IMPAKT WORKS
What's Going On
Next to organizing events and the annual Impakt festival, there is more happening behind the screens at Impakt we want to keep you informed about. An important part of our activities consists of Impakt WORKS: in addition to our long established artist in residence agenda, we now have made a first selection for the brand new Visiting Curator program. This Impakt program allows young researchers and curators to meet experts from the Dutch art world who may be useful for their research.
The selections are here, the schedule is complete: Impakt Works is in full swing.
Below, we present you a survey of all selected artists and curators who will be our guests now and in the near future.
Early April, we welcomed our first guest within the framework of our new residency branch, the VISITING CURATOR PROGRAM. With her project ‘The Mediatic Accident’, Gaia Tedone from Italy (1982, working and living in London) explores the abundance of visual material in contemporary media. Do we believe everything we see, and how does our attitude influence possible controversies surrounding images? Following profound research through various meetings with Dutch artists and academics, Gaia convoked a group of committed people at a so-called think-thank dinner in order to collect ideas for a next step in her project: an online, interactive image board is one of the concepts in the pipeline.
From his current home in Berlin, visiting curator Avi Feldman (1976), former lawyer practicing in Tel-Aviv, recently began researching the relationship between the arts and law practice. In ‘Image Law’, he is looking for ways in which these universal but only rarely interconnected key values of civilization may interact. In his encounters with law lecturers, artists and other experts, Feldman met with highly stimulating reactions. Following his two weeks at Impakt, these meetings have become the breeding ground not only for new possible assumptions but also for new concepts to be worked out in Imagine Law: a book, an exhibition or a symposium are all ambitions of Feldman, but until these ideas materialize, new concepts will take shape on a website.
Another fresh perspective from Berlin is offered by our most recent artist in residence Linda Franke (1980). In her work, she uses humor and performance as strategies of endearment. Clichés from soaps and propaganda are dissected in an absurdist manner with a disturbing combination of existential questions asked in the hyper artificial world of 3D-animation. During her residency in Utrecht, she will not only use her synthesizer to test the patience of her neighbors but also to produce a series of video shorts that will be screened at an Impakt Event in June. Stay tuned!
Caetano Carvalho & Leandro Cardoso will take up residency in the city of Utrecht as from May. These Brazilians join forces in constructing a confined cave consisting of projections of Internet GIFs– an image file format allowing short, repetitive movement. In this cave, they plan to give an interactive live show meant to verify a variety of myths relating to perspectives of truth. In addition, they will give a workshop involving the creative use of GIFs. So, better keep a close eye on our website and Facebook page.
Canadian author, director and avant-garde filmmaker Daniel Cockburn no longer is a stranger at Impakt. Following a few very entertaining screenings, a screen-writing workshop and an ironic anti-artist talk about in November 2011, Cockburn visits Impakt for a second time in June and July. There is a new workshop planned, plus an evening of screenings and the very promising All the Mistakes I’ve Made, part II. We will keep you posted on these exciting new events.
Spanish artist Daniel Silvo, who will be Impakt’s guest from June through to August, uses his video work, photography and installations to question the political load of objects in a critical manner: from design originating from the Cold War to the ‘communist’ Lada – still the only car brand available to Cubans. Silvo approaches these controversial subjects with a good dose of humor and from various angles. In Utrecht, he wishes to make a fifties sitcom around the tongue-in-cheek question Are art and design able to protect us from an atomic bomb?
As from September, we are happy to welcome Mexican artist Ruben Gutierrez. Impakt selected him from the EMARE MEXICO Call. His work can be described as philosophical concepts on absurdity. Further details about his plans at Impakt will follow soon.
And for the second time in a row, Impakt is pleased to collaborate with LabMIS on organizing a residency exchange. LabMIS is the residency program of Museu da Imagem e do Som – museum for image and sound – in São Paulo, Brazil. A Dutch artist will be selected to work there for two months, while Impakt will welcome a Brazilian artist in Utrecht for a similar period.