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Fashion Music Politics

The exhibition featured at IMPAKT Festival 2003 is fully centred around the theme “It’s happening again: Fashion Music Politics”. By means of various installations artists express their opinions on CLOTHING, MUSIC and SOCIAL COMMITMENT. In addition the exhibition will feature projects open to visitors participation. For example, the artist’s collective ‘DE GEUZEN’ has set up a sewing and clothing studio in which visitors are invited to create their own works. In ‘Learning to Love You More’, a project by MIRANDA JULY and HARREL FLETCHER visitors are given simple but purifying assignments through their website. SOCIALFICTION.ORG invites visitors to take psycho-geographic walks through the city of Utrecht. The installation work featured in the ‘My Mind Is Your Emotions’ program forms a special part of the exhibition and includes a work by Prix de Rome winner 2003, JAMES BECKETT.


ERWIN WURM (AUSTRIA)
59 Positions / 59 Stellungen (1992)
In this work, Erwin Wurm arranges 59 meetings between the human body and a number of extraordinarily elastic garments. Wurm creates amorphous, organic-like sculptures that betray their human content at second glance only. By placing articles of clothing outside the usual context, the clothing takes on a new meaning; a green pullover changes into an alien creature, two sweaters turn into a Siamese elephant and a grey sweater resembles a lonely cactus.

DE GEUZEN (THE NETHERLANDS)
Fripperies and Trimmings: Meaning Arises Through Use (2003)
‘De Geuzen’ is a collective of three artists that have been joined in collaboration since 1996. During the Impakt Festival, they will present a number of collective D.I.Y. projects. For the project, the collective will restyle a space into a sewing and ironing studio where visitors can work on printing their own clothing or fabrics available in the studio. In addition, fabrics printed beforehand can be used to design garments and accessories. The central element within this project is the thought that the body can be used as a tool to convey a ‘message’. Wearing clothing and accessories with texts or signs and the way in which they are worn can be regarded as significant signals enabling the person to express his position on politics, society or religion.

FISCHERSPOONER (USA)
Emerge (2003)
Fischerspooner is the musical sensation of the moment and the figurehead of the electroclash movement. Their performances, a rarity due to the exorbitant costs, are extravagant and overall presentations. However, Fischerspooner is more than a performing act alone. The collective led by Warren Fischer and Casey Spooner also comprises fashion designers, graphic designers and video artists, and engages in the production of films and video installations. The Impakt Festival will feature ‘Emerge 2003’.

ADD (GERMANY)
white light white heat (2003)
ADD is both a Berlin-based fashion label and a platform for collaborations with other artists. The key figure behind ADD is Wibke Deertz. Having been educated as a visual artist, Deertz prefers to engage in fashion. The reason being that fashion allows her for greater artistic freedom due to the lack of high-brow artistic pretensions. Distinctive features of ADD include the low-nonsense attitude and the strong influence from street culture. During Impakt 2003, ADD will manifest itself both in the Centraal Museum and in the city of Utrecht.

ASSUME VIVID ASTRO FOCUS (USA)
Free Bird (2003)

Assume Vivid Astro Focus is the name used for the artistic manifestations of a young Brazilian artist. The name itself indicates the hybrid character of the work which combines video and photography with drawings and digital printing techniques. The influences of Assume Vivid Astro Focus vary from cartoons, children’s colouring books and fashion to soft porn and pop music. A recurring element in this work is a colourful touch of the psychedelic sixties.

SOCIALFICTION.ORG (THE NETHERLANDS)
DiscoSocialisme (2003)
With the slagzin “claims the dance floor” back, the socialfiction org will set from to realize two of their voornaamste mean: 1 – mere disco in politics and 2 -mere politically in the disco. During the Impakt Festival will social- fiction org seek these mean round through means of psycho geographical sessions and micro demonstrations to reach. (socialficton.org)
Thursday, 5 June, 16.30h, Walk starting from the Festival Desk / Sunday, 8 June, 15.00h, Walk starting from the Festival Desk

PETER BOGERS (THE NETHERLANDS)
The Secret Place of the Most High (2003)
This project is based on present-day global, political and religious contra- positions. Bogers uses video and sound recordings taken from international satellite transmitters broadcasting religious programs. He creates delicate combinations of chanted Koran texts and images of an American TV-priest. The contrast is put to its maximum while emotional connexions are created between two juxtaposed philosophies.

FEDERICO D’ORAZIO (THE NETHERLANDS)
Hitman (2003)
Through a go-between, Federico D’Orazio got in touch with a contract killer who granted him permission for an interview while driving through the sub- urbs of Los Angeles. The hitman tells us about his first ‘drive-by shooting’ committed at the age of ten, the daily practice of his profession and the development of his career up to now. The killer’s honest and open attitude is disarming and cruel at the same time. As a witness to the confessions of violent behavior, the spectator unintentionally feels like an accomplice.

ZORAN NASKOVSKI (SERBIA)
Death in Dallas (2000)

For his work ‘Death in Dallas’ Zoran Naskovski was inspired by a recording of a gusle player. On the recording the gusle player sings a traditional epic song about the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963. Naskovski combines the song with documentary outtakes and television images of the events imprinted in our collective memories. In a fascinating manner, this work combines the idiom of the epic poem, as developed within the oral tradition of the Balkan, with the idiom of modern Western reporting.

JONAS OHLSSON (THE NETHERLANDS)
Jonas Ohlsson
My inner child asks the woman in me… -“If we speak what’s truly on our mind, do we still need to worry about aestethics?” (2003) With digital dialogues remixed live by Heimir Björgulfsson and DJ Lonely. Next to being a visual artist, Jonas Ohlsson from Sweden is also a musi- cian. Sound and music are an essential part of his installation work. During the exhibition Ohlsson constantly adds new elements expanding his installation in time and space. Ohlsson has recorded several albums with Heimir Björgulfsson (ex-Stilluppsteypa). Björgulfsson will also participate in the project in the Impakt Festival. In a construction that is a cross between a tree hut, a 3-D cartoon and a slum dwelling, Jonas Ohlsson fits out his sound studio. The result is a “Gesamtkunstwerk” centring around the issue of the power and powerlessness of art in a political context. At the opening of the Impakt Festival Jonas Ohlsson and Heimir Björgulfsson will perform live in the installation.

MIRANDA JULY & HARRELL FLETCHER (USA)
Learning to Love you More (2003)
On the website “Learning to Love you More”, Harrell Fletcher and Miranda July consistently issue assignments open to visitor participation. The simple character of the assignments liberates one from the pressure to do something that is highly original. Compare it to cooking according to a recipe, doing a meditation exercise or the singing of a song. This creates leeway for each participant to concentrate on his or her own feelings and experiences. Especially for the Impakt Festival, July and Fletcher issued two new assignments: Assignment #24: Cover the song Don’t Dream It’s Over, by Crowded House and Assignment #25: Video a person dancing to Don’t Dream It’s Over. If you want to participate, do not hesitate and check www.learningtoloveyoumore.com right away.

 

 

My Mind Is Your Emotions

At the moment there seems to be a true hype surrounding the use of music and sound in the visual arts. More than video, sound and music are appealing to artists and art students alike. Popular music has many different traditions, but for a significant part it originates from protest music often dealing with the desire or fight for independence and freedom. Artists often engage in musical activities in order to take a radical stand in respect of the art establishment. Music turns out to be a better means of adopting an anarchist attitude than the visual arts. Although the artists in the program use the same medium the ways in which they use it is very different. The program represents both musical and visual qualities. The more conceptual approach in which the medium itself takes center stage is represented next to the anti-establishment attitude that leaves room for emotions.

Curated by Theo Tegelaers

JAMES BECKETT
Untitled / Sound installation
The starting point of James Beckett’s installations are sources of sound that can be found everywhere in our daily environment but we do not observe as such (anymore). Beckett is interested in sounds that are the by-products of physical processes enabling electrical devices to work. For the installation exhibited at the Impakt Festival Beckett uses electrical devices on loan from the Museum of Energetics. A computer program written by Beckett will operate the devices in the installation to perform his compositions. James Beckett was awarded the Prix de Rome 2003 for Art and Public Space, a prize which he will receive at the end of June.

NATHALIE BRUYS
Fly Target Fly / Sound installation
Bruys explores the possibilities of sound as a medium in the visual arts. She believes sound has the power to free listeners completely of place and time taking them into an endless world without friction. The soundtrack of the “Fly Target Fly” installation contains sound recordings of frequencies gathered by Bruys during a parachute jump high in the air. These sounds, which cannot be heard by ear, are the basis of a composition which can be heard through headphones especially designed by Bruys for this purpose.

BEGONA
Live performance: Thursday, 5 June, 20.00h, Stables
Up to now Begona Munoz was predominantly known as a visual artist who uses the expectations of the audience to shape her work. In the past two years Munoz fully focused on making music. The result is a soon to be released CD with pop music. At the Impakt festival she will perform her music for the first time. Whether Munoz will appear on stage in the capacity of musician or visual artist is something that she likes to leave in the mid- dle. She deliberately chooses ‘the real thing’, and does not wish to be a rep- resentation of a pop artist but be one. But maybe we in turn are to interpret this choice as an artistic statement …

“I guess I put myself in contrast with art and that creates gaps and then questions and sensations will rise… You understand? I don’t leave art, I like art, I like what I do in art. And I want to make music also.”

ANGELBLOOD
Live performance and image collage / installation: Friday, 6 June, 20.00h, Stables
Angelblood is a New York-based collective of three female artists: Rita Ackerman, Lizzi Bougatsos and Jess Holzworth. In addition to musical pro- ductions, their collaboration yields an immense production of images con- verted into collages. These collages evoke a bohemian-like outlook on life straying between independence and despair. The music of Angelblood is an outrageous mix between arty black metal extravaganza and crazy acid rock balancing the thin line between humanity and death.

SCRATCH PET LAND
Live performance: Sunday, 8 June, 20.00h, Stables
Scratch Pet Land is a discovery of Nicolas Godin of Air and although their music is considerably less mainstream, it nevertheless echoes the light electronic sound of Air. Scratch Pet Land is the project of two brothers: Nicolas and Laurent Beaudoux from Brussels. Their music is playful and pleasantly experimental. Scratch Pet Land fiddles around with the tradition- al conception of song structure and instrumentation. The brothers are true masters of Atari / turntable / bongo and ukulele aestheticism and with their uninhibited lo-fi approach their compositions are turned into little gem- stones.

THOM REVOLVER
Live performance: Monday, 9 June, 20.00h, Stables
Electrorock in style. In 1999, author Thomas van Aalten made up the invin- cible pop hero “Thom Revolver” and formed a band around this figure. In the beginning the band’s music was subordinate to the act and the Ziggy Stardust-like image, but now the five-piece band plays real pop songs that stand on their own. When playing live the band at one moment approaches the blistering and exploding energy of the Stooges, with drum computers and synthesizers added and then suddenly the sound goes entirely the other way and the band’s tunes bear more resemblance to The Pet Shop Boys or Duran Duran. Thom Revolver stands for show, bombast and all going down together.

IMPAKT SOUND LOUNGE
DJ sets: Wednesday, 4 June to Monday, 9 June, 16.30 to 18.00h, Stables
Artists from the program and invited guests will play informal DJ sets daily.

Website by HOAX Amsterdam