Monthly Archives: July 2012

Bolivian Animated Film “Abuela Grillo” Highlights Water Issues

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http://youtu.be/YMM7vM7aiNI

Abuela Grillo, an adorable – though equally tear-jerking – animated short-film, calls attention to Bolivia’s fraught history with water privatization.

The film is a collaboration between Bolivian animators and the Animation Workshop of Denmark. The Abuela Grillo character is based on a myth from the Bolivian lowlands, but the film tells the story of a historic moment in Bolivian water politics.

Water issues reached a boiling point in 2000 after water privatization legislation led to a significant spike in prices for Bolivian citizens. Demonstrations rocked Cochabamba in what is also known as the Cochabamba Water Wars. Though they began as peaceful protests, demonstrations quickly grew violent, leading to dozens of civilian and police injuries and casualties. Then President Hugo Banzer was forced to resign.

This animated film takes you on journey with Abuela Grillo (Grandmother Grasshopper), who walks through rural and urban landscapes with a raincloud constantly looming over her shoulder. She encounters various obstacles as the film weaves a sad – and deeply symbolic – tale of environmental exploitation and government corruption.

Reposted from the Center for Latin American and Caribean Studies at NYU blog.

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

/adaptations/ 2012 Call for Entries

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This exhibition is open to proposals from all fields of design including industrial design, fashion design, interior design, graphic design, architecture, fabrication, engineering, and information technology. We are looking for innovative approaches which reflect the future of design through sustainable, emergent and regenerative systems, particularly those which are informed by biological and natural processes.

Adaptation refers to the ability of an organism to survive in a particular setting or milieu, through alterations of structure, physical form and/or behavior, operating through a process of natural selection. Similarly, design ingenuity, the creation and articulation of new technologies, is a human expression of adaptation.

Patterns of global consumption, resource depletion, and pollution have rendered many of our current modes of design and production insufficient or harmful to our existence. Innovative solutions to these issues are essential and as they emerge, they collectively influence and integrate the fields of design, fabrication, and information technology to bring us back into balance with our planet.

/adaptations/ is an exhibition to showcase leading developments in sustainable, emergent, and regenerative systems, particularly those which are informed by biological and natural processes. The exhibition is curated by Ginni Stiles, as part of DesignPhiladelphia 2012.

/adaptations/ will be installed in indoor and outdoor galleries at  Provenance Architecturals, located in the Northern Liberties neighborhood of Philadelphia.

October 10 – 20, 2012
Provenance Architecturals
912 Canal Street
Philadelphia, PA 19123

Deadline: August 1, 2012

Proposal Submission:

Please email a .pdf file (max 5MB) which includes:

  • a description/narrative of the work including any specific display requirements (max. 200 words)
  • 3 to 5 images
  • bio(s) or company information (max. 200 words)
  • Supporting links for reference may be included in the body of the email but may not substitute for the information requested in the Proposal document.

Email for Submissions: entry@adaptations2012.org

For more information and inquiries please contact ginni.stiles@adaptations2012.org

DesignPhiladelphia, in partnership with University of the Arts, now in its eighth year, is a nationally recognized, city-wide design festival that celebrates Philadelphia as a center for creative advancement, drawing from broad range of design disciplines.

Ginni Stiles is an interior designer and craft artisan who specializes in the reuse of salvage materials. She is currently designing the renovation of several Philadelphia row houses and organizing the non-profit initiative Arcadia Commons. Previously, she worked at Greensaw Design & Build, where she was the lead designer and one of the fabricators for the “Reclaimed Kitchen” episode of House Crashers, and at Onion Flats, where she assisted with the construction administration of green roof, storm water management, and solar pv projects.

Bug Cinema USA – An ecological forest art project

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Bug Cinema’s work-in-progress is located in the Siuslaw Model Forest, from 25 June to 9 July

Bug Cinema is a new ecological forest art commission for the Whale Oil to Whole Foods summer eco-arts festival in Greene County (Hudson Valley), on the edge of the Catskill Mountains, upper New York State. The eco-arts festival consists of a large group exhibition, site specific artworks, and accompanying public events in June/July 2012. Manifest through a collaboration between Greene County Arts and the Cornell Agroforestry Centre, it is curated by eco-artist Christy Rupp and GCCA Catskill Gallery Director, Fawn Potash.

Bug Cinema is revealed to the forest as a portable ‘glow-lab’ ultraviolet solar light sculpture: a trans-disciplinary hybrid of art/entomology and functions as an integrated, collaborative inter-species ‘social-sculpture’ and biodiversity research project. Essentially, this sculpture embodies a distinctive minimalist aesthetic, playfully combined with a desire to facilitate the observation of moth species living in the forest. Bug Cinema transforms areas of the forest into a film/theatre-like staging of light and shadow, subsequently becoming a social space for moths, humans and other wildlife, through which the ‘performance of life’ is played out.

If you want to know more about the project, please visit http://bugcinemausa.wordpress.com

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

SIdeways : Artistic laboratory along slow paths

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33 projects in open space, a journey of 334 kilometres, 16 walking days, 5 festival weekends, 2 symposia and 1 multimedia donkey! 17 August – 17 September 2012, Belgium

Sideways is an itinerant festival for contemporary arts and cultural research. In times of acceleration and hypermobility, this nomadic initiative follows a web of slow paths. Artists and public explore different sidetracks in the Belgian landscape: footpaths, alleys, backroads and shortcuts. Behind the ribbon development and in the margins of the ubiquitous car infrastructure, a terra incognita appears; a fluid interstitial space of passages, tracks and stories. From this sideline, the Sideways exploration unfolds, focusing on being on the go, slowness and creation, arts and ecology, im/mobility and activism, spatial un/planning and landscape.

Both in form and content, Sideways engages into an experiment: a 4 week walking journey through Belgium, from west to east, undertaken by the audience as well as an international group of artists. An expedition without a predetermined destination, with room for detours and encounters, mapped and documented via the DonkeyXote multimedia donkey. Different lines of movements are entwined into knots of activity during 5 consecutive festival weekends in Menen (19/8), Herzele (25-26/8), Brussels (1-2/9), Turnhout (8-9/9) and Zutendaal (15-16/9).

For those who are interested, you can read the Catalogue and this Article. And you can visit the Sideways Website.

This post is also available in: Spanish

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

Call for papers on Art and Freedom of Expression for Seismopolite Journal of Art and Politics

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www.seismopolite.com

The next issue of Seismopolite Journal of Art and Politics will discuss how art can promote freedom of expression.

Contributors from different disciplinary backgrounds are invited to submit articles, reviews or interviews that address this theme through a high variety of possible angles.

Topics may include (but are not restricted to):

  • Forms, causes and consequences of censorship of art in countries and contexts worldwide.
  • Art’s potential to create new prospects in political contexts where the freedom of expression/ Human Rights are violated.
  • Artistic decolonization strategies; art’s potential to challenge and rewrite geopolitical, economic, cultural or historical master narratives, as well as to promote understanding of, and cooperation between peoples whose lives, voices and histories are suppressed/ alienated by such narratives.
  • Minority perspectives in art.
  • Art’s democratic role under global capitalism and neoliberal political geography.
  • Advantages and obstacles pertaining to the globalized scene of contemporary art (and its center-periphery-relationships) in terms of freedom of expression.
  • Art/ architecture/ literature/ film/ music/ theatre or other cultural events which address these topics.

We accept submissions continuously, but to make sure you are considered for the upcoming issue, please send your proposal/ draft, CV and samples of earlier work to submissions@seismopolite.com within July 24, 2012. Completed work will be due August 7, 2012. Commissioned works will be translated into Norwegian and published in a bilingual version.

Seismopolite Journal of Art and Politics is a bilingual English and Norwegian quarterly, which investigates the possibilities of artists and art scenes worldwide to reflect and influence their local political situation. Read more about Seismopolite here

Current issue: www.seismopolite.com

Previous issues: www.seismopolite.com/artandpolitics

Contact: submissions@seismopolite.com

Michelangelo Pistoletto – The Third Paradise

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Rebirth-Day: the first worldwide day of rebirth

A great celebration throughout the world—a vital, living, breathing symbol of a new beginning.

December 21st, the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere and the summer solstice in the Southern, is a day celebrated by mankind since time immemorial. A fateful “end of the world” connotation, as widespread as it is unfounded, has been attributed to this day in 2012, proposing a theme that is recurrent in mythologies and religions as well as in the literature of fantasy and science fiction.

All imaginative factors aside, this date can take on a symbolic meaning, as it effectively corresponds to a climactic phase of human history. We are progressing steadily toward an inevitable collapse—the science is there to prove it.

The whole of human society is now in the reckoning and so must face a historic transition, a complete change.

Humanity has gone through two paradises. The first, in which it integrated fully with nature; the second, in which it expanded into an artificial world of its own, which grew until it came into conflict with the natural world. It is time to begin the third stage, in which humanity will reconcile and unite nature and artifice, creating a new balance at every level and in every area of society: “an evolutionary step in which the human intelligence finds ways to live in harmony with the intelligence of nature” (Michelangelo Pistoletto).

A new perspective opens up that involves everyone, without exception, in the daily effort to implement the process of rebirth—each according to his or her abilities and possibilities.

Cittadellarte – Fondazione Pistoletto invites everyone to join the celebration on 21 December 2012, all you have to do is meet in streets and squares all over the world, and on the Web, to take part in the great inaugural celebration of the Third Paradise.

If you are interested in joining the celebration, you can find more information  at http://www.rebirth-day.org/eng/index.htm

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

Sense of Planet: The Arts and Ecology at Earth Magnitude

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NIEA Symposium

Saturday, 25 August 2012, 9:30–6:30pm

The acceleration of climate change, species extinction, and other ecological crises enjoins us to find ways of grasping historical and evolving circumstances at earth magnitude. The Sense of Planet symposium concentrates together an international array of artists, eco-theorists, and scholars to address the issues and activities of representing the earth in its entirety, and of representing and self-representing regions or localities amid the complex global systems in which they are enmeshed. The symposium follows the lead taken by Ursula Heise in her book Sense of Place and Sense of Planet: The Environmental Imagination of the Global to investigate the possibilities and difficulties of sensing the planet, in all senses of sense.

Invited speakers

Ursula Heise, Professor of English and Director of the Program in Modern Thought & Literature,

Stanford University

The Database and the Ecological Imagination of the Planet

Marko Peljhan, Professor in Art and Media Arts & Technology, University of California at Santa Barbara, Co-director of Arctic Perspective Initiative

One Degree At A Time – Creating Systems of Systems for Interpolar Constructiv(ist)e Engagement

Jennifer Gabrys, Convener of the MA Design and Environment at Goldsmiths, University of London

Environmental Sensor Technologies and the Arts

Nicholas Mirzoeff, Professor of Media, Culture and Communication, New York University

Anthropocene Aesthetics

Timothy Morton, Professor and Rita Shea Guffey Chair in English, Rice University

Of Planet-Sense

Panel discussion

Terry Smith (Professor at Pittsburgh and NIEA, UNSW), Douglas Kahn (Professor of Media & Innovation, NIEA, UNSW), Jill Bennett (Professor and Director, NIEA, UNSW), and others. Convened by Douglas Kahn and Jill Bennett.

Click here to go to the Registration page.

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

UK Theatres At Risk 2012

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Forty-nine theatre buildings across the UK are at real risk of being lost unless owners recognise they are responsible for community assets and work with trusts and local communities to secure their future, says The Theatres Trust.

Publishing its 2012 Theatre Buildings At Risk Register (TBAR) today, changes since 2011 highlight how a lack of care and investment leaves theatres particularly vulnerable to neglect whilst opportunities to harness the social and cultural value of theatres are being lost. It also shows how local champions, with the support of councils, grant making trusts and Lottery distributors are providing a new lease of life for theatres at risk.

The passing of the Localism Act in November 2011 and its emphasis on social well-being means local authorities now have to prepare lists of assets of community value, which include cultural interests such as theatres. The Trust’s hope is that this will encourage more owners of theatres at risk to realise that their theatres are assets – for the community and the country.

Mhora Samuel, Director of The Theatres Trust said, “There’s good news that overall the number of buildings on our Theatre Buildings At Risk Register has come down from 56 last year to 49 this year. And we’re pleased some have found the funds and support they so desperately needed, such as Wilton’s and the Gaiety in Ayr. However we’ve also lost some important venues and I’m very concerned about the future of the 17 theatres we’ve added to the Register including the Theatre Royal in Margate, Darlington Arts Centre and Croydon Warehouse.”

Twenty-four theatres have been removed from the 2011 Register including the Grade II* Wilton’s Music Hall in London and State Cinema in Grays, the Category B Ayr Gaiety in Scotland and the unlisted Conwy Civic Hall in Wales. Wilton’s has received funds from SITA Trust and the Heritage Lottery Fund which mean the capital works needed to secure the building’s future can now proceed. The State, Grays, received planning permission for a mixed use leisure and retail development in January this year. Ciwb Conwy Cube, the Community Interest Company  formed to take on the Conwy Civic Hall has been able to take over the running of the venue with some funding from its local council and it has reopened. And the Ayr Gaiety has secured vital funding from the Scottish Government and South Ayrshire Council to enable it to appoint a development officer, undertake an initial programme of capital works, and reopen later this year.

However, some of those lost from the 2011 Register have been demolished including the Waltham Forest Theatre in Lloyd Park (demolished August 2011); lost through change of use, including the Grade II Bedford Civic; or have been granted Listed Building Consent for demolition such as the Brighton Astoria.

England

The top theatres at risk in the 2012 Register in England include the Brighton Hippodrome (Grade II*), Margate Theatre Royal (Grade II*) (new 2012), Morecambe Winter Gardens (Grade II*), Plymouth Palace (Grade II*), Alexandra Palace (Grade II), Burnley Empire (Grade II), Derby Hippodrome (Grade II), Doncaster Grand (Grade II), Hulme Hippodrome (Grade II), Hulme Playhouse (Grade II), Hyde Theatre Royal (Grade II), Tameside Hippodrome (Grade II), The Regent, Great Yarmouth (Grade II) (new 2012), Victoria, Salford (Grade II) (new 2012), Farnham Redgrave (not listed) and Scarborough Futurist (not listed).

Though not listed, Darlington Arts Centre, the Precinct Theatre, Islington, and Croydon Warehouse have been added to the 2012 Register, as redevelopment plans are affecting the provision of their replacement. Darlington Borough Council closed the Arts Centre in 2012 and plans to develop a new arts centre are yet to be finalised. The Precinct Theatre in Islington is yet to find a new home as a result of the redevelopment of the Packington Estate, and it is unclear what impact the loss of the Croydon Warehouse, which went into receivership earlier this year, will have for its planned replacement.

Scotland

In Scotland, the five theatres on the 2012 Register include the Britannia Panopticon in Glasgow (Category A), Leith Theatre in Edinburgh (Category B) (new 2012), the Odeon in Edinburgh (Category A), the Old Athenaeum, Glasgow (Category A) (new 2012), and the Tivoli in Aberdeen (Category A). Theatres removed from the 2011 Register are the Ramshorn in Glasgow (Category A), now under the care of the University of Strathclyde; the Gaiety in Ayr (Category B) which has secured funding and investment; the Stockbridge Theatre in Edinburgh (Category B) which is likely to receive planning permission for change of use to residential and restaurant use; and the Gateway in Edinburgh (Category C(s)) which has permission for demolition.

Wales

In Wales, the six theatres on the 2012 Register are the Merthyr Tydfill Theatre Royal (Grade II) (new 2012), Pontypridd Town Hall (Grade II), Swansea Palace (Grade II), Theatre Elli (Grade II), (new 2012) the De Valance Pavilion in Tenby (not listed) and Corwen Pavilion (not listed). Theatres removed from the 2011 Register include the Conwy Civic Hall (not listed) which is  now being operated by a local CIC; Treorchy Parc Hall, currently mothballed; Theatr Harlech (not listed) which has remained open; and the Theatre Royal, Barry (not listed), which has received planning permission for demolition and residential redevelopment.

Whilst the Trust welcomes the new Y Ffwrnes (The Furnace) in Llaneli, Theatr Elli is due to close in July and its future is uncertain.  The new Merthyr Tydfil Town Hall redevelopment in association with Chapter Arts in Cardiff is also welcome, however it highlights the plight of the existing Theatre Royal, another asset for Merthyr.

The 2012 Theatre Buildings at Risk Register can be searched online.  More information on each theatre is provided through a link to the Trust’s online Theatres Database, which includes around 2,000 existing theatre buildings.  Each of the top entries has a downloadable information sheet.

NOW – Permaculture in Europe

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11th European Permaculture Convergence, 1-5.8.2012

Gastwerke Kassel, Germany

Now! This year the EuPC will focuss on Earth Care, People Care, Fair Share in August. For five days 300 activists and designers gather together to start a dialogue on permacultures. Interdisciplinary workshops, lectures and art will be part of the program and will promote European networking and grand celebration.

EuPC stands for ideas themselves, not only for  financeable ideas. Communication is more important than reactions of others.

Speakers from all over the world will dedicate their focus on methods and the design of transition processes. Workshops on many different topics such as Deep Ecology, Wandelnde Gärten and Social Sculpture will be held in Englisch and German.

Adjacent to the Convergence, the traditional international Permaculture Design Course takes place in Kassel: Its challenge is to bring in ‘Permaculture, Art & Society’ as an innovative focus and approach.

Tickets and more Information can be found on the website of  EUPC or in the leaflet.

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

Speedier spring

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‘Progress of Spring’ final report

Kellie Gutman writes:

The  fourth and fifth grade class at the Paideia School in Atlanta, Georgia, has completed their year-long project documenting the progress of spring, as defined by the first blooming daffodil reported along the length of Route 1, from Florida to Maine.  Their results confirm the general impression that this was a very warm spring on the eastern seaboard.  At the northernmost point, Fort Kent, Maine, daffodils were spotted on April 4, 2012 – nearly a month earlier than last year, and the earliest in the twenty-two years that the class has been keeping records.  The rate that spring advanced, 1570 miles in 93 days, was approximately 17 miles a day, or .7 miles per hour, which is about average.

See also: our report on daffodil spotting

“ashdenizen blog and twitter are consistently among the best sources for information and reflection on developments in the field of arts and climate change in the UK” (2020 Network)

ashdenizen is edited by Robert Butler, and is the blog associated with the Ashden Directory, a website focusing on environment and performance.
The Ashden Directory is edited by Robert Butler and Wallace Heim, with associate editor Kellie Gutman. The Directory includes features, interviews, news, a timeline and a database of ecologically – themed productions since 1893 in the United Kingdom. Our own projects include ‘New Metaphors for Sustainability’, ‘Flowers Onstage’ and ‘Six ways to look at climate change and theatre’.

The Directory has been live since 2000.

Go to The Ashden Directory