engage2012-ABOUT THE PROJECT

                engage 2012 artist led residential city project

          project description and details

Thematic background

During engage2012, a group of artists will travel from their different cities of residence, to Bucharest, Romania where none of them have ever been before. They will stay in Bucharest for two weeks. The artists will go out on their own into the city, where they explore, engage and interact, drawing from their own artistic practice and perspective. In this way they are made aware of their surroundings; a city in which they are strangers, newcomers. Bucharest Air, an artist run organization, will host the project and in return the project participants will share their research in a public presentation at the end of their stay.

Each day the group will meet together and share their thoughts and experiences, developing both their dialogue with the group and with the city of Bucharest.

The artists leave their homes, where reactions and interactions are often familiar and defined. They come together in a foreign city, where they themselves are the others, simultaneously being in the city, as well as apart from it due to their position as foreigners. The artists who are participating in engage2012 have during the course of their own practices, explored issues such as inside(r)/ outside(r), separate/ integrated, subject/ object. They have an interest in continuing these explorations, bringing their practices “onto” a city in an open and communicative process. They intend to establish a dialogue with each other, with the city, and with their host.

The process questions where and how “art” takes place. Here the dialogue is central, the making and unmaking of ideas and collective and individual strife, pushing beyond the boundaries set out for us.

How

As the project is intended to involve both individual research and collective dialogue all the participants will be expected to partake in daily meetings/ conversations. When, and under what circumstances these will take place will be planned within the group. It could, for example, be over dinner or in a public space. Apart from these meetings the participants are expected to engage with the city, explore it through the interface of their own art practice. Whatever impressions, questions or conflicts that appear relevant during these daily engagements with the city will constitute the topics of our conversations. Each participant will be encouraged to support their thoughts with “material” they have collected throughout the day; stories, drawings, anecdotes, found ephemera, recordings etc. During the first part of the project these meetings are intended to be closed so as to socially establish the group. As a form of presentation at the end of the project they will then be held open to the public for 1-3 days. During these final meetings participants can invite the public and local artists to join in the conversation. It could be moderated as a large “around-the table” or a speed-dating session. This is meant as the conclusion of the residential aspect of the project. The three organizing artists have also been invited by Bucharest Air director Tudor Bratu to present a lecture/ workshop to local art students about their individual practices and their experience of working together on engage2012.

Engage2012 is currently without funding, proposals for funding are being submitted locally by each artist, if you can offer funding or support for the project please contact us directly. We anticipate that engage will develop further, considering that we have had such positive responses from several art organizations across Europe, we foresee an ongoing dialogue and collaboration internationally, developing rich and diverse networks of exchange.

Documentation/ Publication

Throughout the process the meetings will be documented via audio recordings (ca 1-3 h daily). The transcriptions of these conversations, as well as any additional material produced in/ around/ and relevant to the project by the participants will be edited together in a publication. This publication is intended to exist online as a blog and newsletter from which parts could be sent to existing art-magazines. If possible we also wish to produce a small paper-edition that can be presented in an exhibition. It is however important to point out that the conclusion of the project takes place in the open conversations during the final stage of our stay.

We have begun and maintained this blog thus far and this could become a public document of the overall process from early planning stages to the point of visiting and residing in the new city, sharing the knowledge gained over the course of this artist-organized project.

Who is Behind Engage 2012?

This project is born from the collective concerns and curiosities of three artists; Josefin Rasmuson (Sweden) Emma Haugh (Ireland) and Tess Walkowski (US/ Resident in the Netherlands). Josefin Rasmuson and Tess Walkowski met during their studies in Amsterdam. During this period they organized several projects together. Josefin Rasmuson met Emma Haugh during Aerial Blue (organized by the Good Hatchery, Ireland) summer 2011 where they both participated in a "survival camp for contemporary artists". These relations are the basis for engage2012. The three artists meet regularly online for collaborative writing sessions and group discussion about the project and it’s ongoing development.

the evil second paragraph?

The artists leave their homes, where reactions and interactions , are often familiar and defined. They come together in a foreign city, where they themselves are the others, simaltaneously being in the city, as well as apart from it due to their position as foreighners.

The artists who are participating in “engage” have during the course of their own practices, explored issues such as inside(r)/outside(r), seperate/integrated, subject/object. They have an interest in continuing this explorations, bringing their practices “onto' a city in an open and explorative process.

They intent to establish a dialogue with each other, with the city, and with the support institution.

The artists engage with the city, drawing from their own artistic practice and methods. There is space to experience, to explore, and to experiment. As strangers to the city, with unestablished social bonds and interactions, they have space to redefine and to question. The process questions where and how “art” takes place. “Engage” is shaped by the participants and the participants in relation to the city and to each other. In the end of the project, the artists will organize and “opening” or a dialogue with the support institon and the city.   

These are the various organizations that I found that seemed of interest.

ACSL – Art and Cultural Studies “Art Commune” (Armenia, Yerevan)

Contact; Susanna Guylamiryan

info@acsl.am

They want min 2 weeks.

ACOSS (Armenia, Yerevan)

Contact; Mary Tonoyan

office@acoss.org

TICA (Albania, Tirana)

contact: contact.tica@gmail.com

Gallery Friends Art Center (Bulgaria, Ruse)

http://www.culturenergy.org

contact: chr.stom@gmail.com

(deadline 15 jan)

Rex (Serbia, Belgrade)

contact: rex@b92.net

Polymer International (Estonia, Talinn)

Culture Factory Polymer, Artist in Residency Program

Contact; Jaanika Kuklase

jaanika@kultuuritehaas.ee

/ Air Coordinator Ernest Truly (thats a proper name?)

ernest@kultuuritehaas.ee

GeoAir (Georgia, Tblisis)

Contact: infogeoair@gmail.com

(Seems cool but probably out of our league.)

IAL International Authors Lodge (Hungary, Budapest)

contact: authorslodge@gmail.com

NIDA art colony (Lithuania, Neringa)

contact: info@nidacolony.lt

Public Room (Macedonia, Skopje)

contact: contact@publicroom.org/ marija@publicroom.org

Bucharest Air (Romania)

Contact; Tudor Bratu

tudor.bratu@gmail.com

www.tudorbratu.com

Young Emerging Artsists Residency Program in Cluj Napoca (Romania)

Contact:

letter@young-emerging-artists.net

(unclear if still active + must make work)

Air Celeia Celje (Slovenia)

Seems interesting and professional but I had problems in loading the page with their contacts.

MOTA Museum of Transitory Arts (Germany, Berlin)

contact; mota.museum@gmail.com

Im working on the practicalities draft this weekend, 

hugs

j

Here is the link to the online list for residencies and funds and stuff.
You can just go there add any more information that you have found, dont forget to save and
maybe place a note somewhere. its just to collect this informations somewhere, its a hazzle when it is scattered in 20 emails..

http://titanpad.com/sYDf97drif

With love,

Josefin

that troublesome paragraph

Please can we sign? I get so confused

Obviously there are some problems in formulating the paragraph of the conceptual frame.
We have all fibbled with it, but I still think words still just seems to slip of the issue.

I have been spending some time trying to figure out the common denominator between all these aspects; inside/outside, static/dynamic, safe/unsafe, majority/minoriy, home/away, and on and on. Such a fundamental conflict of states, but I can find a good way to phrase.

So I have tried to  rewrite it completely, if not for anything else than to give us a new startingpoint for potential twists and changes.

/.../
The conceptual frame is concesquential to how the project is laid out. By leaving our "home"-environments we seek change/ and to be changed but we also construct a situation that strikes on all situations in which being included/ excluded, majority/ minority plays a significant role. These issues tend to become tangible first when one is not included, that is, part of the majority; at home.  All of the participants in Encounters; 2012 (/whatever name) have dealt with dealt with such situations previously both privately and in their practise, and so Encounters function as a space for dialogue and experimenting.
/.../
Gaaah!
I feel like I am trying to utter a name-less -----.

//jo

I REALLY THINK WE SHOULD LOOK INTO FUNDING WITH KICKSTARTER

it allows us to fund not only our costs, but also to fund the ammount of time  we would need to take off of work.....
but it also enables us to be completely autonomous, and is something I have wanted to try.

http://www.kickstarter.com/



we offer something to the participants in return, prints of our work  perhaps, the book of our documentation

I rewrote the first paragraph and raised some questions about the second. 

Bucarest? http://www.bucharestair.com/

During Encounter, five artists will travel from their different cities of residence, to a city where none of them have ever been before. They will stay in the new city for ten days. The artists will go out on their own into the city, where they explore, engage, and interact with the city, drawing from their own artistic practice and perspective. They are aware of their surroundings. They develop an active relationship with the city Each day the group will meet together and share their thoughts and experiences, developing both their dialogue with the group and with the city.

Encounters; 2012 is about location; relocating to one place and dislocating from another. It questions how we navigate and move through a city; how we choose to relate ourselves, while in relation to a new city. These simultaneous experiences are played out as a conceptual frame that references the individual and shared experiences of moving from one place to another, feeling disjointed or connected to the surroundings, acting to promote a minority which is, or isn't our own, answering for national ideas or actions and struggling with a burden of history, tradition and culture. Don't want to sound critical but I feel a little bit that the word “burden” sets carries a sort of negative implication, If I reflect on this sentance I feel a bit like it touches the issues, that we already as others investigate a city which is not our own, , come with our own otherness into a culture with it's own traditions, maybe there is a way to reword it.

Encounters; 2012 can be shaped in whichever way the participants choose to do so. At the core of the project are issues that we all have in common; how we negotiate our lives around lines of inside/ outside, home/ away, majority/ minority, connected/disconected and how this relates to the place where we are at.

Encounters; 2012 attempts to establish a meeting point and dialogue, in which a group of people with very different perspectives can exchange ideas and experiences. Each participant is encouraged to explore the location in accordance to their own artistic preference, and at the end of the day, the group comes together in a dialogue concerning questions objects and experiences. There is no intention that the participants produce collective or individual work, or that a final “concept” is reachd. Rather, the project is partly intended to question and explore where, or when in a process, “art” takes place. In Encounters; 2012 the art takes place in the real time and space, engagement that is facilitated by the project. Encounters 2012 is an artist initiated and led project, developed through ongoing dialogue and text based exchange. 

greetings

agree with the ten says, feel like it might be interesting to do it for two weeks.

personally I would document in a book like form; though that can be due to not love of film as a medium


also I don't necessarilly think we need to say that we always meet in the night times, the city of night is a much different than the city of the day.

 Someone just wrote me an email with the line "explore, engage, expand, exhilerate"    Just thought it was interesting re the title of the project.    not that exhilerate is quiete what we aim to do.  

I also feel a bit drawn to romania at the moment.    I have been to alot of eastern european cities........though.....just sayin.....as we plan.....

shall we all write the cities we consider as interesting choices?


excuses, will go missing for some more days.....coworker is still hobbling on crutches feeling sorry for himself, leaving me in the kitchen too much to think clear. 

going to try to hack at the text a bit   :)

TEN DAYS ?

How about extending the project to ten days ? A week seems kind of short.

Liquid concrete

How about we all add to the text to come to a consensus. I think it's very clear and outlines the project well. The name isn't hugely important, engage or encounter are fine...we encounter the city and engage with each other, the blog title can be changed easily if we decide to switch. I would like a more flamboyant name but can't think of one suitable so either is good.


I remember a Gaudi quote where he said that he thought the majority of architects were lacking imagination in their use of concrete which he saw as a fluid material that could take any form but was usually cast into squares and blocks...lets maintain a fluidity in our process, we are making this ourselves and don't need to do the usual gymnastics involved in application writing or pandering to the institution.


I've made any changes in red,

SATURDAY, 24 SEPTEMBER 2011

Writings toward more concrete

Lets change the work title? What do you think of Encounters; (city/place) 2012

now that we have a blog and all named engage... 

 .-)

During Encounter; 2012, five artists will travel from their different cities of residence to a place where none of them have ever been before. They will stay in this other place for the duration of a week, alone in the new city during the day, and together in the evening. In the daytime each participant has the space to discover the new location within the confines of their artistic practice and perspective. In the evening the participants join as a group to share their thoughts and experiences in an ongoing dialogue. Art as awareness of one's surrounding, to which one has an active relationship; to which one is in constant dialogue.

Encounters; 2012 is about location; relocating to one place and dislocating from another. These simultaneous experiences are played out as a conceptual frame that references the individual and shared experiences of moving from one place to another, feeling disjointed from the surroundings, acting to promote a minority which is, or isn't our own, answering for national ideas or actions and struggling with a burden of history, tradition and culture. Encounters; 2012 can be shaped in whichever way the participants choose to do so. At the core of the project are issues that we all have in common; how we negotiate our lives around lines of inside/ outside, home/ away, majority/ minority and how this relates to the place where we are at.

Encounters; 2012 attempts to establish a meeting point and dialogue, in which a group of people with very different perspectives can exchange ideas and experiences. Each participant is encouraged to explore the location in accordance to their own artistic preference, and at the end of the day, the group comes together in a dialogue concerning questions objects and experiences. There is no intention that the participants produce collective or individual work. Rather, the project is partly intended to question where, or when in a process, “art” takes place. In Encounters; 2012 the art takes place in the real time and space engagement that is facilitated by the project. Encounters 2012 is an artist initiated and led project, developed through ongoing dialogue and text based exchange.