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Vienna Secession
Nowadays, if you think of neoliberalism, capitalism, government control or any other of the recent paranoia that the free market has created in the global village, art galleries, believe it or not, are part of the tip of the iceberg. Very simple, the art market continues to be a very good economic investment, no matter what many people say, it does not solve much, or, when it comes to current issues such as the economic crisis problems of migration, xenophobia and gender discrimination. Clearly, these issues are the inspiration of many artists and politicians, however, despite the conceptual and the “goodwill” of many, the work of certain artists is linked with the market of contemporary art that although in their proposals condemns the recent miseries of humanity, does almost nothing to avoid investing in invisible or conceptual works, that do not do anything to reduce the daily drama that people live around the world. On the other hand, the aesthetic experience the works and their functionality caused by the “white cube” in which they are presented it is simply overwhelming. In fact, not all art have to have a political view, but it is alarming that galleries and museums are used as a space for democratic or multiple dynamic, engaged in a discourse that already sounds like conservative, but that solves nothing. However, in Vienna the Secession Gallery is a space that for many years has been presenting innovative and radical proposals of contemporary art. We should remember that this space was organized as an association of visual artists from Vienna back in 1897, presenting its first exhibition the...
AltaRoma Fashion Festival
Fashion defines reality. And that has little to do with what you buy and wear, what the others wear and you watch in shop windows, shopping centers… nothing to do with at all. Fashion generates aesthetic senses that strongly influence reality. Catwalks, despite being ephemeral, are always covered by international media including printed, radio, television or internet. A fashion show, even if it seems illogical, is a political “statement”, is the next step, a portion of the future that goes through your eyes. The risk in the parades ranges from the material of the designs, the cutting of fabric, accessories and of course the models themselves, who are creatures from another reality, who do not belong to any human species. Here goes one of the contradictions of this vision: what bodies is fashion being designed and what is the purpose of these designs. What is the message below the clothing? Is it that the suit is dressing up the model and not vice versa? The fashion risk at a level of creativity and performance should be considered a performance art indeed. Of course AltaRoma Altamoda is an essential event if you want to know the best and latest in design. The AltaRoma takes place twice a year in the Monumental Complesso Santo Spirito in Saxia, and combines elements of traditional fashion shows with a series of unconventional events and experimental performances, seeking to further remove the fine lines that now exist between art, fashion and entertainment. Thus, the catwalks show classic collections of renowned designers, as well as the most daring creations made ??by young talents, who dare looking...
Hipnotik Festival 2011 in Barcelona
A new era begins, says the slogan of the Hipnotik Festival 2011 of Barcelona. This interesting proposal seeks to break the summer concerts records with a proposal that exceeds 13 hours of Hip Hop music and art in the scenarios of the Centre for Contemporary Culture in Barcelona, ??which will be held on July 9. Few things are as attractive as music, perhaps it is the ancestral spirit that leads us to communicate with the body, the environment and to free the mind for the cathartic process of listening and expressing the sounds with movement. These reasons make of Hipnotik 2011 the perfect festival because the music integrates a whole range of art and dance in the competitions, battles, brakedance, exhibitions, graffiti, graphic design and audiovisual. Catching up with social networking, the Hipnotik 2011 is open to participation through the Internet and prepares its platform to make this version of the festival interactive. For those who want to earn some euros with their talent for Hip Hop, Hipnotik 2011 has an award of 2,000 euros to be granted at the end of the MC Battle to be held in the Festival. In addition, they will have to go on stage to prove their quality to the renowned MC. For those worried about global warming and pollution due to excess of waste and their taste for art takes them to dream of other worlds, they will be able to approach the recycling urban art exhibition organized by Hipnotik along with Drap-Art. Drap-Art is a non-profit association that works and promotes ecological awareness through exhibitions and art workshops with recycled items,...
Lucknow in Paris
Maybe it is not just a coincidence that the city Lucknow in India has been known for centuries as the Golden City of the East and the Constantinople of India, located in the state of Uttar Pradesh, where the first bank of ADN Asia is found. Not in vain do the above mentioned credits refer to the splendid multicultural past of this city, whose legacy is still remembered as something legendary and whose power of inspiration continues though there was a rapid decline of the so extraordinary and fabulous city after the Rebellion of 1857 and the establishment of the imperial power of the British over this Asian country. Its aura, halo and charisma live on despite the controversies in regards to the national identity, moving constantly in a territory of ambiguity and contradictions. Therefore it is difficult to define the place that occupies the myth of Lucknow in culture. Its position varies in the collective unconscious – also in historical records that are so special in the culture of this Asian country. It keeps moving between places where we find sources of great national pride and those where it is impossible to speak of the golden eras that disappeared to never return again. We can inform ourselves through the splendid exposition at the Guimet Museum for Asian Art with the title Une cour royale en Inde: Lucknow (XVIIIe – XIX ème siècle). Through more than 200 pieces of art that include paintings, water color paintings, sketches, jewelry, decorative art and fotos (not just an art in itself but an excellent medium for propaganda with the purpose to create...
Picasso: Feasting on Paris, exhibition in Barcelona
What would life be like without Picasso? Or as Jonathan Richman would say: Well some people try to pick up girls /And get called assholes / This never happened to Pablo Picasso / He could walk down your street / And girls could not resist his stare and / So Pablo Picasso was never called an asshole. So, the Original Gangster, the Pimp Daddy of last century´s vanguard returns to Barcelona for a powerful new exhibition. Organised by the Picasso Museum and the Amsterdam Van Gogh Museum, the show presents the evolution of the artist, from his arrival in Paris in 1900, where he encountered the colourful art community of the time – up to 1907, when he was crowned the main face of the Paris scene. The word revolution was in the air – and everyone knew its meaning. It was time when Dada reigned supreme, and the young surrealists were having problems – not to mention the almost “romantic” trio Buñuel, Lorca, and Dalí. If nowadays we don´t really refer to people as “geniuses” in any form of art or format – back then, the word “genius” was frequently used to refer to original practioners of fine art. Of course, Picasso was a genius, the extent of his originality, and the barriers which were broken have placed him at the foundation of modern and contemporary art. However, nothing is coincidental, and it´s evident that the direct contact that Picasso had with the Parisian community would go on to be essential and formative. He was exposed to new pictoral techniques, and new forms of representation. In this sense,...
The possible partition of Istanbul
Part of the fascination that subjugates visiting Istanbul invariably comes from the transformations throughout its rich history. On the primitive Zoni or Byzantium a new Rome was built in 330 by Emperor Constantine´s decision on the eastern end of the Roman Empire, thus appearing on the world map a city of prodigious qualities called Constantinople that was the capital of the Empire on 395 , the year the division thereof into two parts after the death of Theodosius. The eastern part led to the Byzantine Empire, a prolongation of the Roman Empire that extended into a world of Greek cultural environment throughout the Middle Ages, being its capital, Constantinople, one of the most dazzling qualified tendentious and barbaric cities of the dark millennium. Its legendary fall at the hands of the Turks in 1453 has not only been used for centuries as a chronological milestone marking the transition to a new era. It also sparked a new transformation in the city, which was renamed Istanbul, capital of the powerful Ottoman Empire until shortly after the end of the first world war. Since then, Istanbul is not Turkey´s political capital but has remained long the most important and populated city in an era marked by a political regime defined by its Republican and secular character. This however might not remain the same if the the Turkish prime minister and former mayor of Istanbul, Tayyip Erdogan Reccep wins the elections as one of the great strengths of his electoral program is the division of the city in two different cities on each continent, by creating in less than twelve years of...
Maja Bajević in Madrid
At the Crystal Palace in the Retiro Park in Madrid there will be an exhibition called “Continuará” which is a show, on between the 27th May and 3rd of October, presenting the work of artist Maja Bajevi?, who was born in Sarajevo in 1967. What´s interesting is that the artist has carried out the project especially for this space, making it a particularly unique show, along with the reason that this will be the first time that Bajevi? will have an individual exhibition in Spain, where she has been not quite as successful as in the rest of the world. The show is, above anything else, based around 140 economical and political slogans released between 1911 and 2011. Interestingly, as well as the information provided by the slogans, they can also be compared, as a study of the different political epochs ruling the world over the past 100 years. The get the best out of the show, it is divided into different sections, according to whether it is day or night, including an installation, archives, projection and performance. On top of all this, the artist will attempt to incorporate into the exhibition the construction of the Cristal Palace in the Retiro Park. This part of the work will be called “Sleeping Beauty,” which, according to Bajevi?, is because it is like a woman who for many decades remained distant from all that was going on in her surroundings. More information: http://www.museoreinasofia.es/exposiciones/futuras.html Palacio de Cristal del Parque del Retiro: Plaza Independencia s/n, 28001 Madrid, España MiLK If you fancy visiting “Continuará” and discovering one of the most acclaimed contemporary artists,...
Barcelona 1900. The Pearl of the Mediterranean
1900 is a complex fabric of cultural dimensions that converge at an intersection we call the end of the century. In a context of heterogeneity of thought a great eclectic and syncretic movement will erupt. The subject becomes a fragmented crowd. This metamorphosis of the individual is the result of a change in the environment: the oppression exercised by the walls in a rapidly growing society created a new urban fabric, the construction of a modern city. A public announcment released on June 27th, 1843 said: Bring Down the Walls!. This was the beginning of the demolition of a barrier that oppressed and stifled a city that was crying out to expand and breathe. Undoubtedly, this will mark withour a doubt a turning point in the history of Barcelona, the changing of an old town to a big industrial city. From this moment, the disappearance of the old medieval walls, the construction of the “Eixample” the 1867 (designed by Ildefonso Cerdà) and the annexation of several independent municipalities the 1897 (Gracia, Sants, Sant Martí de Provençals …) Barcelona became a art center in which urban development, industrial, commercial and artistic movement converge In a complex society, the bourgeoisie from Barcelona surpasses the binomial proletariat. The powerful families of the capital will be involved in the industrial revolution, relying on modernity and progress, to take control of the political and economic power. This enrichment is unsustainable, creating huge inequalities in the working class, soon to fight for their rights. The beautification of the city was growing, but unfortunately the social differences were also becoming more noticeable. The luxurious downtown part...
Abd-al Rahman and the Debod Egyptian Temple
In the year 750, during the Christian era, a young prince called Omeya managed to escape from the massacre of his entire family at the hands of the Abasíes, and after heading for the north of Africa, in an extraordinary journey of fleeing his persecutors, he arrived five years later at the Muslim territories of the ancient Roman Iberia – recently renamed Al-Andalus, in the beautiful Arabic language. His name was Abd-al- Rahman, and he was the grandson of the last Omeya, making him in some way the most noble of the Arabs, the last descendant of the fighters who had been companions to the Prophet himself, now that his family had been appointed into another dynasty, making a break with the past – having abandoned the splendid city of Damascus, moving from the capital of Islam to Baghdad, a formidable and brilliant new city on the banks of the Tigris. Abd-al- Rahman was also Berber, from his Mother´s side, which permitted him to campaign politically in Al-Andalus, and win the trust of both the Syrians, and the Berbers there, in order to become the new governor of the province, and be finally recognised as an emir by the abasíes – satisfied with having him duty bound to them politically – during this time, the presence and influence of the Abasi extended to the remotest China. In the lands of Al-Andalus, far from his beloved Damascus, Abd-al- Rahman devoted the best part of his life to the construction of a series of palaces, gardens, and temples (the quibla in the Cordoba mosque is not pointed towards Mecca, but is...
