Below is a complete artist list, presenting both City Excavations and the exhibition.
FRANCIS ALŸS
BORN 1959 IN BELGIUM, LIVES AND WORKS IN MEXICO
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.FRANCISALYS.COM
Francis Alÿs is acclaimed for his intricate political and poetic interventions in the social fabric, in its broadest sense. The video work Chateau du Sable is part of an ongoing project called Children’s Games. The project is a tribute to children’s games as bearers of symbolic social structures, and as creative inspiration for the building of new societies. Three boys are building a sand castle by the sea, working intensely on it – only to abandon it.
Photo: Francis Alÿs, Dorota Lukianska
ÖRN ALEXANDER ÁMUNDASON
BORN 1984 IN ICELAND, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.ORNALEXANDERAMUNDASON.COM
What does a financial collapse sound like? This is a question posed by the Icelandic artist Örn Alexander Ámundason in the 14-minute concert Kreppa. Ámundason, who has explored what happens when, for instance, politics are transformed into music, or chess moves into clay sculptures, has researched TV and radio reports on the great financial crisis that hit Iceland in 2008. Ámundason identified nine main protagonsists, gave them each an instrument, transformed their voices into a music score, and the resulting work is performed at the biennial opening in collaboration with the orchestra Gageego and the Göteborg Concert Hall.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
ZARINA BHIMJI
BORN 1963 IN UGANDA, LIVES AND WORKS IN ENGLAND
GÖTEBORGS KONSTHALL
WWW.ZARINABHIMJI.COM
In a poetic installation Zarina Bhimji presents a series of photographs. Starting from the migrations across the Indian Ocean she explores issues of contemporary India, its atmosphere, light, textures and touch following traces of violence, terror and colonial systems.
Photo: Zarina Bhimji, Dorota Lukianska
WIM BOTHA
BORN 1974 IN SOUTH AFRICA, LIVES AND WORKS IN SOUTH AFRICA
GÖTEBORGS KONSTHALL
Wim Botha presents a new work produced for the biennial. The work is a sculptural installation made of polystyrene. Formed into roaring human and animal shapes, that virtually dissolve in fluorescent light. Through art historical, religious and cultural influences, Botha conjures up a chaotic struggle that brings to mind the demonic and turbulent new order represented by Pandemonium in John Milton’s classic epic Paradise Lost.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
MATTHEW BUCKINGHAM
BORN 1963 IN USA, LIVES AND WORKS IN USA
KONSTHALLEN–BOHUSLÄNS MUSEUM + CITY EXCAVATIONS
WWW.MATTHEWBUCKINGHAM.NET
Matthew Buckingham works in video, photography, installation, film, text and drawing to challenge and examine social memory, often by undermining well-established truths. His works are characterised by both poetic refinement and political acuity. The work The Spirit and the Letter is centered on the author Mary Wollstonecraft, acclaimed for publishing the first feminist treaty
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman in 1792. She was also one of the very first to write an account of Göteborg and the Bohuslän archipelago through the eyes of a traveller, in Letters written in Sweden, Norway and Denmark in 1796.
Photo: Matthew Buckingham, Dorota Lukianska
CHEN CHIEH-JEN
BORN 1960 IN TAIWAN. LIVES AND WORKS IN TAIWAN
GOTHENBURG MUSEUM OF ART
Chen Chieh-jen’s film installations are both documentary and fictive portrayals of the closed borders and silenced stories of our globalised world. In Empire’s Borders II–Western Enterprises, Inc, Chen Chieh-jen returns to his father’s life as a secret soldier in the commando group Western Enterprises, which was created by the American CIA in Taiwan with the purpose of invading China during the Cold War in the 1950s. This is one of the many anonymous dramas that took place in the shadow of the geopolitical constellation of Taiwan–China–USA.
Photo: Yang Chen-hao, Dorota Lukianska
CHIMURENGA
LIVES AND WORKS IN SOUTH AFRICA
RÖDA STEN KONSTHALL
WWW.CHIMURENGA.CO.ZA
The Pan-African magazine Chimurenga presents The Chimurenga Chronicle – a once-off, one-day-only edition of a speculative, future-forward newspaper that travels back in time to re-imagine the present. Back-dated to the week May 18–24, 2008, The Chimurenga Chronicle is situated during the first week of the xenophobic violence in South Africa, and is focused outward, covering the events, scenes and situations around the world during this period. Across the city you will find headline posters that connects to the content and questions posed in the newspaper. On Black Wednesday, the 19th of October The Chimurenga Chronicle, is released at a special event produced in collaboration with the Gothenburg-based cultural journal Glänta.
JIMMIE DURHAM
BORN 1940 IN USA, LIVES AND WORKS IN ITALY
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
Sculptor and poet, Jimmie Durham insistently interrogates questions of national identity, narrative and architecture/monuments. For the Biennial Jimmie Durham has created a new work based on stories about the so-called Hitler stones, the granite blocks from Bohuslän in Sweden that were ordered by Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich for a victory monument in Berlin, in the midst of the Second World War. For historical reasons, the stones were never delivered.
Drawing: Adolf Hitler / Photo: Dorota Lukianska
KLAS ERIKSSON
BORN 1976 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.KLASERIKSSON.ORG
Flares are commonly used for emergencies at sea but have also become popular at various events. By setting off a large amount of flares at Älvsborgsbron, Klas Eriksson creates a visual bridge between the neighbouring areas Hisingen and central Göteborg. The work investigates the symbolic language of activism and the way in which individuals, communities and the public space are organised around events.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
KAROLINA ERLINGSSON
BORN 1980 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.KAROLINAERLINGSSON.COM
Kulning is an ancient vocal technique used by women in Scandinavia to call the cows home from summer pastures, but also to send messages to one another over great distances. This vocal technique has fascinated Karolina Erlingsson who has created a new sound piece for the biennial that conjures up a preindustrial era in the hills around Hisingen and the river Göta älv. This time, the kulning takes on a different meaning than in those days, which emulates the presence, echo and disappearance of voices that attempt to communicate with eachother.
Photo: Attila Urban, Dorota Lukianska
Listen to AKT
LIAM GILLICK
BORN 1964 IN ENGLAND, LIVES AND WORKS IN USA
KONSTHALLEN–BOHUSLÄNS MUSEUM
WWW.LIAMGILLICK.INFO
Construction of One is a manuscript that Liam Gllick has worked on since 2005, through a series of texts, exhibitions and films. Included in the manuscript are reflections on the revised working practices deployed by Volvo in the early 1970s. In the manuscript, Liam Gillick avoids documentary strategies in favour of interwoven narratives, speculation and eco-political fantasies. Based on these, he presents a sound piece inspired by the early factory radio programs as well as a series of readings.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
Read Liam Gillick’s text Construction of One (Fragment)
GOLDIN+SENNEBY
SIMON GOLDIN BORN 1981 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
JAKOB SENNEBY BORN 1971 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
KONSTHALLEN–BOHUSLÄNS MUSEUM
WWW.GOLDINSENNEBY.COM
Goldin+ Senneby is an artistic framework created by the artists Simon Goldin and Jakob Senneby to explore economic, political and financial structures and geographies. In the work The Discreet Charm, Goldin+Senneby works with the complex relationship between theater, model, stage and reality. A stage model, which in the theater is used in communicating the choreography between actor and director, or between theater and investors, is used here to depict the rethorical strategies in contemporary economy.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
MAHLET OGBE HABTE
BORN 1972 IN ERITREA, LIVES AND WORKS IN NORWAY
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.MAHLET.NO
While living in Norway, Mahlet Ogbe Habte dived into mushroom knowledge, as an artist, but also as professional cook. She has explored it as a season luxury, tasty food and secret knowledge. It is said that in Europe spots in the forest where you find mushrooms are secrets shared only with family members and handed down from generation to generation. Mahlet Ogbe Habte is contributing with a performance at the opening ceremony of the biennial.
Photo: Haile Yohannes Ekealo
MAGNUS HAGLUND
BORN 1960 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
CITY EXCAVATIONS
In the spirit of the Situationists, author Magnus Haglund takes us on a psychogeographical walk around the city. By taking us to places where we can sense the presence of people such as William Burroughs, Erik Satie and Leif Elggren, he brings hidden stories to life. This walk with musical elements gives us a taste of the rhythms of the pop band Tages and the techno group Matmos, along with the magical tones of the child singer Christer Falkenström, famous from the movie Åsa Nisse på hal is (Åsa Nisse on Thin Ice).
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
ZILLE HOMMA HAMID
BORN 1972 IN GERMANY, LIVES AND WORKS IN FRANCE AND GERMANY
KONSTHALLEN–BOHUSLÄNS MUSEUM
WWW.ZILLEHOMMAHAMID.DE
Zille Homma Hamid’s installation experiments with the relationship between unity and diversity, where the different mediums textile, wood and photography repeat and overlap eachother. The work appeals to our different senses by highlighting textures as well as patterns, taken from traditional weaving techniques worldwide. The aim is to generate a sensory journey beyond fragmentation and individualism.
Photo: Simone Gilges, Dorota Lukianska
FLORIAN HECKER
BORN 1975 IN GERMANY, LIVES AND WORKS IN GERMANY
GÖTEBORGS KONSTHALL
WWW.FLORIANHECKER.BLOGSPOT.COM
In the sound pieces Pandämonium 9 Playlist and Stocha Acid Vlook, Florian Hecker explores the sonic dimensions of pandemonium. In his installations, live performances and publications, Hecker deals with specific compositional developments of post-war modernity, electro-acoustic music as well as other, non-musical disciplines.
Pandämonium 9 Playlist and Stocha Acid Vlook pieces equally feed from the construction principles based on stochastic calculation of tonal outcomes by Greek polymath Iannis Xenakis and the British composer Trevor Wisharts’s sound editing and structuring approach called Wavesets.
In Florian Hecker’s sound installations, live performances and publications, he often
collaborated with other artists, engineers, and scientists.
With the purchase of the Biennial catalogue comes a copy of the sound pieces.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
LISA JEANNIN & ROLF SCHUURMANS
JEANNIN BORN 1972 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
SCHUURMANS BORN 1972 IN THE NETHERLANDS, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.LISAJEANNIN.BLOGSPOT.COM / WWW.LISAJEANNIN.COM
Lisa Jeannin has been producing poetic and complex films, sculptures and installations since the late 1990s, presenting a dreamlike and occasionally comical universe, powered and maintained partly by a multitalented spider and an itinerant tortoise, trolls and zombies. Together with Rolf Schuurmans, Jeannin has produced a film for the biennial, where a submarine and her grandfather, the seasick sailor and inventor, play the leading parts.
OLAV CHRISTOPHER JENSSEN
BORN 1954 IN NORWAY, LIVES AND WORKS IN GERMANY
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.NO.WIKIPEDIA.ORG/OLAV_CHRISTOPHER_JENSSEN
Göteborg International Biennial for Contemporary Art and Röda Sten Art Center will receive a new permanent piece by the Norwegian artist, Olav Chrisopher Jenssen, the sculpture Lingaphone. It will be installed and inaugurated during the biennial period.
Photo: Nils Tengdahl
ISAAC JULIEN
BORN 1960 IN ENGLAND, LIVES AND WORKS IN ENGLAND
GÖTEBORGS KONSTHALL
WWW.ISAACJULIEN.COM
The work Better Life is a single-screen reinterpretation of Isaac Julien’s 9-channel installation Ten Thousand Waves (2010). The work is inspired by the Morecambe Bay tragedy of 2004 in North West England, in which 23 Chinese cockle-pickers drowned as they were cut off from the incoming tide. Following ideas surrounding death, spiritual displacement, and the uniquely Chinese relation to ghosts or »lost souls«, the work links the Shanghai of the past and present, symbolising the Chinese transition towards modernity, aspiration and affluence – the so-called »better life«.
Photo: Isaac Julien, Dorota Lukianska
REENA SAINI KALLAT
BORN 1973 IN INDIA, LIVES AND WORKS IN INDIA
GÖTEBORGS KONSTHALL + KONSTHALLEN–BOHUSLÄNS MUSEUM
WWW.REENAKALLAT.COM
The practice of Reena S. Kallat spans between painting, photography, video and sculptural installations. In her new work for the biennial, Kallat maps out the global flow of labour migration in the form of an abstract projection of sculptural installation made out of electrical light-wires. Here the map becomes a dynamic, ever changing document that streams and transfers data of global flows and energies of people and their paths.
Photo: Primo Marella Gallery Milano, Dorota Lukianska
JOHN KELLY
BORN 1965 IN ENGLAND, LIVES AND WORKS IN IRELAND
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.JOHNKELLYARTIST.COM
John Kelly’s steel sculpture The Garden Shed is designed as a »monumental model« of the Tate Modern in London, and like the museum it contains a number of art works. These are installations that contrasts the riches that founded the Tate Gallery, generated by Henry Tate’s success in the food industry, with the contemporary An Gorta Mór, The Great Hunger in Ireland. The famine created an uprising that led to Irish independence from British rule, but that also has far-reaching economic consequences that forced many into exile, among them John Kelly’s own family.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
MATTS LEIDERSTAM
BORN 1956 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE + CITY EXCAVATIONS
WWW.MATTSLEIDERSTAM.COM
Since the early 1990s, Matts Leiderstam’s oeuvre has explored how we see, what we see, and why. In a series of presentations, he has discussed the relationship between the gaze, sexuality and undermined notions of authenticity and reproduction. G877, alias Matt Ramsey is based on a series of photographs donated to the archive of Valand School of Fine Art in 1989, portraying fleeting details from a gayporn movie with the now legendary pornactor Peter North acting under the alias Matt Ramsey. These are entry points into Matts Leiderstam’s time in Gothenburg in the 80′s, when the art scene was dominated by painting, economic boom and the advent of postmodernism – while the gay scene featured cruising and disco, but also backlash, the AIDS crisis and death in the wake of the gay liberation movement.
Photo: Ola Carlsson, Dorota Lukianska
ANTONIO VEGA MACOTELA
BORN 1980 IN MEXICO, LIVES AND WORKS IN THE NETHERLANDS AND MEXICO
GÖTEBORGS KONSTHALL
Antonio Vega Macotela explores how we interpret and perceive time. The work Time Exchange is the result of a two-year project in which Antonio Vega Macotela visited one of the largest prisons in Mexico City and worked with the prisoners to create various forms of exchange. The works in the exhibition were made by prisoners according to the artist’s instructions, in exchange for services outside of the prison walls. The exchanges were performed at the same time on an agreed day. In the work, time is a currency that constitutes a possibility for the prisoners to temporarily overcome the physical restrictions of imprisonment.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
ASMA ARSHAD MAHMOOD
BORN IN LAHORE, LIVES AND WORKS IN TORONTO
WORK LABOUR CREATIVITY – UDDEVALLA
WWW.ASMAARSHAD.CA
”Pandomonium and end of Statuesque” is a commentary upon the various aspects of representation that have appeared among Muslim communities in form of traditional Arab garment, linguistic influences and ideas of pan Islamic identity as a reaction to post 9/11 retaliation of US and Europe. The essay reviews the crisis of identity in Europe and the West that has seen rise in dated garments such as Burqa and Abaya among Young Muslim women and extreme views among an entire generation of Young European Muslims. The essay also examines the role that media and political parties have played in bringing about this shift.
ERNESTO NETO
BORN 1964 IN BRAZIL, LIVES AND WORKS IN BRAZIL
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.EN.WIKIPEDIA.ORG/ERNESTO_NETO
The flexible materials used in Ernesto Neto’s sculptural work resemble the organic nature of skin. His three-dimensional sculptural organisms question conventional concepts of space. The lack of straight lines and static angles evokes thoughts of futuristic dwellings, microscopically enlarged cells and human bodily shapes. The work The Weight, the Time, the Body, the Moon and Love…wow! contrasts the industrial architecture of Röda Sten Art Centre in the creation of a world based on a weightless and timeless experience.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
THE NEW BEAUTY COUNCIL
ANNIKA ENQVIST BORN 1975 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
THÉRÈSE KRISTIANSSON BORN 1981 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE + CITY EXCAVATIONS
WWW.NEWBEAUTYCOUNCIL.ORG
The carnivalesque performance art of The New Beauty Council poses questions relating to the urban condition. This work centres on the potential to reclaim and decode the city of Göteborg. In the work Twilight Walk, The New Beauty Council worked around the notion of making visible without exposing. Costumes and choreography were made for a group action, performed by The New Beauty Council on streets and in public transport to a gentrified bay area of Hisingen, during the City Excavations in Göteborg in June 2011.
Photo: Hannah Goldstein, Dorota Lukianska
KATARINA NITSCH & PATRIK BENGTSSON
NITSCH BORN 1972 IN USA, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
BENGTSSON BORN 1978 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
WWW.GOTEBORG.BIENNAL.ORG/DOLDRUMS
We must defend ourselves, against the flow, against the floating state, dark forces and objects coming at us. We create a net, a defence and a resistance, a weave of thin but sticky threads. We find the tracks, we gather information, we are everywhere and we are prepared.
Two characters, Owl and Fox, are determined to pursue the fight against the malicious monster threatening the city. Via a liaison office in the center of Gothenburg, they collect data; video clips, texts and image messages from mobile phones sent from their investigators.
From the liaison office they can govern and give their investigators new clues and directions. On the 17th of June 2011 the continuously submitted material was posted at www.goteborg.biennal.org/doorway as well as the image from a surveillance camera recording Fox and Owl while working. Then everything went dark and silent. A state of interregnum emerged, and we are still floating now visible at www.goteborg.biennal.org/doldrums
WILLIAM POPE.L
BORN 1955 IN USA, LIVES AND WORKS IN USA
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE + CITY EXCAVATIONS
WWW.EN.WIKIPEDIA.ORG/WILLIAM_POPE_L
The American performance artist William Pope.L’s performance, Göteborg Crawl, involved some 40 people crawling from Linnéplatsen to Masthuggstorget, some carrying flashlights, others dragging bundles of texts on events such as the Gothenburg riots in 2001 and the recent hungerstrike at Gustav Adolfs Torg. With the performance Pope.L wishes to open up for a bodily experience of the hardness of the city. By exploring the city from an asphalt perspective, space can be created for action and reflection.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
HANS HAMID RASMUSSEN
BORN 1963 IN ALGERIA, LIVES AND WORKS IN NORWAY
KONSTHALLEN–BOHUSLÄNS MUSEUM
Since the mid-1990s, Hans Hamid Rasmussen has revealed intricate links and unexpected dilemmas in relation to language, identity and dual cultures, using mainly embroidery but also sculpture, photography and installations. Seeking out poetic detail and significant personal narratives, he uncovers larger underlying structures. Here Rasmussen presents a new work, Appareil, in which he has used sculptural embroidery to collect the memories and stories of sailors, ships, harbours and their mutual relationships.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
VIKTOR ROSDAHL
BORN 1980 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.VIKTORROSDAHL.SE
Viktor Rosdahl is a young Swedish painter who has been acknowledged for his dark, often furious, portrayals of industrialism and contemporary society from an underdog perspective. He usually produces his works from found materials, which he attacks with ink pens and brushes, carves at with etching tools and smashes up, to achieve the desired effect. This expressive anarchism gives him scope to oscillate between pastiches on mediaeval painting and graffiti. At the biennial he is showing paintings that are in direct contrast to the Gothenburg colourism to which he has an exceedingly ambivalent relationship.
Photo: Anders Paulsson, Dorota Lukianska
JOHANNES SAMUELSSON
BORN 1982 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
CITY EXCAVATIONS
On a sightseeing boat on the Göta Älv river, the artist Johannes Samuelsson reads his essay Att skriva ett modernt äventyr (On Writing a Modern Adventure Story). Listen to a personal account of the construction and contemporary history of the Swedish East India ship Götheborg III.
The essay Att skriva ett modernt äventyr started as a video diary about a consultation at the local bank. It led to a five-year study of the story behind the East India ship Götheborg III. The ship is a replica of an 18th century East India ship, and was built in Göteborg in the 90s and 00s. This art and research project reveals both the fascination and frustration concerning what we know as the Göteborg Common Spirit.
Photo: Johannes Samuelsson
ANNA SANDGREN
BORN 1979 IN SRI LANKA, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN AND USA
CITY EXCAVATIONS
WWW.ANNASANDGREN.SE
Is a place created by people? Or does the place create the people who occupy it? What happens when market forces increasingly take over the urban space? The artist Anna Sandgren creates a work at Järntorget that plays with sunlight and reflections, starting as a whispered dialogue that gradually spreads like circles on the water.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
TINO SEHGAL
BORN IN GERMANY, LIVES AND WORKS IN GERMANY
GÖTEBORGS KONSTHALL
WWW.EN.WIKIPEDIA.ORG/TINO_SEHGAL
Tino Sehgal creates immaterial art works – art works that do not include any objects. Instead, he creates situations by working with human behaviors; language, song and dance. Central to his work is the meeting between people. At the biennial Tino Sehgal presents the work This Exhibition.
YVONNE SINGER
BORN IN BUDAPEST, LIVES AND WORKS IN TORONTO
WORK LABOUR CREATIVITY–UDDEVALLA
KWTCONTEMPORARY.COM/ARTIST/YVONNE-SINGER
Through the lens of autobiography, memory and language, these works investigate the collision of tumultuous historical events and personal narratives. Juxtapositions of irony, humour, awkward translations and paradox articulate cultural issues of disjuncture.
BRYNDÍS SNÆBJÖRNSDÓTTIR
& MARK WILSON
SNÆBJÖRNSDÓTTIR BORN IN ICELAND, LIVES AND WORKS IN ENGLAND
WILSON BORN IN ENGLAND, LIVES AND WORKS IN ENGLAND
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW. SNAEBJORNSDOTTIRWILSON.COM
Seagulls are often regarded as a nuisance. In the specially commissioned work Vanishing Point: Where Species Meet, Bryndís Snæbjornsdóttir and Mark Wilson invite seagulls to »break bread« with the artist at a dining table. It is an extension of hospitality and a meeting of species over food, thus exploring the contemporary relationship between humans and non-humans in an urban environment.
Photo: Attila Urban, Dorota Lukianska
Read a conversation between Snaebjörnsdottir & Wilson and Andréas Hagström
ÅSA SONJASDOTTER
BORN 1966 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN NORWAY
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.POTATOEPERSPECTIVE.ORG / WWW.KUNSTAKADEMIETITROMSO.NO / WWW.CRIR.NET
By collecting and cultivating various species of potatoes, Åsa Sonjasdotter examines the historical and cultural lineage of the plant. In spite of its modest appearance, the potato has become a deeply politicized plant. As a migrant with roots in South America, the potato has played a significant role in colonial conquest, industrialism, the development of a global market economy and the production of national identity. The project The Order of Potatoes was launched already in May, when the potatoes were planted outside Röda Sten Art Centre.
Photo: Attila Urban, Dorota Lukianska
MÅRTEN SPÅNGBERG
BORN 1968 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
CITY EXCAVATIONS
WWW.MARTENSPANGBERG.ORG
Welcome to City Excavations’ concluding discussion led by the artist and choreographer Mårten Spångberg. In times when politics has lost its ideological fundaments, when organization of life has become thoroughly financialized and capital operates on the basis of fast forward until shit hits the fan it is time to come together again. Come together not in order to save or improve something but instead to start from scratch without memories and without a plausible future. In the form of a picknick, The General Assembly sets the scene for a discussion about the various explorations that have been made in the city – prepare for unexpected conclusions and lively debates!
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
INGA SVALA THÓRSDÓTTIR
BORN 1966 IN ICELAND, LIVES AND WORKS IN GERMANY AND CHINA
KONSTHALLEN–BOHUSLÄNS MUSEUM
WWW.CITYOFBORG.COM
BORG BRAIN GARDEN –The Sleeping Heights 2010
The BORG project of Thorsdottir has been to a draft an imagined city, called BORG, located in 21°W and 64°N in Iceland. Thorsdottir has focused on different aspects of this city, for example the concepts of work and sleep. In order to define the concept of work in BORG, sleep and the role of sleep in the society had to be considered. Thorsdottir has made the installation BORG BRAIN GARDEN – The Sleeping Heights, to demonstrate the great value of sleep for each individual as well as the economic value of sleep for the whole society of BORG. In BORG, sleep is the most valuable working time.
Elements of the Installation: BORG BRAIN GARDEN – The Sleeping Heights 2010
1. BORG Sunset
watercolor on paper, size: 155 x (102cm x 66cm)
2. BORG DAY-BED
Made of seven different wood sorts and linen, size: 250cm x 150cm x 235cm
3. BORG Pillow
Made of seven different wood sorts, size 20cm x 25cm x 90cm
4. BORG Blanket
Made of cashmere and silk, size 105cm x 175
5. BORG Stool,
Made of oak, size: 4 x 45cm x 35cm x 70cm
6. BORG Release ‘Agathes EXIT a Hommage a Musil’.
A locket made of silver, size 1cm x 1cm x 2,75cm
Photo: Sigfried Carlsson
YOEL DÍAZ VÁZQUEZ
BORN 1973 IN CUBA, LIVES AND WORKS IN GERMANY
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE
WWW.YOELDIAZVAZQUES.COM
For Ruido (Noise), Yoel Díaz Vázquez has invited 40 young Cuban rappers to speak their mind about the Cuban society today through sung interventions filmed in their own domestic environments. Through their critical urban poetry, they express discontent, frustration, helplessness and a lack of perspective in Cuba. Dozens of monitors are piled up to form a chorus, each screening the intervention of one rapper. The resulting cacophony becomes a metaphor for the public context, where discourse is reduced to mere noise.
Photo: Yoel Díaz Vázquez, Dorota Lukianska
SYNNøVE G. WETTEN
BORN 1978 IN NORWAY, LIVES AND WORKS IN NORWAY AND SWEDEN
CITY EXCAVATIONS
WWW.SYNNOVEGWETTEN.ORG
In collaboration with SVEAS SFI, a group of women from different backgrounds that live and study Swedish in Göteborg, will gather for a common procession at Redbergsplatsen in Göteborg, exploring notions of sisterhood and group dynamics. Join a poetic performance that expands, regroups and develops into a dynamic demonstration – a symbol of poetic and feverish activism. In this work, Synnøve G. Wetten experiments with the documentary performance format. A call for a wild democracy in the form of a social sculpture.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
JANA WINDEREN
BORN 1965 IN NORWAY, LIVES AND WORKS IN NORWAY
RÖDA STEN ART CENTRE + CITY EXCAVATIONS
WWW.JANAWINDEREN.COM
Jana Winderen’s unique composition is based on recordings from Göta Älv river, sampled with recordings of fish and insects from other waters. Together, they form a resounding choir of underwater life. With sensitive hydrophones, she listens to subaqueous life, sounds that give us information about the health of the river, and where the degree of pollution can be measured by monitoring the sounds from surviving insects.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
HENRIK FRISK & STEFAN ÖSTERSJÖ
FRISK BORN 1969 IN FRANCE, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
ÖSTERSJÖ BORN 1967 IN SWEDEN, LIVES AND WORKS IN SWEDEN
GÖTEBORGS KONSTHALL
WWW.HENRIKFRISK.COM / WWW.MYSPACE.COM/STEFANOSTERSJO
In a unique collaboration with Isaac Julien, the composer Henrik Frisk and the guitarist Stefan Östersjö respond with an entirely new composition to Julien’s work Better Life. Using the imagery in Better Life as an improvisation partner in the composition, Henrik Frisk and Stefan Östersjö combine it with traditional Vietnamese music, aiming at a balanced exchange between traditional and experimental music forms. Sound recordings from previous collaborations with musicians such as Nguyen Thanh Thuy on Vietnamese cither, an instrument strongly linked to Chinese music, is also featuring in the composition.
Photo: Dorota Lukianska
