PLAY! 游戏 ! /  by fariba mosleh

What an incredible powerful performance … PLAY!
The Bruegel year not only led to blockbuster exhibitions like the one at Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, but also inspired artists of other fields to develop this contemporary dance theatre production for instance.
Basis for PLAY! is Pieter Bruegel’s famous painting “Kinderspiele”, also to see at Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna. Dschungel Wien and Het Paleis Antwerp did an exciting coproduction bringing together the Belgium choreographer Karolien Verlinden and her crew with six professional Austria based dancers. After the premiere in Vienna in September I took the chance to the Belgium premiere yesterday in Antwerp (by the way one of the last pieces where I did production back in Vienna ;) … The piece surprised, and has it all - great performers, an unique choreography (actually more sport than dance), sound, costumes, set design … and above all: games, games, games … without hardly more than some wooden slats these guys used their bodies to play a countless number of competitive children’s games*

Highly recommended. Don’t miss PLAY! in December on stage at Dschungel Wien age 10+

Well, once in Antwerp, I obviously seized the chance to visit Chinatown and have lunch there! The topic I was occupied with intensively for my publication Vienna Chinatown INvisible still thrills me so much. In 2001, Antwerp was Europe’s second city (after The Hague shortly before) to build up a dragon gate and call this quartier near the Central Station officially Chinatown, even though Chinese migration to Antwerp dates back to the 1970ies. It’s Belgium’s only official Chinatown, though there is a Chinatown INvisible, as I would call it, in the very centre of Brussels between La Bourse and St. Catherine. It felt so familiar to walk through this not more than 3 streets … and, it reassured me that Vienna’s decision against building up such an architectural sign like the dragon gate is a good one. It’s above all a marketing gag - what’s happening in this area is the interesting part, not its branding.
The food was delicious*

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

the sound of... /  by fariba mosleh

I’ve to confess, classical music is way to missed out on my cultural agenda — the more I loved the invitation of our very neighbour to an intimate evening of a semi-private concert in his house gallery. The audience in the age between 4 and 103 (!) years had the pleasure to listen to wonderful pieces by Ludwig van Beethoven and Dmitri Schostakovich interpreted by the pianist Damien Bossy and violoncellist Emmanuel Tondus. A real treat for the ears and soul*

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

*singing masks* /  by fariba mosleh

On Thursday I joined the opening performance of ASEM, the Asia meets Europe cultural festival at Bozar.
The renown Belgium visual artist Honore d’O has been invited to develop a piece for this occasion. I already had the pleasure to get know Honore half a year ago in Vienna, where he should have done a work in public space in the frame program of the current Pieter Bruegel exhibition at the Kunsthistorische Museum in Vienna. Unfortunately it seemed that the whole framework program of contemporary art has been thrown over board. Even more I was curious about Honore’s piece for Bozar.
The commission work for Horta Hall at Bozar, a Belgium architectural classic, with an orchestra and a famous Chinese pipa player already gave a strong frame to the performance. In the beginning I thought it’s gonna be a “nice” but probably boring piece bringing the musicians together with art through a video projection. However, even though he worked with the leitmotif of the mask (in his case from an industrial background) and a Chinese classic singer, the in-situ sound installation had something really inclusive and deep-going. Performers coming out behind the curtains into the audience positioning flowers made out of masks, the music, the projection … it was kind of contemplative. Everything fit together. Honore worked collaborative with other artists, got into dialogue with the architecture and also included the audience.
It’s a silent piece - but somehow it’s tangent in a quite sensitive and resonant way*

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

EUtopia* /  by fariba mosleh

Meanwhile we have been living in Brussels for two months already***
The perfect time to focus the initial idea of leaving Austria for a while and researching on this European thought as a contra statement and vision against the European-wide growth of populist politics and nationalism like in Austria. As already stated in the first blog entry I’ve had a ambiguous relation to the idea of Europe and the Union as I prefer a global thinking and citizenship. Still, in times like those I feel like a European more than ever before. This residency in Brussels shall add to my transnational view and reception, in the private as well as professional sense. And, I want to forward this idea and everything surrounding this discourse. Through the discourse on this transnational approaches I got to know other people and initiatives who believe in the chances of a united Europe.
Hence, I became a member of the EUROPEAN REPUBLIC which will be officially proclaimed through the European Balcony Project on November 10th 2018 at 4pm from balconies and in public spaces all over Europe. The project was initiated by the political scientist, Ulrike Guérot, the author, Robert Menasse, and the theatre maker, Milo Rau. Background of the idea of a united European Republic is the fact that there exists a common market as well as a common currency within the EU, so this project promotes the aim of sharing a common democracy - a United Europe of cultural diversity beyond nation states with equal rights and opportunities for all its citizens***
This might be a EUtopie — but it’s about spreading a positive and transnational dialogue on the possible future of Europe!

Es lebe die Republik Europa!

Long lives the Republic of Europe!

Vive la République Européene!

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studioOne will participate at the Balcony Project with an event at our studio in Brussels. We’ll proclaim the European Republic by reading the manifeste the 10th of November at 4pm - further details coming soon - safe the date*

For further information on the European Balcony Project download the press release here: PR

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

Big bears cry too* /  by fariba mosleh

Theatre season has startet as well. And how could we have a better start than going to see a guest play of Miet Warlop’s production Big bears cry too for people age 6+ at BRONKS Theatre for young audience in Brussels?
I had the pleasure to see Miet Warlop’s performance Fruits of Labour last year the Festival of Regions in Upper Austria - she is simply a great artist with a vision! Couldn’t wait to see Big bears cry too with my kids and again it was an inspiring performance for all senses. She takes kids for serious and goes beyond certain borders - she confronts not only the kids, but the whole audience with contemporary art instead of a pedagogical approach.
The production is touring through Europe - so take the chance*

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

My first "visit" in Vienna - a new perspective* /  by fariba mosleh

BXL - VIE - BXL
I’ve been living in Vienna for more than a decade meanwhile. Moving to Brussels made me a visitor there for the first time: going there, leaving my family in Brussels, sleeping at wonderful friend’s houses, meeting people,… a new perspective.
Well, I had a few intense days, as I am more than linked to there, catching up with news, politics, culture etc. After not only the recent attacks on freedom of press or the intimidation of individuals and the pressure on NGOs in Austria, it was obligatory to take part of the #donnerstag demonstrations against the current far right Austrian government, which take place every Thursday eve and is organised each week by a different organisation of collective.

… zooming out and changing perspective is a real privilege which makes one see things differently sometimes … what kind of triggered me most this time in Vienna was the newly introduction of the prohibition of consuming food on the metro. After implementing a prohibition of alcohol consumption in the area of Praterstern in Vienna and the prohibition of full-face veil this is the third big impact into one individual’s liberty in Vienna and Austria. There are more constructive ways of organising live in a pluralistic society! Still, in Vienna the biggest problem seems to be malodorous food in public transport —— god save the BIM***

…well, saying goodbye to Vienna and coming back to Brussels felt quite good and right for the moment. Here have been communal elections yesterday, Sunday 14th of October, and I am happy and inspired by the fact of living and working in a neighbourhood and city with an election results that I wish to be similar for the next elections in Vienna.
So let us #donnerstag and see you on the streets of Vienna the 20th of December again***

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

Nuit Blanche BXL /  by fariba mosleh

Nuit Blanche BXL 2018 - in Austria a term which has the connotation of Fête Blanche, an event which I’ve always avoided to go to - in Brussels an yearly art event in early autumn like in other cities like Paris as well.
Nuit Blanche here made me extremely happy last Saturday - a night long installations, performances, and interventions of local and international artists on diverse places of the quartier Marolles immersed the visitors “in contemporary art in a friendly way” as the info folder states. And, it turned out to be fantastic. Highest quality performances for free in public space on well chosen locations with prevailing topics for everyone! I enjoyed that night with my 9-year old daughter who was as fascinated as me, and the other audiences as diverse as the neighborhood (and the artists) - simply as it has to be in my opinion.
This year’s Nuit Blanche picked up the topic 2018 Year of the protest and therefore opted for Marolles, a quartier historically known for resistance and protest, as the place to act.
Don’t know where to start sharing some impressions of that night with you - the installations PeoPL, an immense ice sculpture in the roofed courtyard and basketball site of a primary school in form of a statue of Leopold II was a perfect and surprisingly good beginning of our eve’s tour. The sculpture by the Belgian/Ruandan artist LAURA NSENGIYUMVA was meant to melt throughout this eve and a reflection on the slowly but gradually mental decolonialisation process.

In another primary school there were robot like self-moving protest sign under the title Activists by the Slovenian artists NIKA OBLAK and PRIMOZ NOVAK.
Place Jeu de Balle, the daily setting for the city’s most famous fleamarket surrounded by bars and restaurants was venue for several performances, among them the Mission Roosevelt by the French-Italian Tony Clifton Circus - not only fun, but a well drafted and penetrative production. About 25 wheel chairs, a tabu object, symbol for inferiority, immobility and marginal groups, were bound together for a tour with the artists and participants from the audience who navigated through the quartier adding a whole lot of diversity.

Our absolute highlight of the night took place at La Dalle in front of two massive high buildings (“Plattenbau”) in an L-shape, a residential complex for hundreds of families, where I’ve already seen a great opening performance of Kunstenfestival two years ago. The concrete place became venue for the production D-Konstruktion by Compagnie Dyptik — a stunning and moving performance on the topic of contemporary revolutions and urban movement! It’s a must-see for everyone, would love to invite this French group to Vienna.

Well, last but not least we got involved in the first KLAPPING event in Brussels, a global movement in urban dance originating in Australia. Simply a great approach to dance developed from the incorporated moves in soccer these guys are developing at least to me completely new kind of body movement and co-creation between each other. Ahilan Ratnamohan and Feras Shaheen, both dancers and former soccer players introduced us into the world of KLAPPING in a public soccer field and with the youngsters playing soccer there every day*

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

Les femmes dans l'art brut? /  by fariba mosleh

I’ve to confess that I’ve a quite problematic feeling towards the Austrian Presidency of the Council of the European Union due to the current politics in Austria … but I have to mention that there is a whole body of events in the cultural field organised in Brussels within the framework of the presidency. … With the cooperation of the Austrian Cultural Forum Brussels and the Austrian collector Hannah Rieger with the Art et Marges Musée Brussels they came up with a really good project.
Under the title Les femmes dans l’art brut? they brought together over hundred works by international art brut artist from the collection of Hannah Rieger. Female art brut has ever since rarely been supported and much less collected. The ? in the exhibition title refers to that point that it is hardly possible to see and collect female art brut, also in the renown Maria Gugging female art brut is an exception - as for instance the work of Leila Bachtiar, who attended the opening last thursday. About 22 female and 19 male artists were represented in the show, among the works were many of actually high quality - above all the smaller sized drawings.
Besides some people affiliated to Austria many local people joined the opening, what I really appreciated. I even met some of my neighbours :)
Still, I am asking myself - is it really necessary to put a ? into the title and hanging all these great works by (less known) female artists next to the well known big names of art brut instead of putting an ! and highlighting this hardly existing female part of the brut story?

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

WIELS again* /  by fariba mosleh

… as it´s simply interesting and a pleasure I went to WIELS again yesterday to the opening of Belgian artist Koenraad Dedobbeleer’s exhibition Kunststoff: Gallery of Material Culture, curated by Zoë Gray and attended the accompanied talk Musée des Accessoires by Patricia Falguières, an art critic and historian based in Paris - again a challenge as it was in French, but a good training to listen to museology, material culture and the topic of display :)
Actually I really like Dedobbelleleer’s approach to the topic of display in the exhibition space - his mix of found object installations and his own sculptures. Even though the first part displays older works dating back till 2003 everything fits together and makes you feel like in an indoor sculpture park until you go up into the second floor of the exhibition where the artist kind of takes care of the visitor installing an salon like environment with a heating stove and a room full of wood bullets and an incredible view over Brussels.

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

Warm up at WARP /  by fariba mosleh

Off to Flanders we went on Sunday to take the chance to see the current exhibition Verknipt at WARP contemporary art platform and meet its director and curator Stef van Bellingen with whom studioOne did its wonderful cooperation last November in Vienna with the exhibition at Krinzinger Projekte and a whole week of frame program for the participating artists … it is such a pleasure to finally get to know WARP on-site in Sint Niklaas.

WARP is located in the center of St. Niklaas in an awesome 19th century building with an 20th century annex - it is a former artist´s residence now dedicated to the promotion of Belgian as well as international artists. They organise exhibition with a diverse and in-depth frame program on-site but also internationally via artists villages on diverse cities.
The space is huge with many possibilities of presenting, working, doing workshops, lectures and all kinds of events.

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

Can´t pronounce that institution's name ... /  by fariba mosleh

… last Thursday I stopped by at the famous Beursschouwburg - for a newcomer in town an extremely active, vivid multi-disciplinary event hub with tradition - to see the opening of Margarita Maximova exhibition You’re on your own and all over the place … it was surprisingly cool! Have a look on the pics …

… the video-sound installation was presented in a way open to the street what a I liked a lot. For the opening eve with an opened glass front that the audience was inside and outside of the display. More than inviting to dive deeper into the screened topic …

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

WIELS presenting their new AIR /  by fariba mosleh

That was really a cool event on Tuesday at WIELS, the presentation of the new residents - WIELS has an extraordinary residency program with about nine studios where changing local as well as international artists work up to months - I highly appreciate the idea that the new residents at the beginning of their working period get the opportunity to introduce themselves, their ideas or artistic approaches with a 10 minute presentation to a public audience. And the auditorium was packed with people who were eager to get know the artists.

Seven residents (among whom also the Austrian artist Nikolaus Gansterer) talked about what they are doing and shared some impressions of there ongoing projects in their individual style and afterwards the audience was invited to get into touch with the artists informally at the bar …
The current AIR are quite diverse from their artistic practice and their backgrounds …

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

French - I - ssss* /  by fariba mosleh

On Monday evening I was testing my poor, but growing French knowledge via attending the Didier Eribon à propos de `Retour à Reims´ at KAAITHEATER - a great institution, which promises to offer quite a lot and highly diverse program. This eve is the season’s kick-off with a series of #conversations To Authenticity … and beyond! where the invite artists and intellectuals to talk about their approaches to increasingly exploited word and its implications.
After missing Eribon’s visit to Vienna at the Academy of Fine Arts a few months ago I took the chance to listen to him at KAAI. At least I’ve read the book by Eribon - so I’ve been astonished how much I understood from the talk he had with the journalist Béatrice Delvaux from Le Soir. They focussed their conversation on the discourse around the class systems and its limits and shifts… How is it possible that former French communists now vote for the far right Le Penn for instance?
It was a big pleasure to attend this evening and I am very much looking to the next event at KAAI.

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

Oh-Oh-Opening /  by fariba mosleh

After another two exhibition openings in more and less contemporary art I am looking forward to check out activities from another field.
Well, Richard Long’s exhibition at Foundation CAB, by the way Long’s first presentation in Belgium after about 40 years, might attract many people and has an prestigious outreach, but I experienced the opening as quite boring, decorative and a meeting point for the chicaria. The building of CAB in the heart of Ixelles is a fantastic - 1930s style Art Deco architecture - end opens up many opportunities for artists (they focussed on minimal art). Also the presentation of four of Long´s stone works in the main room is quite appealing from an aesthetic angle, but I didn’t like the combination of that with his poster works.

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And there was the opening of Teresa Cos exhibition The Measure of disorder at ARGOS, Center for art and media, last Saturday. One again an institution in an great building with multiple possibilities not only to research in their archive but also present various kinds of projects. Even though the topic of the exhibition portraying certain aspects of Ludwig Boltzmann’s life and therefore is strongly linked to Austria, I couldn’t really connect to the professionally presented two channel video and sound installation. When I see results of artistic research presented like that I often ask myself where is the line between research, documentation and art? Why do they choose this way of presenting? It’s a very personal view, but I see neither the artwork nor the scientific representation of the topic.

Still from Teresa Co’s projection

Still from Teresa Co’s projection

Booming Brussels? /  by fariba mosleh

Within the framework of Brussels Gallery Weekend I attended a talk staging a topic which is my topic at the moment of leaving my country to get to know whats going on here:
Booming Brussels . On the panel - Zoë Gray (curator at WIELS), Anne Vierstraete (Director of ART Brussels), and Harlan Levey (Galerist), moderated by the art critic Sam Steverleynck (second from left on the picture beneath).
- well, I´ve to confess that the thesis that a place is vibrant, developing and trendy with new discoverings on the artist´s heaven might be an assumption every minor city is stating mediawise during events like a gallery weekend. The director of an commercial art fair and a galerist on a panel also won’t make bad add for the locality for their businesses. Still, a perfect event for me to dive deeper into that question of why Brussels.
During the talk I heard several points and arguments which underline the growing importance and influence of Brussels as an important center of not only dance, performing arts, but also fine arts in the last 10 to 15 years like the geographical situation of the city, which makes it possible to easily work on projects in several countries, or the internationality also through its status as center of the EU, but the experts also formulated facts which I start to feel and understand gradually: in 1986 there has been no single museum dedicated to modern or contemporary art in town, then 11 galerist gathered together and started a kind of an alliance which in 1996 ended up in the Art Brussels. The most crucial point for the development into a more vidid not only commercial but also a off-scene, diversity of artists and institutions definitely has been the opening of WIELS Centre for contemporary Art about 10 years ago. Further, the diversity in this comparatively small city is huge; it’s easy to navigate. The speakers emphasised the high quality of life and the accessibility of people here seems to be unique, it´s easy to meet people as they are not snobby - certainly a fact that I till now can underline. Harlan Levey stated that all these are characteristics suited to art.
Zoë Gray, originally from Great Britain, reported something highly interesting: she has been working in The Netherlands for several years, with the shift towards right politics she experienced more and more hostility towards art and therefore moved to Brussels…
But they were also coming up with aspects I´ve not thought of so far. For instance the theory of the “absence of the state” - on the one hand an advantage, as you are free to produce and show more self-driven, but on the other hand sometimes certain financial and symbolic support is as well absent. The division of the Flemish and the Francophone is stated to be so strong that it leads to a division within the fields. One artist recently also told me that you kind of have to decide when you settle down in Brussels as an artist - do you want to work with the Flemish or the Francophone institutions … that seems to be a pity as exactly this diversity enriches this place and makes it so strong otherwise.
Altogether, it was a quite balanced and in depth talk - it raised several points which I want to check out further within the upcoming months.

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*experiment*

It´s such an honour to be free to reflect and write about the fields I am working in for a period with an undefined aim. It´s kind of beaming myself out of the business and gain new insights. And, the most important aspect - I don´t restrict it to one field; Visual art might be crucial, but I am not less interested into performing art, theatre, experimental stuff, local projects with a smaller outreach and above all transcultural approaches … let´s see what I´ll discover.

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

Jump into BXL Gallery Weekend 2018 /  by fariba mosleh

After settling down as a family in a new country, a new city, neighborhood, what is a better kick-off for diving into the local art scene than the Brussels Gallery Weekend which each year starts the season after a long summer. The Gallery Weekend in September and the Art Brussels in April are kind of the focus points in the yearly calendar of visual art here. Not only the big commercial galleries and big museums are orienting their exhibitions towards those events but also the off-scene is more than active in showing what´s going on in their spaces, with their residents, what projects are going on etc.

For me personally it was a great pleasure to visit CLEARING Gallery Brussels for the first time as I know CLEARING from New York where the run an quite exciting space in Brooklyn - same as in N.Y.C. CLEARING Gallery is near my neighborhood here in Brussels. The space is huge with an impressive architecture, perfect to display the works by Jean-Marie Appriou. By the way, the also represent Bruno Gironcoli - would be amazing to see his works there.

Well, highlight of the opening evening of course was the opening of René Daniëls exhibition Fragments from an Unfinished Novel at the fantastic WIELS. I was quite honoured to get to know the artist, whose works I´ve also seen in New York, personally - his œvre is impressive and touching.

Then there was Vanderborght Building that weekend. Three floors present exhibition like Generation Brussels which to me unfortunately was not appealing. And, there was A performance Affair — a kind of performance festival within the Gallery Weekend. Informally opened by a performance of Joris Van de Moortel and his team. I´ve to confess that the sound of that happing at 11 am in the morning, in this architectural environment took over everything and didn´t really make it possible for all the other scheduled artist to start their performances.

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.

Brussels - where a dance is a dance* /  by fariba mosleh

The 18th of August 2018, Austria, Styria´s countryside - where a dance is not a dance. It´s a good day to leave this rapidly turning more and more right and fascist country for a while in order to gain new inspiration, ideas and approaches for the transcultural work in contemporary art and performance.
We´ve decided to come to Brussels - the informal capital of Europe.
Never before in my life I felt more European than in these times. I´ve always believed that “European” would be a term, too narrow and restricting. I´ve prefered “citizen of the world” but living on a continent where nationalist thinking is spreading out at an immense speed refacing the idea of EUROPE seems to be striking.
”Why Brussels?” everybody keeps asking. Back in New York 2015/16 while working at the ISCP N.Y.C. I got to know the Italian artist Francesca Grilli who then just moved to Brussels. She made me curious about it, and highly recommended me to check that city out artwise. In the last two years I went there several times, worked with local and international artists of different fields, in Belgium as well as in Vienna. Hence, I got more curious. And, after a few years of intense work in Austria I took the liberty to step out of our life defining system, the structures of daily routine and see how all that works in another European country. We want to get to know this city and it´s surrounding far beyond its EU status.
Last but not least, Robert Menasse´s fantastic book Die Hauptstadt was more than convincing that it must be Brussels, where I now moved to for at least a year with my partner Florian Nitsch and our two kids. We want to get to know this city and country with its highly pluralistic society far beyond its EU status. Let´s find out what a dance is here meant to be*

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I am pleased
to share
this blog on

the
brussels
ART
project

with you*

fariba*
september 2018

For the whole blog of the brusselsARTproject click here.