july - september 2004 focus on film 12



 
Visiting Galleries in Belgium
by Adriana Schmorak


 
Brussels, Knokke, Amberes, Hasselt; some big cities and others small towns in Belgium that Bistart has chosen to end its visit around European galleries. The Animé and millenary technique Sumi-e, the latest in photography, and the newest in interactive media art, could not have been better choices to end this fascinating trip Bistart embarked on in December 2003, to circulate the latest works from this fascinating world. From our selection of galleries, Bistart shares the following summaries with its readers.  
     

Dieter Appelt, "Tableau Oppedette", b & w print, 1980.

 
Verlatstraat 23-25, Amberes
Birth – Sex – Death
 
Galerie Tim van Laere

 
april 2004
 
http://www.artsite.be/VanLaere
 
Birth – Sex – Death is an exhibition that reflects on these key moments in human life. Subjects that are usually present in the works of these five artists, Dieter Appelt, Nan Goldin, Edward Lipski, Maryam Najd, Manuel Ocampo, in autobiographical form or not, in different techniques such as photography, video, painting, drawings, collage and sculptures. Dieter Appelt has been teaching photography, film and video at the Hochschule der Kunst in Berlin since 1982.This artist studied photography at the Academy of Fine Arts of Berlin and music at the Academy of Leipzig. Appelt·s works of the ·70s and ·80s was intimately related to performances. In fact, he started taking photographs to record his performances on outdoor stages. Occasionally, he uses long exhibitions to record the effects of light during the day. “In my photographic work, familiar parameters of perception, space and time are manipulated by means of various operations and transformations. In this sense, the central aspect is my interest in the phenomenon of the slowness of exposures and the movement of objects.” Dieter Appelt·s photographs have been on view in Europe since the ·70s, more specifically at the Victoria and Albert Museum of London, the Centre George Pompidou of Paris and the Staatliche Museen of Berlin. In the United States he has held individual shows in New York, Chicago and San Francisco.

 

Noritoshi Hirakawa. c-print

 
Leopold De Waelplaats 16, Amberes
Noritoshi Hirakawa
 
Galerie Zeno X

 
march 2004
 
http://www.zeno-x.com
 
Noritoshi Hirakawa was born in 1960 in Fukuoka, Japan. He currently lives and works in New York. This artist·s photographs have a strong sexual connotation. According to him, the sexual revolution has ended and the Puritans have won. Hirakawa proposes the ruling cultural idea of controlling and suppressing irrational forces in human sexual behavior, such as desire, fantasy and lust. His images question the process through which the desire of the heterosexual man has been inhibited and repressed, while Western society pretends to be tolerant towards diversity. His photographs and videos often portray young women in insinuating situations in front of the camera. This way, Hirakawa refutes the arguments of those who suppose that all expressions of heterosexual desire are evidence of an oppressive masculine view. Noritoshi Hirakawa has held individual exhibitions in Tokyo, Paris, New York and Köln. He was invited to present his work SMAK in Gantes at the group exhibition “Casino 2001”, and the Modern Art Museum of Frankfurt included the piece Tokyo Dreams in its permanent collection.

 

Granular Synthesis (Kurt Hentschlager y Ulf Langheinrich), "Installazione_LUX_01", instalation

 
Zuivelmarkt 33, Hasselt
Feel the Old & Feel the New
 
Art Centre Z33

 
augoust 2004
 
http://www.limburg.be/z33
 
Z33 is an experimental art center that, as an initiative of the Province of Limburg, focuses on new media and on art and contemporary design. It aims at young people who currently live surrounded by new media such as portable computers, Internet, state-of-the-art cell phones - GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) or new phones with in-built cameras, DVDs, CDs and CD Roms, just to name a few. However, the process has been so fast that not enough time was devoted to stopping and reflecting on all these technological advances and their possible applications. Z33·s objective is to achieve a better understanding of this new and changing world, as well as the new art philosophy. Between March and August 2004, Z33 presents two shows titled Feel the old and Feel the New. In Feel, there is research into the evolution of media, first as a life experience and later as a message, allowing visitors to enjoy these experiments without the need of having any previous knowledge about the application of new technologies in art. Feel has three parts: Feel the old is a historical vision of the new media and a summary of the most outstanding features in their evolution. It is complemented by documents, objects of all types, scientific instruments and several demonstrations on small computer screens. This exhibition takes the visitor back to the time when movies were not technologically standardized. It also shows the beginnings of video art with several experimental videos from the ·60s screened on six television sets. The artists are: Vito Acconci, Lyunda Beglis, James Byrne, Douglas Davis, Vaie Export, Joan Jonas, Mike Kelley and Paul Mc Carthy, Christof Migone, Nam June Paik, ReMi, Bas van Koolwij, Woody and Steina Vasulka, among others. Feel the New is the continuation of this project in which a group of artists such as Granular Synthesis (Kart Hentschlager and Ulf Langheinrich) present LUX, an installation in which the piece itself is the source of light, not the projection on the screen. A light appears combined with sound, in such a way that each modification of light or color in the video corresponds to a proportional change in sound. Thus, an unending continuum between image and sound is achieved. Other artists participating in Feel the New are: Anja Kempe, Björn Schülke, Francisco López, Rosa Barba, Jeffrey Shaw, Ryoji Ikeda, just to name a few. For the third part: Feel the Young, which is presented between May 20th and August 15th, 2004; Z33 has invited young Belgian artists to mount innovative interactive installations.

 
     


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