Opens Oct 30, 2010 at MK Galerie, Rotterdam

New Graffiti, Old Revolutions is an exhibition that imagines readings of contemporary culture as seen through the prisms of the ‘hauntological’ and the ‘spectral.’ These ideas are understood as ways of inscribing the past within the present, not as a way to order knowledge, but as a means of encountering the strange, the unheard of, the obscure and the other.  The term Hauntology was first used by Jacques Derrida in Spectres of Marx and more recently it has become shorthand in music criticism as a way of reading (analysing) music that is sample based and/or reliant on obsolete technologies. However it’s origins can be speculated back to Marcel Proust’s À La Recherche du Temps Perdu  (In Search of Lost Time), where he puts forward  the notion of ‘involuntary memory;’ the unexpected and sudden recurrence of the forgotten. The exhibition is a place to test our relation to the obsolete by examining the elusive identities of the living, and exploring the boundaries between the thought and un-thought. The idea is to create a ‘spectral’ debate to understand what ‘hauntology’ could mean in terms of artistic methodologies and productions.

curated by Jason Coburn

MKgalerie

                                                                                                   City Guides Prototype – Tbilisi

Jesse Albrecht unce upon a time David Dunlap and Pete Schulte, Jody Boyer, Carnal Torpor with Min | Day, Mel Chin, Matthew Cusick, Design99, Dana Fritz, Fundred Dollar Bills by the People of Omaha, Theaster Gates, Gregory Green, Patrick Greene, Natalie Jeremijenko, Lucy Raven, Eric von Robertson, Larry Schwarm, Morgan Schwartz, Aaron Storck, Matt Wycoff…

Project sketch and 250 hand written leaflets distributed 

Sarah Palin’s recent barb “How’s that hopey changey thing workin’ out for ya?” sent a penetrating, shrill, cynical and knowing shot to the heart of our country’s public life. Deep divides surround fundamental concerns such as the health of capitalism, the role of government in relation to individual liberties, desires for social justice and sustainability, and belief in the free market. Our political discourse wielded to address such rifts, however is fraught with useless oppositions. In a political landscape where gamesmanship trumps dialogue, contemporary art makes space for openness, belief, hope and change rooted in an authentic attempt to understand what our world is, and what it could be. The exhibition HOPEY CHANGEY THINGS believes that artists enliven our democracy in ways that our political structures delude.

HOPEY CHANGEY THINGS celebrates artists who transform places, communities and subjective histories. Plato thought artists disturbed social order by traversing classes, yet their unique ability to infiltrate social structures allows omniscient perspectives. Artists have long harbored utopian impulses, both in creating the dream and digging through its ruins; however the current collapse of political and economic structures has rendered normalcy exotic. The artists in this exhibition have adopted a kind of radical pragmatism; their sense of wonder is tempered by making do with what’s at hand to produce work of subtle and sweeping import for their worlds.

HOPEY CHANGEY THINGS traces myriad ways artists understand their place in the world, carve new ways out of existing problems, and reframe the symptoms of our present condition. Including highly personal forms of documentation, social and community interventions, and works that re-imagine our shared public sphere, the exhibition triangulates three positions: apocalytic urgency, the right of an individual or community to re-envision their place, and a gleeful acceptance of the absurdity of our current moment.

There is benevolent danger in the way art can bring us to our culture’s frayed edges, places of lurid complexity and renewed possibility. These artists are not rogue figures; they pare down the extremism of our political life to ask large questions and form hyper-rational answers. It is a beautiful contradiction to find political frontiers in the normality of artists. Art and artists can do something new for our public life, because not much else can.

HOPEY CHANGEY THINGS is organized by Hesse McGraw, Bemis Center curator. Bemis Center For Contemporary Arts

Traveller   1985/ 1990

Bronze, polychromed in oil, mixed media with accessories.

1/4             FL

2/4            NY

3/4            CT

4/4            Location Unknown. 

An editioned announcement and a series of excursions to find a displaced sculpture.

An exhibition curated by pietmondriaan.com

March 12 – April 18 2010,
opening: March 12, 20:00h

Stichting KOP
Speelhuislaan 171, Breda 

Participating artists:

Stefaan Dheedene (BE)
Wolfgang Plöger (D)
Jack Falanga (USA)
André Kok (NL)
Pierre Ardouvin (FR)
Olivier Maarschalk (NL)
Frederik van Simaey (BE)
Raf Rooijmans (NL)
Eric v Robertson (USA)
Ruben Kindermans (BE)

March 23, 2010    5:00pm – 9:00pm   Stichting KOP, Breda

I’m entertaining questions about a plant on designer drugs Tuesday night

In 2005, a project was started named Sapporo II, set in the winter landscape of Sapporo. It is the name of an imaginary parallel world, in which the people of Sapporo can rethink themselves and engage in a different reality. It is a project about snow as a means to investigate the possible role of the artistic producers in context of the city and its urban conditions. Its intentions are to develop a stronger, independent artistic community. Snowfall is specific to the city of Sapporo and its urban and social conditions. Each year the city is covered with a white surface of frozen water that touches and engages everyone.  

More About Sapporo II – Japan Times

The Melting Gift

In collaboration with Kamiel Verschuren & Luaran Schijvens – 2010

Test Site – 4 sketches produced with heavy snow removal equipment. In Sapporo II artists direct the displacement of snow within the urban context.

A collaborative project produced in the context of ‘Displacements’ – a workshop with Cesare Pietroiusti

The theme of this workshop is the contemporary experience of dislocation, both in its psychological and social aspects of estrangement and alienation, and in its meaning within the discourses of tourism and migration. 

Participants; Agnieszka Roguski, Alex Auriema, Anna-Sophie Springer, David Buob, Egle Micikeviciute, Eric Von Robertson, Felix Marlow, Georgios Papadopoulos, Katarzyna Perlak, Katy Beinart, Laura Garbstiene, Manuel Prados Sanchez, Manuela Buttiglione, Nico Angiuli, Saulius Leonavicius, Susan Barnet, Susan Schmidt, Timea Anita Oravecz, Valentina Vetturi

Transient Spaces – The Tourist Syndrome is an interdisciplinary project on the symmetries and asymmetries between contemporary tourism and migration, encompassing research, theory, practice, workshops, seminars, conferences and art exhibitions in Italy, Lithuania, Romania and Germany in 2009 and 2010.

The Tourist Syndrome Summer Camp, 3 – 11 September 2009.  Palanga, Lithuania –  a renowned seaside resort on the Baltic Sea coast.

16-23 may 2009

Organhaus Art Space is a non-profit and independent art organization, founded in 2001. It is located next to the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute. It organizes multi-media art-exhibitions and cross-media art activities for young and experimental artists. 

Address: Organ, 501 Art Space. Huang Jueping, Jiu Longpo District, Chongqing, 400053. PR China

Over the coarse of two weeks these students set out across the sprawling city of 4million to capture the everyday life being performed in their city.  To offer the world a mere glimpse of a city that is rapidly expanding between the Jialang and Yangzi rivers.  Amongst the mountains and below the skyscrapers, citizens arrive daily from the countryside looking for work and a better life offered by this era of hyper-industrialization in the Sichuan region.

The videos from this workshop were presented on June 4th at the Zero Bar, a popular hang out below a large complex of artists studios and galleries located in the Jiu Longpo District.  At least 70 people showed up for an evening of celebration, discussions and above all a moment to reflect and consider a city in the making. A city in all of its irrational scale and vibrant street life was in focus, offering a glimpse of what plays out in front of us as we navigate our zones of urban life. 

城市一分钟 City One Minutes – ChongQing screening at the Zero Bar, Jiu Longpo District

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Kansas City, April 9-23

                             

About city one minutes

Making a portrait of a city is to record the unique. To register the characteristics with which this city distinguishes itself from others. It is also the city seen through the eyes of the artist.

The exhibition will be a walk through the world of cities. An insight into where and how people live. A visual report of the now.

The city one minutes is a project in partnership with the Dutch digital documentary channel Holland/Doc VPRO and the East China Normal University in Shanghai. The videos will be screened on a new website www.cityoneminutes.org on digital television, at  the Rotterdam Architecture Biennial in November 2009 and the World Expo Shanghai 2010 among other international venues.

participate   c1-app-form

A city is a living entity and its face in the morning is different from the night. One artist makes a portrait between 9:00 and 10:00. Another one makes a portrait between 21:00 and 22:00 or 01:00 and 02:00; together a portrait of 24 visions. 24 individual portraits 

I have submitted some excursions to a website that accompanies the current exhibition running at the The Canadian Centre for Architecture in Montreal

Please check it out and leave a comment if your compelled

http://cca-actions.org

The Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA) presents the exhibition Actions: What You Can Do With the City, an exhibition with 99 actions that instigate positive change in contemporary cities around the world. Seemingly common activities such as walking, playing, recycling, and gardening are pushed beyond their usual definition by the international architects, artists, and collectives featured in the exhibition. Their experimental interactions with the urban environment show the potential influence personal involvement can have in shaping the city, and challenge fellow residents to participate. 

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In cooperation with Architecture Center Aorta, The Center for the Advancement of Recreation and Leisure (Eric von Robertson) will provide two excursions through the shopping-terminal. These tours highlight; collisions in architecture, the key roles of sculpture in commercial settings, a banished rest area with large tropical palms and other improvised encounters in an attempt to gain some sense of orientation amongst the surrounding visual congestion of the shopping-terminal

Resevation is neccesary. send an e-mail to tours@aorta.nu   or visit www.aorta.nu 

Publication presentation
> 10th July, 20.00 hrs, Krugertsraat 11, Utrecht.
> As part of this project, Expodium presents a publication in which the whole trajectory is documented.   With contributions by Luuk Boelens, Hans Buiter, Saskia Sassen and participating artist.

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Traversing the ‘Knot’

Upon arriving by train in Utrecht I find myself caught in a tangled wash of pedestrian traffic, being cut off, skipping stride to avoid the oncoming wall of elbows and briefcases. In this situation it’s essentially a question of gaining some sense of orientation, of locating myself in relationship to a space or existing elements that maintain some continuity for the entire layout. With this in sight I kept returning to an existing sculpture by the artist Shinkichi Tajiri a large vertical tube twisted into a knot. This work seems to lend a clear definition for the space and functions, as it was probably intended – as a landmark or central meeting point.

Revisiting the rest area

 What is difficult to grasp and which remains invisible behind this ‘knot’ today, is a complete rest area with high tropical palms and adjoining hardwood benches. These are the kind of spaces that provide an inhabitable atmosphere and visually distinguish the site. When malls begin occupying city centers or defining the routes between public transit hubs, consideration should be taken to provide more than the average shopping experience. This means creating environments that are compelling, legible and publicly accessible. 

Weathering the Storm 

It happens a few times a season. A severe storm closes all transportation terminals over a wide region and you’re stranded. Ticket in hand, with no idea how to get where you’re going or what to do with the time in-between. In summer it can be hurricanes, heavy rains, thunderstorms, or high winds that delay travel plans for days, but every season has its natural disasters.

Jan 18 2007, Thousands of travelers stranded in Utrecht Central / Hoog Catharijne.

Hurricane force winds battered parts of Europe on Thursday.  The storms brought torrential rains and winds gusting at close to 170 kilometers per hour (105 mph). The Dutch transport ministry suspended public transport leaving thousands of commuters stranded throughout the country. 

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Hoog Catharijne project opens May 29  

Expodium, Utrecht
 o.a. Tilmann Meyer-Faje, Hendrik-Jan Hunneman, Edward Clydesdale Thomson, Sebastiaan Verhees en Eric von Robertson


Opening thursday 29th May, 20.00 hrs, Gildenkwartier 37 (inside Hoog Catharijne, just across the Mediamarkt).

Jewel of the….. HC on the move focuses on urban development in Utrecht, and in particular the development of the Hoog Catharijne shopping complex The complex was built in the early 1970s as a revolutionary shopping concept, but already during the construction concessions were being made that watered down the original design and the vision of the design team that lay behind it. After the completion of Hoog Catharijne there were more and more adaptations made over the course of time, so that little of the revolutionary concept is left today. Hoog Catharijne is no longer equipped to deal with today’s public and the demands of our day. With a group of ten artists, research will be done into the redevelopment of Hoog Catharijne and all of the agendas that are caught up with that redevelopment.

This Sunday: Hacking IKEA in public space

Location; Platform 21 

Prinses Irenestraat 19, Amsterdam

Sunday Sept 21 @ 15:00 hr.

Join us in publicly Hacking IKEA, participants are in invited to build their own version of the Desert Lodge.

The Desert lodge is a prototype for a makeshift shelter used for getting from here to there – a synthetic tumbleweed drifting in the wind. It plays on an intuitive sense of geometry and lightweight structures. The Lodge traverses diverse zones in an attempt to be realized, from an instore prototyping demonstration in IKEA to the High Plains mesas in Arizona, the Lodge is in a constant state of motion.

Where I Lived and What I Lived For - Henry David Thoreau, 1854

“As for a Shelter, I will not deny that this is now a necessary of life, though there are instances of men having done without it for long periods in colder countries than this…. But, probably, man did not live long on the earth without discovering the convenience which there is in a house, the domestic comforts, which phrase may have originally signified the satisfactions of the house more than of the family; though these must be extremely partial and occasional in those climates where the house is associated in our thoughts with winter or the rainy season chiefly, and two thirds of the year, except for a parasol, is unnecessary.”

6 september t/m 12 oktober 2008   

 Voorstraat 180,  Dordrecht 

CBK Dordrecht presents an exhibition of works by recent post-graduates who have studied in the Netherlands. Participating artists;Michael Anhalt, Joshua Beck, Julien Grossmann, Chris Meighan, Margo Onnes, Eric von Robertson, Sanne Rous, Boba Mirjana Stojadinovic, Aldwin van de Ven, Sjoerd Westbroek and Emily Williams.

Curated by Hanne Hagenaars - art historian and initiator of art magazine Mister Motley, Theo Tegelaers – freelance curator and project coordinator at SKOR and Maaike van de Wiel – assistant director CBK Dordrecht

Hours: Wednesday – Saturday 12-17 uur

Become a tourist in Your Backyard – 12 fluid ounce excursion, Location Den Haag, 2007

HM: I recently went on an excursion with your can in Kansas City. I began the drive at the western edge of Kansas City and throughout this drive through low-density suburbs, maybe 10 miles; there was simply no response. This was the middle of the day; people were completely oblivious to the can being on top of the car. As soon as I passed I-35 and drove into the higher-density, established suburbs, there was an immediate escalation. Drivers began to honk and point at the roofs of their own cars. Then when I entered the center of the city the responses were much more dramatic — a homeless man left his grocery cart and sprinted down the street flagging me down, people got out of their cars and knocked on my window, pedestrians would frantically point at the can. Driving with the can creates an opportunity to gauge awareness of public space and the various levels of participation that occur throughout the city. You could almost use the can to map zones of consciousness. The theory would be that suburban, low-density new development areas breed a lack of engagement with public space. I was truly surprised by the complete oblivion.

EvR: Even when presented with this completely misplaced object — a can riding on the top of your car? And at all different intervals of speed, even cruising down the highway? They have to be left with some kind of thoughts; maybe at dinnertime they think, “what was going on there?”

HM: Have you had any experiences with that piece in The Netherlands where the response to the can has varied?

EvR: We did this project for the Bureau for Contemporary Adventure in The Hague, but it would be more difficult to gauge that here, because the density level is so high. It was the same setup — the can was on top of the car. Early in the morning there was an older couple already waiting for an excursion. I drove in their car and the guy had his own camera so he was documenting the work for me. We left the area and headed down these small streets in the morning. It escalated from one thing to the next — bicyclists were signaling, a guy driving a backhoe pulled into the middle of the street and was signaling as he was turning. We continued and stopped at an intersection and a guy got out of his van and knocked on the window and was talking to me, letting me know I had a misplaced object. He got back into his van and honked, because I didn’t remove it, then he got back out again and pulled it away and realized it was kind of this situated object and that he had been caught between a reality and the stage I had created. So we toured this for three days. There was a guy following us in a Mercedes for 20 minutes doing a cell phone movie.

HM: That’s great, I wonder if he understood it was a staged scenario?

EvR: In some sense it doesn’t matter that it’s staged. It is a reality. When people walk out the door everyday they trust the sidewalk is going to be there. When they see a can on top of the car, it’s just a fact, there’s no trick to it.

HM: So then the question in suburban Kansas City is if the sidewalk disappeared one day, would people take notice? Or, how surreal do things have to get to jolt the suburbanite?

EvR: Right, it’s oblivion. Or maybe it isn’t oblivion, it’s just suburbia. Where are they on route to, and what’s occupying their mind? They have no periphery, it’s like they don’t have binocular vision; they are Cyclops! I like this catalyst of the can — it is so mundane and everyday and it’s accidental. It is unexplainable — nobody can explain the accidental. The accidental happens everyday and causes great consequences and stress for people. For some people in poetry and art, this is really the work — the accidental, the uncertainty that we are looking for… It’s about the encounter and being engaged on other levels…

Excerpt from a conversation with Hesse Mcgraw, curator at the Bemis Center for Contemporary Art