In cooperation with BoomBoom Moscow Impakt presents the exhibition:

NEIGHBOURS
The Netherlands are known as an open and tolerant country, a secularized society with a liberal attitude towards drugs, abortion and euthanasia and well defined rights for sexual and cultural minorities. With the assassinations of Pim Fortuyn and Theo van Gogh however, this reputation is no longer taken for granted. Dutch society is changing, although opinions differ on the direction and impact of these changes. Immigration, integration and the position of new cultural and religious values play an important role in this discussion. How do the ‘old’ Dutch citizens deal with the new elements in their society and how to the ‘new’ Dutch citizens relate to the open-minded image of the Netherlands.

Featuring artist and works:

De Aardappeleters
Anna Lange
(The Netherlands 2006, 07:00 min)

The potato cult in the life of two old peasants at their farm. The filmmaker portrays a lost way of life which she was deeply influenced by. It is a tribute as well as a goodbye which puts things into perspective. Concerning us as much as the two humble characters.

Anna Lange is a multimedia and interdisciplinary artist who studied at the Academy for Visual Arts in Hertogenbosch and at the Sandberg Institute in Amsterdam. She produced three short silent movies on Super-8 before working in sound. Moons Dark (2007) was her first film project with sound and was presented on 35mm.

Tagged
Julika Rudelius
(The Netherlands 2003, 13:17 min)

‘Tagged’ is a group portrait of boys who are using their appearance to break free from the persistent generalizations about ‘immigrants’ as opposed to ‘Dutch people’. But first and foremost, these are boys who, no different from other adolescents in this world, are trying to break out of their puberty by creating security for themselves in a close-knit group, with dress codes that are unintelligible and unfathomable to others.

Julika Rudelius is currently based in Amsterdam and New York. She attended the Hochschule fur Bildende Kunste in Hamburg, the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam and participated in the Rijksakademie artist-in-residence program. Her work examines social behaviour patterns as well as physical and verbal communication, especially with respect to how these factors contribute to the creation and reproduction of social hierarchy.

Das schlafende Madchen
Corinna Schnitt
(Germany 2001, 8:30 min)

A sailing boat is cruising into the wind. The camera detaches itself from the scenery to enlarge the field of vision and pans over a suburb tinged in faded light: a still life of white fences, all absolutely identical, little green lawns and red gabled roofs — just as much models as the miniature schooner. The tranquil progress of the camera over the raster of stereotyped detached and terrace houses presents an artificial idyll dominated by exclusions and norms.

Corinna Schnitt began her practice with an understudy in wood sculpture before studying at the Hochschule fur Gestaltung in Offenbach and at the Dusseldorf Art Academy. She has created a series of experimental short films in which she pushes daily phenomena to the point of absurdity in showing them in as an endless loop.

Monitoring the Dordtselaan for Maximum Peace of Mind
Klaas van Gorkum & Iratxe Jaio
(The Netherlands, 2004, 15:00 min)

Monitoring the Dordtselaan for Maximum Peace of Mind is a voyeuristic sequence of observations from the bedroom window, made over a period of a year. The video shows daily life in the Dordtselaan, one of the so-called ‘hotspots’ of Rotterdam. A ‘hotspot’ is a location in the city where drastic measures are taken to curb street criminality, ghetto forming and illegal immigration. One of these measures is the temporary suspension of constitutional citizens rights, authorizing police to shut off whole streets and perform body searches on all passers-by, without having to go through the usual legal procedures.

Iratxe Jaio was born in Basque Country, but lives currently in the Netherlands. Klaas van Gorkum is Dutch, but lived in Africa for most of his youth. Their collaborative work is an investigation into the conflict between individual and collective identity, using documentary methods to visualize the relation between people and their social, cultural and physical contexts.

Respect
Erik van Lieshout
(The Netherlands 2003, 8:00 min)

Two white, goofy-looking Dutch guys rolling down a Rotterdam street. They are Van Lieshout (spectacles, baseball jacket) and his brother Bart (wedge haircut, yellow fleece), and it appears that they are caught up in a stop-and-search swoop. A tipsy Eric and Bart roam late-night Rotterdam with their cameraman in tow. Bart complains about his lack of a boyfriend, and Eric, with the sense of mission only a skinful of beer provides, rejects Barts plan to see a midnight skin-flick in favour of cruising the local North African teens.

Erik van Lieshout studied at the Academy for Art and Design in Hertogenbosch and at Ateliers ’63 in Haarlem. His work was featured in the Fourth Berlin Biennial for Contemporary Art (2006); the Gwangju Biennale (2006); and the Biennale of Sjarjah, Dubai (2004), and has also been presented at the Oberhausen Short Film Festival.

No False Echoes
Wendelien van Oldenborgh
(The Netherlands 2008, 30:00 min)

Stories surrounding the history of radio in the Dutch East Indies at the start of the 20th century, in which the broadcasting company Philips Omroep Holland Indie (PHOHI) played an important role. For this, Van Oldenborgh organized takes in the monumental radio station Radio Kootwijk, with the public and speakers who read quotes from this history as well as having spontaneous dialogues.

Wendelien van Oldenborgh was born in Rotterdam. After graduating from Goldsmiths College in London, her work has been presented at the Van Abbemuseum and MuHKA. Van Oldenborgh’s films explore communication and interaction between individuals, often against the backdrop of a unique (public) location.

Program curated by Arjon Dunnewind / Impakt Festival Utrecht

For more information about the Dutch Urban Culture Festival, please visit:

http://www.boomboompr.com/