subvision. art. festival. off.

Project Outline

olaf.bargheer — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 09:08:42 +0000

From August 26 to September 6, 2009, the festival for international contemporary art, subvision. kunst. festival. off., fathomed artistic strategies beyond the established art business. Artists’ initiatives from around the world presented their artistic work and their unique art presentation and mediation forms that manoeuvre outside established institutions and disregard commercial exploitability to a broad audience. On the invitation of curator Brigitte Kölle and artistic director Martin Köttering, more than 30 artists’ groups, independent project spaces and off spaces from more than 20 countries gathered in Hamburg to create a tension-filled and varied presentation platform with exhibitions, artist’s talks, performances, concerts, readings, and video screenings. A temporary exhibition architecture made of freight containers and scaffoldings formed the unusual framework for an unconventional endeavour. The design of the yet undeveloped Strandkai in HafenCity was oriented toward urban models and cited them, not without irony..
While the scaffoldings and containers have long been dismantled and are being used again in their original function, the ideas and events of the festival continue to resonate: What remains is the memory of an extraordinary situation of exhibiting and gathering, of numerous interesting encounters between artists and visitors, many of whom made use of the mediation programme developed for subvision by students of the Hochschule für bildende Künste (HFBK) Hamburg. A stocktaking of around 400 international project spaces took place – a unique endeavour regarding its scope – and is made available on this Website along with links to the homepages of the artists’ initiatives. We hope that this research effort will form the foundation for further projects in this area. The catalogue and our festival pictures convey a vivid impression of the unusual atmosphere and the events on site. But what remains, above all, are the newly established contacts and connections among the participating artists’ groups, which will lead to exciting exhibition projects and cooperations in the future.
.

Festival Pictures

subvision — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 09:07:54 +0000

Here you find pictures of the festival period. For photos of the subvision area, the construction site and the installation of their artworks by the subvision artists, have a look at our Strandkai-Pictures.

Photos: Olaf Bargheer & Jennifer Smailes
..

The subvision Crew at the festival’s last evening

Bjarni Massi from Kling & Bang calling for subvision’s final evening’s party

M.O.M.I. (invited by F.A.I.T. & umschichten) and liebe*detail’s Eurokai at subvision tunes

Martin Köttering reading Jan Holtmann’s latest issue of “HarbourMass”

99 black “HafenCity bleibt!” balloons at subvision’s final party

The art mediators team*partake changing polaroids with Kling & Bang’s Bjarni Massi

A mellow last evening at the subvision strandkai

Spontaneous cleaning performance by HFBK students of fine arts

Last evening at the pool on top of F.A.I.T.’s & umschichten’s Villa Kownacki

Artists talk by Konsortium

Visitors at Jaffa Lam’s installation “Public Cultural District?” in one of the Para/Site containers

Visitors at Artspeak’s claim

Detail from Galleria Huuto’s container

Detail from the container inhabited by Bell Street

Installation by the Detroid Tree of Heaven Woodshop

Young visitor at Estacion, Tijuana’s Claim

Performance about lingonberries by Mimosa Pale (invited by Galleria Huuto)

Karaoke again at the Finnish party hosted at the subvision hall by Galleria Huuto

Visitors at Gugulective performance (including Fraser Steward from De Service Garage)

Jinhan Ko from Instant Coffee and Camilla Sørensen from Vinyl Terror & Horror enjoying a break gracefully

Katharina Kohl inside her Kunst-Imbiss

Curator Brigitte Kölle and Moka Farkas (Baltic Raw Org)

Presentation by the RussianFrostFarmers from New Zealand

Concert by Kapaikos at BALTIC RAW ORG’s

The audience participating in an explosive performance by Baur-Niessner-Balistics (B-N+B, invited by F.A.I.T. & umschichten) at Villa Kownacki

The audience at the performative detonations by Baur-Niessner-Balistics (B-N+B, invited by F.A.I.T. & umschichten) at Villa Kownacki

Graffiti Research Lab’s raid during the artist talk by De Service Garage & Parachutartists Foundation

Artist talk by De Service Garage and Parachutartists Foundation

Artist Talk by De Service Garage and Parachutartists Foundation

Zoro Feigl’s (De Service Garage) tie, watch and sunglasses, printed on tape

Filmscreening at the BALTIC RAW Tower

Arthur from BALTIC RAW ORG showing his short films

Room with a View DJs at the GUDBERG Magazine Release Party

Gugulective’s Artist Talk

Actor Jörn Knebel at Olof Olsson’s performance (The Suburban)

Olof Olsson performing at the festival hall

Discussion “HafenCity bleibt!” at BALTIC RAW ORG’s

Spoken-Word performance at the subvision hall by Word Alert

Night mood at FRILAND (BALTIC RAW ORG)

Tex & Erobique live at BALTIC RAW

M.O.M.I.’s concert/performance at Villa Kownacki (F.A.I.T. & umschichten)

Lukasz Lendzinski (umschichten), Magdalena Kownacka (F.A.I.T.) and Ehsan Fardjadniya (Parachutartists Foundation)

Kate Phillimore (Publish and be Damned) with mediapuppet heads by Tessa Lynch and Owen Curtis

i-cabin and subvision’s team*partake watching movement at the harbour

Blue hour at the subvision bar

Blue hour at Strandkai

festival. festival.

Thomas Haemmerli successfully trying to “Pimp my CV” at D.I.V.O Institute

Olof Olsson’s Advice office (3 € /10 minutes, here without Olof Olsson) at The Suburban’s Claim

F.A.I.T. and umschichten posing at their Villa Kownacki

Spontaneous Karaoke at Saturday night’s hall party

Spontaneous karaoke by Instant Coffee’s Jinhan Ko at Saturday night’s hall

Gauvres de Liège at BALTIC RAW

Chto delat’s panel discussion “Selforganization: between repression and recuperation? Where (and how) is the way out?”

Mark Divo at Chto delat’s panel discussion on self organization

Pawel Rusakevich (Chto delat), Ehsan Fardjadniya (De Service Garage) and Athi-Mongezeleli Joja (Gugulective) at Chto delat’s panel discussion

Former subvision curator Tim Voss at Chto delat’s panel discussion

Curator Brigitte Kölle at Chto delat’s panel discussion “Selforganization: between repression and recuperation? Where (and how) is the way out?”

Gaweł Kownacki, Magdalena Kownacka (F.A.I.T.), Kit Hammonds (PabD) and Jinhan Ko (Instant Coffee) at Chto delat’s panel discussion

Kunst? Hmnagut.

Heavy rainclouds over BALTIC RAW ORG

Inside Graffiti Research Lab’s container

Performance by Khanyisile Mbomgwa from Gugulective

Berglind Hlynsdottir (Kling & Bang gallery), Olof Olsson (The Suburban) and Guido Münch (Konsortium) at Chto delat’s artist talk

Performance by 98weeks research project

Part of the subvision crew at subvision Strandkai

noroomgallery’s editorial staff writing for the HarbourMass magazine

Inke Schlör and Anja Bischoff from the team*partake at the art mediation container

Berndt Jasper (BALTIC RAW ORG) at his claim

Parcours at Komplot’s Claim

Kacey Wong performing the “Shift City Skyscraper” at the subvision festival opening

Kacey Wong performing during curator Brigitte Kölle’s opening speech

Julia Ziegenbein from team*partake explaining subvision via “Multiple Choice”

At the press billboard

Artistic director Martin Köttering’s festival’s opening speech

Martin Köttering (artistic director) and Brigitte Kölle (curator) at the press conference on 25.09.2009

Martin Köttering (artistic director) and Brigitte Kölle (curator) at the subvision press conference, 25.09.2009

Catalogue

subvision — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 09:06:34 +0000

In spring 2010, a comprehensive, illustrated catalogue will be published, documenting the festival events, the works created on site and the unique atmosphere at Strandkai. Students of the Hochschule für bildende Künste (HFBK) Hamburg with a main focus on graphics/typography/photography substantially contribute to its realisation – one good reason to look forward to this extraordinary product. Students of the class of Professor Ingo Offermanns are responsible for the graphic design. A large part of the image material is from students of the class of Professor Heike Mutter, who accompanied the artists’ initiatives with their cameras during the festival.

Archive of artists’ initiatives worldwide

olaf.bargheer — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 09:05:06 +0000

During their researching artist’s initiatives, the subvision curators collected more than 400 links to artist-run spaces, archives, nomadic projects, blogs and networks whose focus is on cultural strategies alongside established institutions and beyond commercial endeavours. This linklist is - as far as we know - the first to list all these initiatives.

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01 Magazines / Fanzines / Blogs
02 Artist-run spaces
03 Collectives and Artist Groups
04 Archives
05 Nomadic Projects
06 uncategorized

Fischli / Weiss: How to work better

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Magazines / Fanzines / Blogs

Art Threat, Montreal (CA)
http://www.artthreat.net

Cabinet
http://www.cabinetmagazine.org

Faces
http://www.faces-l.net

Fucking Good Art, Rotterdam (NL)
http://www.fuckinggoodart.nl

FUSE Magazine
http://www.fusemagazine.org

IDEA, (Rumänien)
http://www.idea.ro

JAP, Los Angeles, California (US)
http://www.journalofaestheticsandprotest.org

L’Association Multitudes, Paris (FR)
http://multitudes.samizdat.net

LTTR, New York (US)
http://www.lttr.org

Artist-Run Spaces / Off-Spaces

16beaver, New York (US)
http://www.16beavergroup.org

7. Stock, Dresden (DE)
http://www.Stock7.de

ABC No Rio, New York, New York (US)
http://www.abcnorio.org

Adobe Books, San Francisco, California (US)
http://adobebooksbackroomgallery.blogspot.com

After the butcher, Berlin (DE)
http://www.after-the-butcher.de

Airplay – Streetgallery, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.airplay.nu

ak28, Stockholm (SE)
http://www.ak28.org

Aktualisierungsraum, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.aktualisierungsraum.org

Alexandria Contemporary Art Forum,
Alexandria (EG)
http://www.acafspace.org

Al-Ma’mal Foundation, Jerusalem (IL)
http://www.almamalfoundation.org

Alma Enterprises, London (GB)
http://www.almaenterprises.com

Alphabet Dress, Portland, Oregon (US)
ohne Website

Area 10 Project Space, London (GB)
http://www.area10.info

ART2102, Los Angeles, California (US)
http://www.art2102.org

Art Metropole, Toronto (CA)
http://www.artmetropole.com

Artos Foundation, Nicosia (CY)
http://www.artosfoundation.org

Artspeak, Vancouver (CA)
http://www.artspeak.ca

Associates Gallery, London (GB)
http://www.associatesgallery.co.uk

Association Soleil d’Afrique, Bamako (ML)
http://www.soleildafrique.org

Auto – der neue Kunstort, Vienna (AT)
http://www.parking-lot.org

Autocenter, Berlin (DE)
http://www.autocenterart.de

avatar, Quebec (CA)
http://www.lenomdelachose.org

B-22, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.b-22.org

Barbur, Jerusalem (IL)
http://www.barbur.org

Basekamp, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (US)
http://www.basekamp.com

Bautzener 69, Dresden (DE)
http://www.bautzner69.de

Bell Street Project Space, Vienna (AT)
http://www.bellstreet.net

Betalevel (formerly C-Level),
Los Angeles, California (US)
http://www.betalevel.com

Between Bridges, London (GB)
http://www.betweenbridges.net

Big Sky Mind, Quezon City (PH)
http://artplaces.org/content/schede/dettaglio.php?id=93

BLAST, Cologne (DE)
http://www.b-l-a-s-t.de

BLIM, Vancouver (CA)
http://www.blim.ca

Blindside, Melbourne (AU)
http://www.blindside.org.au

Blinzelbar, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.hierunda.de/blinzelbar.html

Block Projects, Melbourne (AU)
http://www.blockprojects.com

Bootlab, Berlin (DE)
http://www.bootlab.org

BUS, Melbourne (AU)
http://www.bus117.com

Buy-Sellf, Bordeaux/Marseille (FR)
http://www.buysellfartclub.com

CAMPUS HANOI, Hanoi (VN)
ohne Website

Candyland, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.glimp.se/candyland

CAS - Contemporary Art and Spirit, Osaka (JP)
http://cas.or.jp

Center of Experimentation & Information, Belo Horizonte (BR)
http://www.ceia.art.br

Center for Land Use Interpretation, Los Angeles, California / Troy, New York State (US)
http://www.clui.org

Chalk Horse, Sydney (AU)
http://www.chalkhorse.com.au

Circleculture, Berlin (DE)
http://circleculture-gallery.com

Cirkulationscentralen, Malmö (SE)
http://www.cirkulationscentralen.com

CLUBSproject inc., Melbourne (AU)
http://www.clubsproject.org.au

CONICAL, Fitzroy (AU)
http://www.conical.org.au

Consortium, Amsterdam (NL)
http://www.consortium-amsterdam.nl

Creative Growth Art Center, Oakland, California (US)
http://www.creativegrowth.org

CUBITT, London (GB)
http://www.cubittartists.org.uk

De Service Garage, Amsterdam (NL)
http://www.deservicegarage.nl

Die Schute, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.gflk.de/schute/de/index.php

Digital Art Lab, Holon (IR)
http://www.digitalartlab.org.il

DINAMO, Budapest (HU)
http://www.dinamo.hu

Display, Prague (CZ)
http://www.display.cz

D.I.V.O Institute, Prague (CZ)
http://www.divoinstitute.org

Dosenfabrik, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.dosenfabrik-hamburg.de

DUNK!, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.dunkdunk.dk

EINSTELLUNGSRAUM e.V., Hamburg (DE)
http://www.einstellungsraum.de

el despacho, Mexiko City (MX)
http://www.eldespacho.org

ELEKTROHAUS HAMBURG, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.elektrohaus.net

Estacion, Tijuana, Tijuana (MX)
http://www.estaciontijuana.blogspot.com

FADs Art Space, Tokyo (JP)
http://www.fads-artspace.com

F.A.I.T. (Foundation Artists – Innovation – Theory), Krakow (PL)
http://www.fait.pl

Five Years, London (GB)
http://www.fiveyears.org.uk

Flor y Canto Centro Communitario, Los Angeles, California (US)
http://www.florycanto.org

FormContent, London (GB)
http://www.formcontent.org

fournos centre for digital culture, (GR)
http://www.fournos-culture.gr

FRANCE FICTION, Paris (FR)
http://france.fiction.free.fr

Free103point9, New York City, New York (US)
http://www.free103point9.org

Freie Internationale Tankstelle (FIT), Berlin (DE)
http://www.f-i-t.org

FRISE Künstlerhaus Hamburg + Abbildungszentrum, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.frise.de

Future7, Berlin (DE)
http://www.future7.de

Galeria de la Raza, San Francisco, California (US)
http://www.galeriadelaraza.org

Galerie Foert, Berlin (DE)
http://www.galerie-kurt.com

Galerie Invaliden1, Berlin (DE)
http://www.invaliden1.com

Galerie Mille d’Air, Berlin (DE)
http://www.kosmotrop.de

Galerie Lifebomb, Berlin (DE)
http://www.lifebomb.de

Galerie Oel-Früh, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.oelfrueh.org

Galerie Zero, Berlin (DE)
http://www.zero-project.org

Galleria Huuto, Helsinki (FI)
http://www.galleriahuuto.net

Gallery Gatchet, Vancouver (CA)
http://www.gachet.org

Gasworks, London (GB)
http://www.gasworks.org.uk

General Public, Berlin (DE)
http://www.generalpublic.de

Gertrude Street Contemporary Art Projects, Melbourne (AU)
http://www.gertrude.org.au

Glowlab, Brooklyn, New York (US)
http://www.glowlab.com

Graffitigalleriet, Frederiksberg (DK)
http://www.graffitigalleriet.dk

Graffiti Research Lab Vienna, London (UK)
http://graffitiresearchlab.com

Green Cardamom, London (GB)
http://www.greencardamom.net

Grossstadtrekorder, Hanover (DE)
http://www.grossstadtrekorder.de

Gugulective, Capetown (ZA)
http://www.gugulective.net

Hafenrand, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.hafenrand.com

Hart Center of Arts, Beijing (China)
http://www.hart.com.cn

Helen Pitt Gallery, Vancouver (CA)
http://www.helenpittgallery.org

Hinterconti, Hamburg (DE),
http://www.hinterconti.de

Homie, Berlin (DE)
http://www.travelhome.org/homie

i-cabin, London (UK)
http://www.i-cabin.co.uk

ID:I, Stockholm (SE)
http://www.idigalleri.org

In Situ, Paris (FR)
http://www.insituparis.fr

Jefferson Presents, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (US)
http://www.myspace.com/jeffersonpresents

JET, Berlin (DE)
http://www.j-e-t.org

Kabine, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.kabine.dk

Ker-Thiossane, Dakar (SN)
http://www.ker-thiossane.com

KHOJ International Artists’ Association,
New Delhi (IN)
http://www.khojworkshop.org

Kling & Bang Gallery, Reykjavik (IS)
http://www.this.is/klingogbang

Koh-i-noor, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.koh-i-noor.org

Kolahstudio, Teheran (IR)
http://www.kolahstudio.com

Konsortium, Dusseldorf (DE)
http://www.konsortium-d.com

Konsthall C, Stockholm (SE)
http://www.konsthallc.se

KuLe e.V., Berlin (DE)
http://www.fernwaerme-berlin.net
http://www.mount-warning.de

Kunstverein St. Pauli, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.ferein.net

Kunstwerft/Werftgalerie, Vienna (AT)
http://www.kunstwerft.at

KuBaSta - Raum für Kunst Bauen Stadtentwicklung e.V., Hamburg (DE)
http://www.kubasta.de

La Générale, Paris (FR)
http://www.lagenerale.org

LCCA, Riga (LV)
http://www.lcca.lv

Les Complices, Zurich (CH)
http://www.lescomplices.ch

LINDA, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.chezlinda.de

LOWSALT, Glasgow, Scotland (GB)
http://www.lowsalt.org.uk

LACE (Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions),
Los Angeles, California (US)
http://www.artleak.org

Macrolab
http://makrolab.ljudmila.org

Mahony, Vienna (AT)
http://www.mahony.fm

Marienborg, Trondheim (NO)
http://www.marienborgkunst.no

Mercer Union, Toronto (CA)
http://www.mercerunion.org

Messagesalon, Zurich (CH)
http://www.likeyou.com/messagesalon

Mess Hall, Chicago, Illinois (US)
http://www.messhall.org

MOP, Sidney (AU)
http://www.mop.org.au

multiplicity.lab, Milan (IT)
http://www.multiplicity.it

NAPA, Helsinki (FI)
http://www.napabooks.com

Neil Young Society, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.gallerisignevad.dk/nys/pix/index.htm

Neon Park, Melbourne (AU)
http://www.neonparc.com.au

Netfilmmakers, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.netfilmmakers.dk

New Langton, San Francisco, California (US)
http://www.newlangtonarts.org

NGBK, Neue Gesellschaft für bildende Kunst, Berlin (DE)
http://www.ngbk.de

NICC (New international cultural center), Antwerpen (BE)
http://www.nicc.be

Nice & Fit, Berlin (DE)
http://www.niceandfitgallery.com

NLHspace, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.nlhspace.dk

OEen Group, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.oeen-group.com

OneZeroMore OZM - URBAN ART SPOT,
Hamburg (DE)
http://www.onezeromore.com

Open Circle, Bombay/Mumbay (IN)
http://www.opencirclearts.org

Open Space, Victoria (CA)
http://www.openspace.ca

Orchard, New York, New York (US)
http://www.orchard47.org

Para/Site Art Space, Hong Kong, (CN)
http://www.para-site.org.hk

Parkhaus, Düsseldorf (DE)
http://www.parkhaus-duesseldorf.com

Parkinggallery, Teheran (IR)
http://www.parkingallery.com

PICA, Portland (CA)
http://www.pica.org

Platform Artists Group, Melbourne (AU),
http://www.platform.org.au

Plastique Kinetic Worms, Singapore (SG)
http://www.pkworms.blogspot.com

Platform Garanti Contemporary Art Center, Istanbul (TR)
http://www.platform.garanti.com.tr

Printed Matter Inc., New York, New York (US)
http://www.printedmatter.org

program angels, Munich (DE),
http://www.programangels.org

Projekt0047, Berlin (DE)
http://www.0047.org

Project 304, Bangkok (TH)
ohne Website

projekthaus | U.FO kunstraum, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.projekthaus-hh.de

Queens Nails Annex, San Francisco, California (US)
http://www.queensnailsannex.com

REINIGUNGSGESELLSCHAFT, Dresden (DE)
http://www.reinigungsgesellschaft.de

RLBQ (Reposez la bonne question), Marseille (FR)
http://www.rlbq.com

Röda Sten, Göteborg (SE)
http://www.rodasten.com

Ruangrupa, Jakarta (ID)
http://www.ruangrupa.org

rum46, Aarhus (DK)
http://www.rum46.dk

Schnittraum, Cologne (DE)
http://www.schnittraum.de

Signal, Malmö (SE)
http://www.signalsignal.org

Simultanhalle, Cologne (DE)
http://www.simultanhalle.de

SKAM e.V., Hamburg (DE)
http://www.skam.org

Southern Exposure, San Francisco, California (US)
http://www.soex.org

Sparwasser HQ, Offensive für zeitgenössische Kunst und Kommunikation, Berlin (DE)
http://www.sparwasserhq.de

Spor Klübü, Berlin (DE)
ohne Website

Studio 44, Stockholm (SE)
http://www.studio44.se

Studio Voltaire, London (GB)
http://www.studiovoltaire.org

target: autonopop, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.targetautonopop.org

TCB, Melbourne (AU)
http://www.tcbartinc.org.au

Tegen 2, Stockholm (SE)
http://www.tegen2.se

The Artists Village, (SG)
http://come.to/theartistsvillage

The Embassy, Edinburgh (GB)
http://www.embassygallery.org

The Hex, London (GB)
http://www.hexprojects.org

The LAB, San Francisco, California (US)
http://www.thelab.org

The land, (TH)
http://www.thelandfoundation.org

The Luggage Store (LS), San Francisco, California (US)
http://www.luggagestoregallery.org

The Modern Institute, Glasgow, Scotland (GB)
http://www.themoderninstitute.com

The New China Town Barber Shop,
Los Angeles, California (US)
ohne Website

The Or Gallery, Vancouver (CA),
http://www.orgallery.org

The Premises, Johannesburg (ZA)
http://www.onair.co.za/thepremises

The suburban, Oak Park, Illinois (US)
http://www.thesuburban.org

The Western Front Society, Vancouver (CA)
http://www.front.bc.ca

The Wrong Gallery, New York, New York (US)
ohne Website

Total Kunst, Edinburgh (GB)
http://www.theforest.org.uk

Transmission Gallery, Glasgow, Scotland (GB)
http://www.transmissiongallery.org

Tresor, Stuttgart (DE)
http://www.kunsttresor.net

Triple Base, San Francisco, California (US)
http://www.basebasebase.com

Trottoir / R+D, Hamburg (D)
http://www.trottoir-hh.de

TTC Gallery, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.ttcgallery.com

Union Docs, Brooklyn, New York (US)
http://www.uniondocs.org

Unten Drunter, Malmö (SE)
http://www.untendrunter.se

Uqbar, Berlin (DE)
http://projectspace.uqbar-ev.de

urbanart Group, Melbourne (AU)
http://avoca.vicnet.net.au/~urbanart

VERKLIGHETEN, Umeæ (SE)
http://www.verkligheten.net

Via Artgenossen, Hildesheim (DE)
http://www.via113.de

Vitamin Creative Space, Guangzhou (CH)
http://www.vitamincreativespace.com

Western Front, Vancouver (CL)
http://www.front.bc.ca

West Germany, Berlin (DE)
ohne Website

West Space, Melbourne (AU)
http://www.westspace.org.au

WESTWERK, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.westwerk.org

White Cubicle Toilet Gallery, London (GB)
http://www.whitecubicle.org

Viennaer Secession, Vienna (AT)
http://www.secession.at

OPA, Guadalajara (MX)
http://www.opa.com.mx

Yeans, Gothenburg (SE)
http://www.yeans.org

Ydre Nørrebro Kultur Bureau (YNKB),
Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.ynkb.dk

YYZ, Toronto (CA)
http://www.yyzartistsoutlet.org

Zagreus Projekt / Koch / Kunst, Berlin (DE)
http://www.zagreus.net

Archives

AAN (Art Autonomous Network)
http://www.a-a-n.org

Agency, Brussels (BE)
http://www.projektmigration.de/kuenstlerliste/agency.html

Alexandria Contemporary Art Forum,
Alexandria (EG)
http://www.acafspace.org

Art Metropole, Toronto (CA)
http://www.artmetropole.com

Ashkal Alwan – The Lebanese Association for Plastic Arts, Beirut (LB)
http://www.ashkalalwan.org

B+B, London (GB)
http://www.welcomebb.org.uk

bildwechsel, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.bildwechsel.org

Bureau of Inverse Technology
http://www.bureauit.org

Buy sellf, Bordeaux / Marseille (FR)
http://www.buy-sellf.com
http://www.buysellfartclub.com

CAA / CAA (Contemporary Art Archive / Center for Art Analysis), Bucharest (RO)
ohne Website

Counter Productive Industries, Chicago, Illinois (US)
http://www.counterproductiveindustries.com

Digital Art Lab, Holon (IR)
http://www.digitalartlab.org.il

Publish and be damned, London (GB)
http://www.publishandbedamned.org

Rhizome
http://www.rhizome.org

Temporary Services, Chicago, Illinois (US)
http://www.temporaryservices.org

The Atlas Group
http://www.theatlasgroup.org

United Net-works, Stockholm (SE)
http://www.unitednet-works.org

V2, Rotterdam (NL)
http://www.V2.nl

Collectives / Artist Groups

0100101110101101.org, New York (US)
http://0100101110101101.org

Auguste Orts, Brussels (BE)
http://www.augusteorts.be

B+B, London (GB)
http://www.welcomebb.org.uk

beige, New York State (US)
http://www.beigerecords.com

Big Hope
http://www.bighope.hu/index.html

Bik Van der Pol, Rotterdam (NL)
http://www.bikvanderpol.net

Bureau d’Etudes
http://bureaudetudes.free.fr

Center for Metahuman Exploration,
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (US)
http://www.metahuman.org

Chto delat / What is to be done?, St. Petersburg (RU)
http://www.chtodelat.org

c-level (now Beta-Level), Los Angeles, California (US)
http://www.c-level.cc

Collective Jyrk, Portland, Oregon (US)
http://www.jyrk.com

commandN, Tokyo (JP)
http://www.commandn.net

Critical art ensemble, New York (US)
http://www.critical-art.net

Dark Passage, New York (US)
http://www.darkpassage.com

Department für öffentliche Erscheinungen,
Munich (DE)
http://www.department-online.de

ESL | Esthetics as a Second Language,
Los Angeles, California (US)
http://www.eslprojects.org

etoy, Zurich (CH)
http://www.etoy.com

Experimental Interaction Unit
http://www.eiu.org

feld für kunst e.V., Hamburg (DE)
http://www.feldfuerkunst.net

FMSW (FallerMiethStuessiWeck),
Berlin / Frankfurt (DE)
http://www.fmsw.net

Fuck for Friendship, Riga (LV)
http://www.fuckforfriendship.com

GALA Committee, New York (US)
http://www.cftnm.ucsb.edu/mpart/

Google will eat itself, Vienna (AT)
http://www.gwei.org

gruppo A12, Genova / Milan (IT)
http://www.gruppoa12.org

Guestroom, London (UK)
http://www.guest-room.net

Human Beans, Los Angeles, California (US)
http://www.humanbeans.net

Instant Coffee, Montreal (CA)
http://www.instantcoffee.org

Institute for Applied Autonomy (IAA)
http://www.appliedautonomy.com

In the Field, Chicago, Illinois (US)
http://www.inthefield.info

IRWIN, Ljubljana (SL)
http://www.nskstate.com/irwin

KiöR - Kunst im öffentlichen Raum, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.kioer.de

Kooperative Kunstpraxis,
Dresden / Berlin / Weimar (DE)
http://www.kunst-basis.org

kuda.org, Novi Sad (CS)
http://www.kuda.org

Ligna, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.ligna.blogspot.com

love and devotion, Stockholm (SE)
http://www.loveanddevotion.org/project.html

LTTR, New York (US)
http://www.lttr.org

Lucky Pierre, Chicago, Illinois (US)
http://www.luckypierre.org

MARS PATENT, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.mars-patent.org

Next Question, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (US)
http://www.nextquestion.org

Nomads & Residents
http://www.nomadsresidents.org

O2 Collective, Ashland, Oregon (US)
http://www.o2collective.org

oginoknauss, Florence (IT)
http://www.oginoknauss.org

PaperRad, New York State (US)
http://www.paperrad.org

Paper Tiger Television (PTTV),
New York (US)
http://www.papertiger.org

Peles Empire, London (GB)
http://www.artsite.tv/peles.html

Pigeon Condo, Toronto (CA),
http://www.pigeoncondo.com

Pony Pedro, Berlin (DE)
http://www.pony-pedro.de

projektgruppe, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.projektgruppe.org

pvi collective, Perth (AU)
http://www.pvicollective.com

Reactor, Nottingham (GB)
http://www.reactorweb.com

Red Heart Art Commune (RHAC), Yunnan (CN)
ohne Website

RoToR
http://www.rotorrr.org

SALA-MANCA GROUP, Jerusalem (IL)
http://sala-manca.net

Space Hijackers, (GB)
http://www.spacehijackers.co.uk

Sparwasser HQ, Berlin (D)
http://www.sparwasserhq.de

Stalker, Rome (IT)
http://www.stalkerlab.it

STEINBRENER/DEMPF, Vienna (AT)
http://www.steinbrener-dempf.com

SuperFlex, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.superflex.dk

Symbiosis, Toronto (CA)
http://www.year01.com

Taring Padi, Yogjakarta (ID)
http://www.anakseribupulau.info/collectives/tp.html

Temporary Services, Chicago, Illinois (US)
http://www.temporaryservices.org

The London Particular, London (GB)
http://www.thelondonparticular.org

Torolab, Tijuana (MX)
http://www.torolab.org

TTC Gallery, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.ttcgallery.com

UBERMORGEN.com, Vienna (AT)
http://www.ubermorgen.com

Ultra-Red, Los Angeles, California (US)
http://www.ultrared.org

Undenk, Berlin (DE)
http://www.undenk.com

Union Docs, Brooklyn, New York (US)
http://www.uniondocs.org

urbanart Group, Melbourne (AU)
http://avoca.vicnet.net.au/~urbanart

Urtica, Belgradee (CS)
http://www.urtica.org

Videotage, Hong Kong (CN)
http://www.videotage.org.hk

Visible Collective
http://www.disappearedinamerica.org

Wir sind woanders, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.wirsindwoanders.de

WochenKlausur, Vienna (AT)
http://www.wochenklausur.at

Wooster Collective, New York (US)
http://www.woostercollective.com

xurban_collective,
Izmir / Istanbul (TR) / Linz (CH) / New York (US)
http://www.xurban.net

Nomadic Projects

a7.ausstellungen e.V., Hildesheim (DE)
http://www.a7-ausstellungen.de

BALTIC RAW ORG, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.balticraw.org

Half Dozen, Sydney (AU)
http://www.halfdozen.org

Joint Hassles, Northcote (AU)
http://jointhassles.blogspot.com

Komplot, Brussels (BE)
http://www.kmplt.be

MAN Museum, (DE/GB)
http://www.museumman.org

noroomgallery, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.noroomgallery.com

nüanS offspace, Dusseldorf (DE)
http://www.nuans.de

O2 Collective, Ashland, Oregon (US)
http://www.o2collective.org

ParachutArtists Foundation, Amsterdam (NL)
http://www.parachutartists.com

szu szu, Warsaw (PL)
http://www.szuszu.art.pl

Plattforms & Networks

16beaver, New York (US)
http://www.16beavergroup.org

98 weeks research project, Beirut (LB)
http://www.98weeks.org

AAN (Art Autonomous Network)
http://www.a-a-n.org

Adbusters Media Foundation, Vancouver (CA)
http://www.adbusters.org

AIT, Tokyo (JP)
http://www.a-i-t.net

aMAZE, Mailand (IT)
http://www.amaze.it

ARCCO - Artist Run Centers & Collectives of Ontario, Ontario (CA)
http://www.arcco.ca

Ars Subterranea , New York (US)
http://www.creativepreservation.org

Artbakery, Douala (CN)
http://adude.free.fr

Artplaces.org
http://artplaces.org

Art Surgery, St. Ives (GB)
http://www.artsurgery.org

Ashkal Alwan – The Lebanese Association for Plastic Arts, Beirut (LB)
http://www.ashkalalwan.org

bildwechsel, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.bildwechsel.org

Billboard Liberation Front, Oakland, California, (US)
http://www.billboardliberation.com

Billionaires for Bush
http://billionairesforbush.com

Biro Beograd, Belgrad (CS)
http://www.birobeograd.info

Bola de Nieve, (AR)
http://www.boladenieve.org.ar

c a l c (casqueiro atlantico laboratorio cultural)
http://www.calcaxy.com

CAMP, Mumbai (IN)
http://www.camputer.org

Center for Land Use Interpretation,
Los Angeles, California / Troy, New York State (US)
http://www.clui.org

Center for Tactical Magic
http://www.tacticalmagic.org

Center for Urban Pedagogy - CUP
http://www.anothercupdevelopment.org

Cittadellarte, (IT)
http://www.cittadellarte.it

Conglomco Media Network (CMN)
http://www.conglomco.org

Constant, Brussels (BE)
http://www.constantvzw.com

Continuous Project, New York, New York (US)
ohne Website

Copenhagen free university (CFU), Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.copenhagenfreeuniversity.dk

Counter Productive Industries, Chicago, Illinois (US)
http://www.counterproductiveindustries.com

CrimethInc (CWC)
http://www.crimethinc.com

Desk.org
http://www.desk.org

d-i-n-a,
Barcelona (SP), Bologna / Rome (IT), New York (US)
http://d-i-n-a.net

Electronic Civil Disobedience
http://www.thing.net/~rdom/ecd/ecd.html

e-Xplo
http://www.e-Xplo.org

Faces
http://faces-l.net

fournos centre for digital culture, (GR)
http://www.fournos-culture.gr

Free103point9, New York (US)
http://www.free103point9.org

freitagsküche, Berlin / Frankfurt a.M. (DE)
ohne Website

Grizedale Arts, Coniston, Cumbria (GB)
http://www.grizedale.org

Guerrilla Girls, New York (US)
http://www.guerrillagirls.com

Hactivist.com
http://www.hactivist.com

iKATUN, Boston, Massachusetts (US)
http://www.ikatun.com

INC (The Institute of Network Cultures), Amsterdam (NL)
http://www.networkcultures.org

institute for Distributed Creativity (iDC)
http://www.distributedcreativity.org

IRATIONAL.ORG, Bristol (GB)
http://www.irational.org

ISOLA Art Center, Mailand (IT)
http://www.isolartcenter.org

KHOJ International Artists’ Association,
New Delhi (IN)
http://www.khojworkshop.org

Kunst-Imbiss, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.kunst-imbiss.de

Kill Radio, Los Angeles, California (US)
http://www.killradio.org

Kulturkasse / Kunststelle, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.kulturkasse.de

la compagnie, Marseille (FR)
http://www.la-compagnie.org

Learning Site, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.learningsite.info

Littoral, East Lancashire (GB)
http://www.littoral.org.uk/index.htm

Looming.org, (EE)
http://looming.org

Las Agencias
http://www.sindominio.net/fiambrera/web-agencias

Luther Blissett
http://www.lutherblissett.net

Mediamatic, Amsterdam (NL)
http://www.mediamatic.net

Memefest, Ljubljana (SI)
http://www.memefest.org

monochrom, Vienna (AT)
http://www.monochrom.org

Moscow WWWArt Centre, Moscow (RU)
http://sunsite.cs.msu.su/wwwart

My Dad’s Strip Club
http://www.mydadsstripclub.com

N55, Copenhagen (DK)
http://www.n55.dk/Index.html

neuroTransmitter (NT)
http://www.neurotransmitter.fm

NSK, (SI)
http://www.nskstate.com

NYC Surveillance Camera Players,
New York, New York (US)
http://www.notbored.org/the-scp.html

ORGACOM, Amersfoort (NL)
http://www.Orgacom.nl

Park Fiction, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.parkfiction.org

parole
http://parole.aporee.org

Peripheral Produce, Portland, Oregon (US)
http://www.peripheralproduce.com

Perpetual Art Machine, New York, New York (US)
http://www.perpetualartmachine.com

Perte de Signal, Montreal (CA)
http://www.perte-de-signal.org

PILOT:, London (GB)
http://www.pilotlondon.org

Printed Matter, Inc., New York (US)
http://www.printedmatter.org

Public Netbase / Institut für Neue Kulturtechnologien, Vienna (AT)
http://www.t0.or.at

Radio Arte Mobile (RAM), (IT)
http://www.radioartemobile.it

Rain Artists initiatives Network, (international)
http://www.r-a-i-n.net

Reclaim the Streets (RTS), (international)
http://www.myspace.com/reclaimthestreetsnyc

Red76 Arts Group, New York (US)
http://www.red76.com

remo, Osaka (JP)
http://www.remo.or.jp

REPOhistory, New York (US)
http://www.repohistory.org

Republic Art
http://www.republicart.net

Rhizome
http://www.rhizome.org

®TMark
http://www.rtmark.com

Ruangrupa, Jakarta (ID)
http://www.ruangrupa.org

Sarai, Delhi (IN)
http://www.sarai.net

schleuser.net, Weimar (DE)
http://www.schleuser.net

Société Réaliste, Paris (FR)
http://societerealiste.net

spurse
http://www.spurse.org

State of Sabotage (SoS), Linz (AT)
http://www.sabotage.at

subRosa
http://www.cyberfeminism.net

tao.ca, Torronto (Ca)
http://tao.ca

The Culture & Conflict Group
http://www.culture-conflict.org

The Thing Frankfurt, Frankfurt a.M. (DE)
http://www.thing-frankfurt.de

THE THING HAMBURG, Hamburg (DE)
http://www.thing-hamburg.de

The Thing, New York (US)
http://www.thing.net

The Yes Men, (US)
http://www.theyesmen.org

Townhouse Gallery, Cairo (EG)
http://www.thetownhousegallery.com

TRAMA, Buenos Aires (AR)
http://trama.uol.com.br

Transform
http://transform.eipcp.net

Transnational Republic, Munich (DE)
http://www.transnationalrepublic.org

tranzit, Prague (CZ)
http://www.tranzit.org

Triangle Arts Trust
http://www.trianglearts.org

turbulence/New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc. (NRPA)
http://www.turbulence.org

United Net-works, Stockholm (SE)
http://www.unitednet-works.org

UNWETTER, Berlin (DE)
http://www.un-wetter.net

V2_, Rotterdam (NL)
http://www.V2.nl

Verybusy, Leipzig (DE)
http://www.verybusy.org

VIA-n (Victorian Initiatives of Artists network), Melbourne (AU)
http://www.via-n.org

Video Art Center Tokyo, Tokyo (JP)
http://www.vctokyo.org

Viva Laura Pérez, Tucumán (AR)
http://www.boladenieve.org.ar/node/557

Waag Society, Amsterdam (NL)
http://www.waag.org

What, How and for Whom (WHW), Zagreb (HR)
http://www.peripherie3000.de

Women In The Arts (WITAS), Singapore, (SG)
http://www.witas.org

Wooster Collective, New York City, New York (US)
http://www.woostercollective.com

XINOBER mobile experience, München (DE)
http://www.blackpunkt.de/archive/xinober/Profil.html

Others

Artbus, New York, New York (US)
http://www.art-bus.com

Artstar TV, New York, New York (US)
http://www.voom.com/whats-on/artstar

Mountain School of Art, Los Angeles, California (US)
http://www.themountainschoolofarts.org

Preserving America’s Cultural Heritage,
Los Angeles, California (US)
http://sites.cca.edu/curatingarchive/americasculturalheritage

Slum-tv, Nairobi (KE)
http://www.slum-tv.org

Toronto Scholl of Creativity & Inquiry,
Toronto (CA)
http://www.tsci.ca

Very Real Time, Cape Town / Johannesburg (ZA)
ohne Website

(Dis)comfort (Im)materiality

subvision — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 09:03:47 +0000

Contribiution by Christina Ruppert Marcos Ramirez Erre, director and founder of the artist-run space Estación, Tijuana, and the architect he invited, Sebastian Mariscal, stood up to provocative questioning within the frame of the first artists’ talk of the subvision academy. The artists’ collectives Barbur and Darom presented their approaches and gave an account of the difficulties involved in producing contemporary art in Israel. Both talks revolved around the question related to what extent the category “off” is important for the artistic practice of these artist-run spaces.

Villas reminiscent of Tuscany next to Swiss chalets and improvised fairy-tale castles – the introductory words of Marcos Ramirez Erre do not refer to Disneyland in California, however, but to the city of Tijuana on the American-Mexican border. Yet the reference to Disneyland is not by chance – the urban structure is indeed characterised by an apparently Americanised and idealised definition of Mexicanitá, shaped by colourful sombreros in all conceivable sizes, huge monuments, Mexican flags, and burrito fast-food chains. With its bizarre combination of heteronomous identitarian attributions, which simultaneously shapes national self-understanding, Tijuana stands in contrast to neighbouring San Diego, which is characterised by its uniform and well composed town houses.

What determines the programme of the artist-run space Estación Tijuana founded by Marcos Ramirez ERRE is its location in an area defined by opposites. From the most various perspectives, Erre explores the living conditions of his homeland – and prefers shedding light on the region taking interdisciplinary approaches. In line with these initial conditions, the containers with works by three artists comprise a history of exploration, of drawing borders and deconstructing the attributions of the region.
Architect Sebastian Mariscal, who lives in San Diego, views the two cities as dependent on each other, despite their contrasts. From his architectural perspective, Mariscal compares the dualism of the two cities with Siamese twins: one couldn’t exist without the existence of the other. He terms this interdependency (dis)comfort (im)materiality.
The comfort materiality that he encounters in his everyday life in the United States – e.g. in the form of permanently air-conditioned interior spaces or serially produced town houses – stands in an almost absurd contrast to the improvised, untidy and in all places incomplete architecture of Tijuana. By using worn tyres on the subvision grounds, Mariscal cites the often employed material that, stemming from American garbage dumps, is reused in Mexican households as wall constructions, for example. But on the claim, the tyres simultaneously form an inconvenient obstacle. Only in a slow and difficult way can one reach the exhibits inside the containers. Conditions meant to remind one of the difficult and often fatal border-crossings of Mexicans willing to migrate.
Luis Sánchez Ramírez – personally not present on this evening – is one of the Mexicans who, like thousands of others, set off on this gruelling border-crossing. Years later, he again visited the individual stations and photographed them. The individual stations of his odyssey unfold like dream sequences. In his photographic triptych, Javier Ramirez Limón remains on Mexican terrain and addresses drug trafficking along the “Christal Frontier”.
Asked whether the interdisciplinary works of the invited artists are meant as an emancipation from the clichéd view of his homeland implemented from the outside, Erre answered with a strong “no”. “Tijuana is a whore,” he said, “but this whore is my mother.” Tijuana sells itself and its clichéd image, thus fulfilling what one expects of the city. Yet it is still a “whore” that must be educated. There are no spaces for contemporary art in Tijuana. Erre’s intention is to offer a platform and a voice to contemporary art under the difficult conditions in Tijuana.
A question from the audience as to how the artistic practice is grasped as “off” here, brought the polemic currently heatedly debated in Hamburg to the subvision academy for the first time within the frame of a talk. This question was probably posed against the background of the obviously well-established architect Sebastian Mariscal. During the presentation, he showed an impressive list of commissioned works.
Erre himself does not see a contradiction here: neither to his artistic practice nor to the overall approach of Estación Tijuana. Just because an artist earns money with his work by no means implies betraying his artistic integrity. Erre views identifying with an “off” as a gesture of deliberate marginalisation. With Estación Tijuana he attempts to overcome precisely this marginalisation by visualising contemporary art.
The term “off” contains far more identificatory and substantial levels than were addressed within the frame of this talk. Yet it became clear that it is indeed a problematic term if it is to subsume all forms of artistic practices that are “in some way anti-commercial and self-organised”.
This also became evident in the following presentation of the two Israeli artist-run spaces Barbur and Darom. Barbur was founded in 2005 by five graduates of the Bezalel academy of fine art and design in Jerusalem. As opposed to the usual practice of most graduates, who leave the country or at least move to culturally much more lively Tel Aviv, the five decided to remain in Jerusalem. As the capital city, Jerusalem is home to the seat of government and above all political institutions. Avi Sabah of Barbur stated that there is hardly a lively, diverse cultural scene there – despite the academy.
With the help of a social worker, the artists’ collective Barbur found and renovated an empty kindergarten in the Nachlaot neighbourhood for their first show. After working in a self-organised way for a year, Barbur now receives financial support from the city. Decidedly intended as a cultural centre for the surrounding community, Barbur, whose five members are all painters, pursues an interdisciplinary programme ranging from film screenings and exhibitions all the way to painting courses. The aim is to offer the heterogeneous neighbourhood a social platform. Barbur deliberately places a focus on areas that distinguish themselves in terms of content from the usual programme of contemporary art galleries, which in their view tend to cater to the taste of an educated middle-class and aloof audience.
They must accept that, for the time being, the contents of the exhibitions or film screenings must be agreed upon with the municipal committees. They answered the question whether this poses a risk to their artistic practice as follows: “We want to make art accessible to a broadest possible audience. Our audience is for the most part comprised of people from the neighbourhood: students, workers, old, young, secular and orthodox people. If they feel insulted and their sense of shame is hurt by the frontal nudity of a man, we respect that. It is not about provocation but about being a part of the society we live in.”

In the final result you are products – but would like to be sums

subvision — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 09:01:26 +0000

Contribution by Olaf Bargheer Prior to the start of the “HafenCity bleibt!” round in the Baltic Raw Tower, stormy weather approached from St. Pauli over the Strandkai. One could regard this, if so inclined, metaphorically. Two hours later, one was indeed smarter, and an approach, a commitment to or a chance for a more satisfactory urban development in Hamburg did not materialise – as expected.HafenCity, strategically planned since the late 1990s, is a popular crystallization point for broadsides in the Hamburg mélange of gentrification, growth, inner-city housing shortage, real-estate speculation, and the displacement of established neighbourhood structures. However, as Bianca Penzlien from HafenCity Hamburg GmbH was able to make clear, the new quarter cannot be made responsible for the indeed sad processes in St. Pauli or the Schanze. HafenCity makes no secret of the fact that it is a strategically designed urban space that intends to convert huge industrial grounds into a new urban centre. Including city branding with beacons such as the Elbphilharmonie or the Überseequartier. “Friendly” thanks was extended that the plans also include cooperative buildings, kindergartens and public squares, but it was no help in face of a much bigger question looming over the now dripping wet Baltic Raw Tower: “To whom does the city belong?”

Cultural stimulation of an architecturally clean, synthetic city district planned in a top-down fashion is deemed all but presumptuous by Hamburg-based artists, because grown cultural structures in other parts of the city are in turn being destroyed by rent increases and the influx of well-heeled residents. Parts of the city that until now shaped the image of Hamburg through their in one way or another subcultural character. Until recently, it was aptly stated in regard to Pudel Art Basel, art in Hamburg counted as “the great unwashed”. And now washed beacon projects and washed off artists? How explosive this tinder box is can currently be observed in the Gängeviertel neighbourhood or in the documentary film “Empire St. Pauli”.

In this context, the subvision Festival is an equally sensitive crystallization point: “Why does HafenCity support a one-off festival instead of creating sustained structures and production sites for art within the city? ”

The simultaneity of the occupation of the Gängeviertal and the subvision festival indeed reveals different instances of energy release; one the one hand, sponsored, professionally organised large-scale events (top-down, at least in regard to subvision’s organisational structure), on the other hand, self-initiated projects organised in flat hierarchies that meet a great response even without initial lobbying (bottom-up, at least until reliable contact persons of the Gängeviertel are required for round table discussions with the city). That, while running, both approaches come closer to each other, was revealed by the controversial events organised by the artists’ initiatives themselves – while the initiators of the Gängeviertel now place their stake on the lobby effect of a “patron”, Daniel Richter, and with the successful establishment of an artists’ quarter may cause a gentrification possessing a dimension of its own.

Hamburg should identify with both approaches. Independent creative and artistic development is possible within both structures. Also in the allegedly so unlively district of HafenCity: A social worker living in a cooperative building at Kaiserkai for three years, speaks of an unexpectedly high quality of life and closeness among the neighbours.

That subvision functions as an exchange platform for an alternatively operating, international art scene was something one could notice when looking at the audience or listening to the statements entirely translated into English. The experiences of artists from Amsterdam, Zürich, Reykjavik or Stuttgart made the deficits in Hamburg appear in a dimmer light: Urban planning and gentrification can be a lot harsher.

After the partially hefty exchanges during the “HafenCity bleibt!” discussion, the Frankfurt poetry slammers Word Alert started their battle: “In the final result you are products – but would like to be sums” was their outro. And even if there was no dramaturgical reference to the preceding discussion, it did provide a title full of allusions.

In, on and between the containers

subvision — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 09:00:00 +0000

Contribution by Jennifer Smailes on the indispensable disruption of the structure. It is often not easy for the festival architecture planned by the Architekturwerkstatt Hamburg, for it was frequently criticised as “perhaps a bit too platitudinous”, as “maritime” and “not especially new” because it already existed at Art Basel Miami (kunstmarkt.com), as “too dominant vis-à-vis the art” (synecstasy.com), as reminiscent of an “artists’ petting zoo” (Jan Holtmann, noroomgallery) or a type case for particularly rare specimens of the art world. Deliberately placed symbols such as the “white cube” of the festival hall are diverted from their intended use as refuge for storm victims, as a shelter for the homeless with burning oil barrels.But at times one doesn’t see the individual container for the container city, the individual initiative, the artist, the artwork for the off-on debates. The architecture is initially meant to function as a frame, at least that’s how Simon Putz describes it in the festival guide, the container is to function as the lowest common denominator with which the different initiatives can work. That may be problematic for some initiatives, for example, when Marita Fraser from Bell Street says that she often regards off spaces as highly sensitive and subjective spaces, the artistic practice of which has to struggle with the coldness and exposedness of the assigned containers. Or it can lead to the box shape prompting one to create small black and white cubes – almost like at art fairs, which subvision wants to counter programmatically. Konsortium from Düsseldorf took up this connotation and created a smooth, white field of gravel in the centre of a blue carpet, which no longer made a rough or bold impression and wouldn’t have been disturbing on Miami Beach either.

Other initiatives worked closer with the image of the container, which is charged with meaning not only in Hamburg: Chto delat, for example, when in their performance “Illegal Migrant” they stood on a container and read texts on suffocating Chinese refugees, while one could hear muffled cries and beating against the resonating walls in the sealed metal box beneath them, until they fell silent shortly before the end of the performance. The location, on a work by Zoro Feigl, is deliberately chosen here. The moving sculpture “Offshore / Onshore“ by the artists of De Service Garage from Amsterdam consists of a container set in swaying motion with the help of hydropneumatics. Standing in the container, one only sees a slightly moving lamp, hears the creaking metal, feels slightly seasick and senses creeping claustrophobia in the twilight. It is less a sea voyage that is conveyed here than the image of flight und uncertainty, of human and animal transport. What price has to be paid to be allowed to live a life in human dignity?

In a further work by Service Garage the notions of access and the denial of access are also negotiated – access to power and means, as well as to the spheres of art. Two stacked containers are covered with black foil, forming a hard, inaccessible landmark. The logos of the sponsors omnipresent on the festival grounds were covered but then brought to the surface again with spray paint and templates, with two flags crowning the monolith: “Private Democracy” and “Art for Power”.

“Alter‐native Spaces” by Gugulective elucidates the reverse side of this phenomenon. While viewers are allowed to enter their container furnished like a living-room, their role as observers and intruders is made clear. Lying on one’s back, one sees the flat of a family installed upside-down on the ceiling, from a divine perspective, so to speak. In contrast to God, however, intervening is made impossible through a plexiglass pane. The details reveal the political attitude of the occupants: Books left lying around, photos and slogans written on the wall document the life of activists in South Africa under the apartheid regime. The living-room in the container becomes a political cell, an alternative space and a refuge for what is marginalised.

A last example takes up this thought: The World Game, initialised by YKON, simulates a world frozen for six years, in which only the “survivors”, the players, who are protected and screened from the world, can actively intervene in the condition of society. In this case, the container functions as a greenhouse of utopias. Protected from reality, financial conditions or one’s own qualms and those of others, a vacuum was created for the participants in which they were to act freely according to their inclinations and conscience.

As varied as these examples are, they all reflect in their own way the themes and conditions of an “off”, or also the reasons why alternative art spaces emerge: Like in the container boxes, alternative art spaces are created in various contexts, some to create refuges for art (e.g. i-cabin, who transfer the production of art to a remote piece of land so as to shift the focus from the presentation of art to process and debate), others to create a possible different public sphere (like with Publish and be Damned, who regularly organise fairs for fanzines and stand up to the possibilities of conscious amateurism). But in the case of subvision, the dangers of such an approach are also revealed, namely, marginalisation by adopting a title such as “off”, by sourcing out, pigeonholing and making the unpredictable third easy to handle, and also entrenching oneself in one’s own bubble. This is the thin line on which the majority of the invited initiative manoeuvre, always against their own local background, and that is also what the discussions of the festival are about, when the issue is high culture, subculture and mass culture, off and on and the power to define all these concepts.

Berglind Hlynsdottir from Kling & Bang formulated an apt statement in this context at a panel discussion on the theme of “self-organisation”. On subvision’s exhibition architecture she said: “This is a super structure. It was created so that we can meet each other and it was created so that we can take over. And if we don’t do so, then we fail on a certain level. Of course, there is a portion of control, but we are responsible for dealing with this as well.”

Unimpressed by the clear structure of the festival grounds, the curator collective Komplot from Brussels, while setting up, thought about leaving its container completely closed. Instead, they jumped from the roof of a two-storey container onto a pile of sand at the opening: Here, too, an attempt to break the structure.

Onepointfivemillion to fifty

subvision — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 08:58:26 +0000

Contribution by Olaf Bargheer Onepointfivemillion to fifty – that , says Harald Stazol, is about the relation of his readers in 1999 to 2009. At subvision, Stazol spends his time attempting to challenge Olof Olsson’s role as the best-dressed artist and, together with other editors, publish Jan Holtmann’s “Harbour Mass” magazine (“Harbour Mass”, a somewhat hackneyed yet still valid phonological reference). subvision’s in-house breviary by noroomgallery is printed on thin packing paper and sold, wrapped around freshly backed bread, for three euros to festival visitors. And because noroomgallerist Jan Holtmann always succeeds in winning over top-class companions for his twisted event formats, several notable editors now gather around the conference table at Strandkai. We wish Harald Stazol, at the end of the 1990s the lifestyle director of the most various, at the time still well-circulated magazines, that the readership of “Harbour Mass” will increase beyond fifty. And that his not exactly restrained Helmut Berger-style can stand up to the plain black Reservoir Dog-suit worn by Olof Olsson.

HarbourMass Editorial, Harald Nicolas Stazol (right)

Pimp my CV

subvision — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 08:55:28 +0000

Contribution by Ele Jansen One can at least say that an artist is foremost a show-off. And as such, he is dependent on an audience that is as large as possible. But what if attention doesn’t work? When the valued audience is distracted by mega-capitalist pop ready to be consumed? That’s when art takes to the weapons of the prevailing economic system and professionally vies for public attention. The artist is then in good company with marketing and PR experts who, in turn, love to grasp themselves as artists. Only they earn a lot more.Thoroughly a PR expert, the Swiss artist Thomas Haemmerli in the D.I.V.O container consequently speaks of “benchmarking“, “elevator pitches” and of ways to “pimp my CV” by participating in the subvision festival. His lecture is comparable to a meta-march through the usual literature of business consultants. Visitors ask themselves, how commercial an artist has to be today in order to reach an audience. Quite so, according to Haemmerli, who delivers his lecture in an entertaining mixture of Denglish and Swiss German.

Haemmerli distinguished himself from his 30 competitors at subvision simply by luring people with red wine, serving 30-euro Barolo in plastic cups. Perhaps the serotonin discharged by alcohol makes the guest less critical – something which is probably quite okay with the old communication strategist Hämmerli. For his art is not exactly path-breaking. The container is installed with old memorabilia from the flat of his deceased mother, the laptop presentation shows shots of rubble containers, mandalas and skeletons.

Of course, there are brief stories accompanying all motifs. Exhilarating. Shallow. And that’s where art is – because the themes make one heck of a thud.

That’s how Haemmerli starts talking about his documentary film “Sieben Mulden und eine Leiche”, a biting meditation about the death of his mother who, as it turns out after her death, was a real compulsive hoarder. He gives an account of the three-minute ignominy (“elevator pitch”) of chasing after programme directors at international film festivals to market his film. It must be said that it is a relatively thankful task to sell a film compared to the marketing of fine art. The “long tail” on the Internet, he said, has led to such a horrible amount of competition available on the market at all times. The remark of a Dutch artist that precisely this offers opportunities reveals to what extent Haemmerli seems to shy away from competition. One would actually assume that the former PR expert would have imbibed communicative persuasion from infancy.

Following brief excursions to Luhmann, Roth, Warhol, and Marx, Haemmerli finally asks the audience to take a photo of him holding a cellophane-packaged copy of “Lenin – What is to be Done” over a sacrificial stone altar. The message? Artists are capitalist communists. Or vice versa. Or whatever.

We are not off

olaf.bargheer — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 08:51:40 +0000

Statement by Chto delat In light of the developing situation around the subvision project in Hamburg, we – Chto delat platform - find it necessary to make following statement with regard to our participation. Only a few months before the festival opened, we - and many other participants - received private letters warning us that the festival is a product and instrument of neo-liberal hegemony and a means of advertising the creative potential of Hamburg’s gentrified HafenCity. We were also told that subvision had taken money out of funding usually given to local initiatives, money that was now being used to brand Hamburg as a center of the “creative industries”. Of course, we do not know enough about Hamburg, so it has been hard to find out what is really going on. The letters we received contained a great deal of contradictory information and personal detail, but their accusations were clearly well-founded. See on the case here: Website “art, money and real estate”, Website “Wir sind woanders”, TAZ Article. Nevertheless, we have decided to participate in subvision. Why? Like everything we do, this is a political decision based on our collective’s principles in dealing with institutions. What are these principles, and how do they relate at hand?

[1] To begin with, we must say it clearly: Chto delat is not an “off” project. True, the conditions in Russia are very repressive. So our resources and visibility are limited. Nevertheless, we insist that self-marginalization is not an answer. In our experience, it depoliticizes and ghettoizes artists and intellectuals in a comfortable non-conformism that lacks any clear articulation. Instead, we feel that it is of the utmost importance to use and contest any space that by weird chance opens up to provide a venue for our uncensored propaganda and art. Participation is not just collaboration, but a struggle for control over means of cultural production. We feel that it is we who produce the values and decisions that are important to culture and society, and not just the institutional frame. This means that we are willing to interact with projects and institutions even if we do not agree with their goals. Because we have goals of our own.

[2] For Chto delat, one of the most important points to keep overarching projects from dictating, censoring, or distorting our work. In the case of Subvision, there were no attempts to do any of this directly. If such things appear on site we will protest it immediately by boycotting and leaving the festival. But there is, of course, an indirect distortion that comes with the curatorial framing of the project in its particular location. We are not naive and realize that our contribution - which is about the collective search for alternatives in a highly repressive situation - is “global protest,” and we are highly critical of the way this representation is being handled. We fear that we might be brought in as artistic Gastarbeiter to confront the local “off-scene.” But we also think it is very important to create real spaces for solidarity and exchange between intiatives that ARE searching for alternatives, and this, after all, is Subvision’s stated goal – and our task is to make it true. When we were shown the list of invited participants, we were not only happy to find that many fellow Gastarbeiter are already our friends and comrades, but also because their presence reflects responsible political choices on the part of the organizers. In particular, we agree with the choice to invite Israeli artists who are searching for alternatives to a nearly hopeless situation of conflict. This decision goes against the unspoken boycott of Israeli artists and intellectuals in Western Europe today, which, unfortunately, is hitting the wrong people. In other words, we hope that actual communication between these different groups will outweigh the inevitable instrumentalization and distortion of our respective positions.

[3] Adequate economic conditions for cultural workers are an important political question. It is important to realize that self-organization should not necessarily mean self-exploitation, and that there is nothing to be gained by refusing payments, as if there was such a thing as “dirty money” or “pure commerce.” Incidentally, we did not sign any kind of contract with subvision, nor did we give them the copyright of our work. The financial conditions that subvision offers are fair enough in view of the project’s scale and allow us to concentrate on fulfilling those tasks that we have set ourselves as artists and writers in this context. Moreover, they allow members of Chto delat to travel to Western Europe and to react to the disheartening context of subvision directly, with interventions of their own. We are fully aware of the fact that ANY cultural product can be instrumentalized as a commodity against its producers. But we are also sure that it is necessary to fight for the reappropriation of the ideological and material dividends that neo-liberal cultural policies will try to draw from our work. This is only possible by occupying spaces within the object of our critique, and using them to challenge the status quo. Here, we need to practice a fundamentally different politics based on egalitarianism and collective participation. We do not think that we are too weak to resist some diabolical plan that would instrumentalize our work for something we oppose.  In fact, we can say it publically: our politics aim at making sure that places like HafenCity would be a thing of the past not only in Hamburg but anyplace else. If the developers suddenly see the need to bring us in, our goal is to create a situation in which art does not need developers. This contradiction remains fundamental to our participation in the project. Which also means that the real battleground in culture can also be inside such a project as subvision and not only outside, in the “off.” It is here that we can contest the nature of such a project and show it as our strenth.

[4] We believe collective political articulation - understood as self-clarification - to be the central goal of our work. We sincerely hope that our presence in Hamburg will help to spark a concretization of the subvision project’s critique. For now, this critique has been influenced by the vagaries of personal correspondence, rumors, and facile judgements, as if everything were “already clear.” But the points of consensus remain blurry, and have not been sufficiently articulated collectively or in public. We have a unique chance to meet in person and to discuss the situation. Chto delat is more than willing to provide a platform of the critique of subvision and other festivals and camps like it; moreover, we are willing to do anything we can to make sure that this critique reaches as broad an audience as possible.  Thus we invite you to a discussion loosely themed “Self-Organization: Between Repression and Recuperation? Where is the Way Out?” which we will hold during our stay in Hamburg on August 29th.

Let’s use this space. Let’s not be “off”! Instead, let’s kick out those who think that they can use the dirty tricks of dividing artists, and using art for their shitty purposes of gentrification and promoting inequalty!