SCREENING
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Films, Video and New Media
Video Pool at ISEA 2011 curated by Tom Kohut
The Foucault of Discipline and Punish postulated a disciplinary apparatus based on the architectural surveillance and distribution of bodies in space. In the essay he wrote immediately after finishing his analysis of prisons, “Right to Life and Power over Death,” Foucault further theorized an additional dispostif to disciplinary apparati: that of the biopolitical regulation and administration of life. The videos in this program inhabit this conceptual space. From the images of confinement and surveillance in Thorneycroft’s Snare (1996), Peterson’s Threshold Economics (2011) and Olafson’s 2 B (201) through to the recoding of biological data demonstrated in Kelly’s 3 Minutes in Bejing (2009) and Takatsu”s Pompidoleum (1978), the apparati of control both discipline and regulate the body for statist, technocratic ends. However, biopolitical recoding can also be made to serve emancipatory programs, as in the overtly pro-labour Foundation (Fisher & Rice, 2007). In this video, technocratic rigidity is replaces with a fluidity that overturns the static apparatus control. The thematic of fluidity is taken up in braun’s In Frequency (2009) and Armstrong’s Electric Eggs (2005); in these videos, de-structuration and flow are offered as contrast to the disciplinary and regulative apparati of the previous videos. The drones of biological data is countered with the “wetness” of biology as matter itself.
Titles
1. Snare (6:09, 1996) - Diana Thorneycroft
2. Threshold Economics (5:29, 2011) - Hope Peterson
3. 2 B (3:55, 2011) - Freya Björg Olafson
4. 3 Minutes in Beijing (3:00, 2009) - Kevin Kelly
5. Pompidoleum (6:37, 1978) - Ryan Takatsu
6. Foundation (7:00, 2007) - Rick Fisher & Don Rice
7. In Frequency (1:50, 2009) - kelsey braun
8. Electric Eggs (3:10, 2005) - Gwen Armstrong
* Video Pool is a nonprofit Artist-Run Centre dedicated to independent video, audio and computer integrated multimedia production, located in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
Video Pool encourages public engagement and support for media art, as well as the innovative use of new media for social and artistic goals and the development of critical and contemporary contexts for media art. Founded in 1983, Video Pool has a membership of over 660 individual and community service organizations.
Click here for the on-line catalogue of the video works
PERFORMANCE
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‘RETRIBUTION’ by Dragan Ilic
The urgency for ‘RETRIBUTION’ on all five continents, an interactive site specific critical performance installation by Dragan Ilic, came about in recognition of the economic, religious, political, generational but most of all epistemological crisis affecting the entire planet.
“RETRIBUTION”, which will begin in Europe (Belgrade), and continue in Asia, Africa, Australia, South America, ending in the U.S.A is a critical act about the power structures not allowing the necessary changes to the system. The idea for this high-risk worldwide retributive justice conceptual art project evolved out of Dragan Ilic’s previous performances- ‘THE PEOPLE I DON’T LIKE’ - which he began in Australia in 1977. The world’s problems have reached a boiling point worldwide, a crisis shared simultaneously through the use of social media, a key organizing tool. People, but particularly the young and minorities have been marginalized; they can no longer sustain the growing mega gap between rich and poor, old and new beliefs and value systems. The biggest stumbling block, however, is the fact that young people are not allowed to participate and contribute new ideas; the social and political structures consistently exclude them. Therefore, critical masses at first grew into peaceful protests. Stubborn regimes did not want to accommodate change, and peaceful protests gave way, in a domino effect, to the uprisings and revolutions, most evident in the Middle East. Regimes could change only when millions of people were on the streets protesting and refusing to work.
HOLDING THE PERPETRATORS ACCOUNTABLE
Dictators and politicians in every corner of the world have to be subjected to retributive justice and be held accountable for their deeds and actions. On Dragan Ilić’s list are Bashar al Assad, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Hugo Chavez, Silvio Berlusconi, media mogul Rupert Murdoch, Muammar Gaddafi, Hu Jintao, Benjamin Netanyahu, Fidel Castro, Vladimir Putin, Robert Mugabe, Kim Jong-il, Rush Limbaugh, Tomislav Nikolic, U.S. Speaker of the House John Boehner, Michele Bachmann, a right-wing 2012 U.S. Republican presidential candidate, and multinational companies Exxon, Shell, BP, Siemens, Monsanto (genetic engineering crops) that rule the world and politicians.
Photographs of politicians (size 30 x 42 cm) with descriptions of their bad deeds and actions and photographs with logos of multinational companies will be nailed through with sharpened red pencils, a symbol of the necessary critical action and consequent epistemological revolution.
Dragan Ilić and spectators will nail photographs down on the ground or on the walls, trees, facades. After the nailing is completed, we will leave them on the site. The entire process will be documented by photographs and video and will be exhibited on various locations around the world. The first exhibition, after the completion will take place at the Video Pool Media Arts Center, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
WORKSHOP
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D.I.Y. Biotechnology by Niki Sperou
3-5 november 2011, Fine Arts Faculty, Skopje
Participants: Toni Dimitrov, Igor Kalkov, Slobodanka Stevceska, Darko Aleksovski, Zorica Zafirovska, Simona Manceva, Goran Eftimov, Jana Lozanovska, Katina Aleksovska, Ivana Spiroska, Pance Prenxov, Kosta Necoski, Ivana Pirkovska, Iskra Ilievska, Dijana Bogdanovska, Todor Novakov, Bisera Georgievska, Danco Jordanovski, Ivan Manev, Ognen Spiroski.
Protecting ourselves from what we work with/ Protecting what we work with from ourselves. Growing what you want to grow/ Not growing what you don’t want to grow.
How to DIY a bio-cabinet & incubator; Where is the dirtiest place? Streak bacteria onto plates; Incubate overnight.
Precision and reproducibility Why repeat?; Quality control; Record keeping. DIY DNA extraction / Are we speaking the same language?/ Moving DNA from one species to another; Gene transfection; Gene technology regulation pre-lab lecture; Heat shock method; Spread bacteria onto plates and grow overnight
Making changes: The spectrum from natural genetic changes to natural selection to directed evolution (selective breeding) to genetic engineering. Analyse results from overnight cultures: Selecting with an antibiotic; Stimulating gene expression with arabinose. Being responsible: Proper disposal of cultures and clean up. Biotech Art 101; An overview of biotech art.
