious fields, that work inside them—questioning, seeking, testing, formulating.
More than 40 international and German artists and photographers will present their works at a total of seven Festival locations.
Participants will include Ai Weiwei (China), Ilit Azoulay (Israel), Gaëlle Boucand (France), Adam Broomberg (South Africa) / Oliver Chanarin (United Kingdom), Edmund Clark (United Kingdom), Sylvain Couzinet-Jacques (France), Henrik Spohler (Germany), Mishka Henner (Belgium), Melanie Gilligan (Canada), Trevor Paglen (USA), Maya Rochat (Switzerland), Rico Scagliola / Michael Meier (Switzerland), Dayanita Singh (India), Jules Spinatsch (Switzerland) and Stefanos Tsivopoulos (Greece).
More detailed information on the artists will shortly be available on the website www.fotofestival.info. The final list of artists will be published in September.
The Festival’s thematic categories and exhibition venues:
[7.1] High-Tech, Logistics & Migration: Wilhelm-Hack-Museum, Ludwigshafen
[7.2] Violence and Destruction: Kunstverein Ludwigshafen
[7.3] Urbanism & Real Estate: ZEPHYR – Raum für Fotografie, Mannheim
[7.4] Money and Greed: Kunsthalle Mannheim
[7.5] Knowledge, Order, Power: Neuer Kunstraum im Jungbusch, Mannheim
[7.6] Ego-Fest and Self-Stress: Sammlung Prinzhorn, Heidelberg
[7.7] Communication and Control: Heidelberger Kunstverein
Fotofestival Mannheim-Ludwigshafen-Heidelberg has firmly established itself as a European biennial for contemporary photographic art. It holds a place as the biggest curated photo festival in Germany. Each Festival edition is curated by a guest curator with an international profile. The curator develops an overriding exhibition concept, the aspects of which are presented at the participating institutions. Through the joint exhibition project, Fotofestival Mannheim-Ludwigshafen-Heidelberg connects the three cities and their art institutions and thus brings about cross-city dialogue.
The three cities Mannheim, Ludwigshafen and Heidelberg are permanent Fotofestival partners. Fotofestival Mannheim-Ludwigshafen-Heidelberg is sponsored by the premium sponsor BASF SE and the principal sponsor MVV Energie AG.
