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Somerville’s speculative history/community art project by artist Tim Devin (previously seen on Groundswell here) has launched, offering a rich vision of the next 90 years, from fleets of mobile libraries to population influx due to the flooded streets of neighboring Boston. Grab a free PDF of the book, or browse the full timeline here.
Residents of Somerville may wish to speak with Tim Devin. His ongoing History of Somerville, 2010-2100 involves gathering stories from past and current residents about life in that city over the next 90 years. Devin’s plan is to compare these visions of a future Somerville against official development plans, and draw up a printed publication for early 2010.
It’s public ideation plus speculative fiction, and it’s entirely in line with our thoughts on crisis folklore.
Thanks, Tim!
(Artist and Groundswell guest blogger Chris Kennedy makes projects for the land and for situated communities. His ongoing projects include Artiscycle, Groups and Spaces, and the Institute for Applied Aesthetics.)
Hmm…so many institutes, schools and research-based projects as of late! A recent project called the Institute for Aesthetic Research by Daniel Lichtman and David Baumflek is holding some events at Exit Art in New York this month and next. Sounds like some good discussions and exchanges will come from this….but I can’t help but wonder – what if anything comes from these projects if they are temporary or event-based….how can we move beyond art as an event-economy in many ways – can the idea of this “Institute” be something long term and meaningful for an actual situated community – can that community be found in NYC? Cultural production outside of the realm of neoliberalism…what does that mean? Still good stuff though…
From Exit Art: As part of America for Sale, artists Daniel Lichtman and David Baumflek will host The Institute for Aesthetic Research (IAR) – a program of public events, talks and discussions focused on Art, Economics and Institutional Critique. They will attempt to translate the traditional role of the “think tank” into the sphere of cultural production and visual art. As the traditional think tank situates itself between the academy, special interests and government, the IAR will consider how to place itself critically within the circuits of distribution and legitimization of aesthetic objects and ideas. The IAR will itself be an experiment in the dynamics of cultural-political discourse. These five weekly meetings will culminate in a collectively-produced publication that explores the possibilities of cultural production in contestation, or outside the realm of Neoliberalism. (Image: University of Trash)
Filmed before the 2005 Israeli evacuation of the West Bank, Wild Seeds (2005) offers a parodic simulation of the conflict within Israel over its relationship to Palestine and its occupation.
Still from Yael Bartana’s Wild Seeds, via
As the Israeli government prepared to remove its citizens from occupied lands, video artist Yael Bartana staged a game with a group of third-generation Zionist teenagers in the hills outside of Prat’s Settlement. The teens, who created the game, oppose the occupation, and the game’s symmetry to the violent confrontation between soldiers and settlers at Gilad’s Farms in 2002 is intentional.
Huddled together, and with limbs entangled, the players tried maintain their grip with others attempted to extract their bodies from the mass. Much laughing and shouting ensued, which Bartana translated into English and chose to project opposite the video of the game, so as to force the viewer to choose between watching the video or its translation.
Wild Seeds feels right at home across from Artur Zmijewski’s THEM (SIE) (2007), also on show at the ICA’s Acting Out: Social Experiments in Video. These two films are the highlights of the show, and one can’t help but compare them, given both their similar subject matter and side-by-side placement in the gallery. Visitors have the opportunity to view both films, as well as three others, until October 18, 2009.
Belgium’s Conflict Room was inspired by Polish artist Artur Zmijewski’s video work Them (2007), wherein he invited politically polarized groups to engage their conflicting ideologies through “communally executed paint-and-paper murals.”
Conflict Room image by Srdjan Stancic
Critical Network describes the work further:
His video documents the ensuing exchanges as they deteriorate from considered alterations to the painted banners of opposing groups to frenziedly burning and hurling the remains of the defaced placards through the window.
Borrowing rather heavily from Zmijewski’s format, Conflict Room gathered artists for a three-month period to explore the nature of conflict through visual arts. Projects ranged from documentaries concerning post-conflict societies impacted by natural disaster, to differences in visually realizing a text. Documentation from the 2008 series is online.
