Manufacturing Today

Manufacturing Today
17 April – 16 May 2010

Private view 16 April, 6pm
Symposium ‘Dictionary of War’ 17 April, 2pm – 10pm

Venue:
Maskinistgaten 1
NO-7042 Trondheim
Norway

www.manufacturingtoday.org

‘Manufacturing Today’ has been conceived as a five year research project and exhibition to be based in Trondheim, Norway, but created more broadly, in this first instance, as a collaboration between art academies in Norway, Finland, Lithuania and the UK. ‘Manufacturing Today’ addresses the question of how art, and art education, might resist instrumentalization by the art market on the one hand, and the streamlining efforts of the state on the other. To resist this instrumentalization means to support the idea of a potential within the institution of art for the imagining of an alternative social order. To focus on education is to engage with real political questions about how institutions shape society.

The title ‘Manufacturing Today’ is appropriated from a US and European industry journal. It points both to the coming industrialization of European art education and to the role of culture in making a social superstructure; in manufacturing society.

Are today’s art schools simply places that produce students as a product for the market, and is there an alternative to this situation? Is there a social role for art students, for young artists, other than to succeed or fail as producers/products in the culture industry?

There has been a great deal of recent interest and critical attention given to the idea of radical education. Aside from the many self-organized initiatives and self-institutions, the institutional mainstream has taken up the theme in many high-profile ways. The art world has seen the revival of broadly anarchist ideas about autonomous institutions, a critique of capitalist or state-institutional modes of knowledge production and distribution, and the return of the ideals of the free universities of the 1960s. ‘Manufacturing Today’ not only intends to map out this situation, but to create a forum in which these ideas can be focused towards practice, a productive space, and to provide room for experimentation and public encounter. ‘Manufacturing Today’ will argue that art can play a vital role in exploring radical possibilities, not only for aesthetic experience but, in its expanded contemporary conception, for the formation of society in general.

‘Manufacturing Today’ includes new works and projects by around 18 international artists and artist groups, bringing together challenging works in a multitude of artistic strategies. ‘Manufacturing Today’ will feature many artist-teachers who, with a group of students, have elaborated specific projects for the occasion, as well as individual artists, post-graduate artists, and artists who function very much like activists and who have created their own self-organized structures.

This project has been conceived together with Will Bradley.

Participating artists are: Bik Van der Pol / Annika Eriksson / Free Class Frankfurt / Eva Grubinger and Jakob Neulinger with students from Sculpture Department Kunstuniversität Linz: Sarah Decristoforo, Richard Nikl, Christian Öhlinger / Jens Haaning / Simon Harvey with students from Art and Common Space from Trondheim Academy of Fine Art / Institute for Colour / Susan Kelly with students from Department of Art, Goldsmiths College: Emily Ballard, Leandro Cardoso, Tara Johnston-Comerford, Abigail Jones, Matt Lewis, Charles Mills, Lina Norell, Ana Noble, Andreas Pashias, Anna Sjogren, Marie Thams, Sarah Walters / Annette Krauss / Martin Le Chevallier / Malmö Free University for Women, MFK / Regina Möller with students from Trondheim Academy of Fine Art: Kerstin Juhlin, Tian Miller, Tore Reisch, Cathrine Ruud, Karen Sørensen, Marte Tidslevold / Florian Schneider / Sille Storihle & Kristin Tårnes / Superflex / Milica Tomic with students from Finnish Academy of Fine Arts, Helsinki: Tatu Engeström, Bonnie Fan, Marina Lucena, Bita Razavi, Jarkko Räsänen, Hermanni Saarinen, Elina Tuhkanen, Filippo Zambon / UKK – Young Art Workers / Nomeda & Gediminas Urbonas with Guggenheim Visibility Study and Slow TV

Curator: Cristina Ricupero

The symposium: Instead of a conventional panel structure the symposium at the opening of “Manufacturing today” will take the form of a dictionary. This means that every guest and contributor is invited to create one concept that is then going to be presented at the opening weekend in a half hour time slot and in alphabetical order. The symposium will bring together recognized theorists, artists, educators and activists from around northern Europe. ‘Dictionary of War’ is an ongoing project by Florian Schneider.

www.manufacturingtoday.org

Organised by Trondheim Academy of Fine Art in collaboration with Finnish Academy of Fine Arts (Helsinki), Vilnius Academy of Arts, Goldsmiths College Department of Art (London University).