Julieta Aranda
If you tell the story well,
it will not have been a comedy
Anton Vidokle
New York Conversations
28 May – 11 July 2010
Opening: 28 May 2010, 19.00
Königstrasse 24
D-59821 Arnsberg, Germany
Tel: 0 29 31 – 2 11 22
kontakt [at] kunstverein-arnsberg.de
www.kunstverein-arnsberg.de
In 1995, Kiribati — a small archipelago nation in the South Pacific uncomfortably straddling the International Date Line — decided to bend the line’s course by 2000 miles so that the entire country could live in the same time zone rather than be split between “yesterday” and “tomorrow”. Fascinated by the idea of experiencing this time paradox first-hand, Julieta Aranda visited the islands in 2008 expecting to arrive to a tropical paradise of beautiful beaches and sunsets. What she found instead on Kiribati was a kind of historical freeze-frame: the site of major WWII battles no one bothered to clean up, the debris of which gave the effect of a moment frozen in an uncannily cinematic landscape: where Fitzcarraldo meets Apocalypse Now. A much greater temporal paradox than Aranda could have imagined, Kiribati produces a sense of history that is purely immanent — a past that has not been historicized because it has not been consumed, one that appears both completely detached from its own occurrence, yet absolutely immediate and available as experience.
For the exhibition at Kunstverein Arnsberg, Aranda will present photographs, a film and a sculpture developed following her trip to Kiribati.
Julieta Aranda was born in Mexico City and is currently based in Berlin and New York. Aranda’s work has been exhibited internationally in venues such as Solomon Guggenheim Museum (2009), where she was the first artist doing a solo presentation for the “Intervals” exhibition series; New Museum of Contemporary Art in NY (2010), MOCA Miami (2009), Witte de With, (2010), Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago (2007), 2nd Moscow Biennial (2007) MUSAC, Spain (2006), and VII Havana Biennial; amongst others.
“New York Conversations”
a film by Anton Vidokle
New York Conversations is a text film. Shot in a Chinatown storefront converted for this occasion into an improvised kitchen/restaurant, the film documents three days of public conversations between artists, critics, curators, and a free floating public. The film is a subjective record of these conversations, which explored various topics ranging from questions concerning precarious and immaterial labor in the field of art, possibilities for non-alienated life and working conditions, the feasibility of artistic freedom, and possible means of reclaiming dignity in the work of art criticism, to more immediate questions concerning whether what was actually taking place throughout the course of the event was in fact an artwork. In the tradition of underground cinema, essay films, and experimental language–based films from the conceptual era, New York Conversations insists upon a certain degree of participation from the audience—by way of critical reading—over passive spectatorship or escapism.
With: Francisca Benitez, Nico Dockx, Daniel Faust, Media Farzin, Liam Gillick, Egon Hanfstingl, Jörg Heiser, Steven Kaplan, Shama Khana, Anders Kreuger, Miwon Kwon, Valerie Mannaerts, Sis Matthé, Hadley Nunes, Saul Ostrow, Marti Peran, Simon Rees, Els Roelandt, Dieter Roelstraete, Martha Rosler, Joe Scanlan, Maxwel Stephen, Monika Szewczyk, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Jan Verwoert, Anton Vidokle, Lawrence Weiner, Andrea Wiarda, Louwrien Wijers and others.
Anton Vidokle was born in Moscow and is currently based in New York and Berlin. His work has widely been exhibited in shows such as the Venice Biennale, Lyon Biennial, Dakar Biennale, Lodz Biennale, and at Tate Modern, London. As founder of e-flux, he has produced projects such as Next Documenta Should Be Curated By An Artist, Do it, Utopia Station poster project, and organized An Image Bank for Everyday Revolutionary Life and Martha Rosler Library. Vidokle initiated research into education as site for artistic practice as co-curator for Manifesta 6, which was canceled. In response to the cancellation, Vidokle and others set up an independent project in Berlin called Unitednationsplaza—a twelve-month project involving more than a hundred artists, writers, philosophers, and diverse audiences.
New York Conversations, 1:06, sound, English
e-flux films 2010
