Tomorrow starts a collaborative processual exhibition in Vienna. The topic is art and repression, and it will be realised till the 18th of March at three different venues. IG Bildende Kunst and Schenke are the other two venues. The opening with performances will take place at IG Bildende Kunst at 19:00. 8th FEB.

This exhibition is and will be generated by an open group and you should follow our blog for further instructions, as we really understand it as a processual exhibition!

Our goal at BOEM is to provide at one side space and time to the general topic, but as we understand ourselves as an emancipatoric project, we aim to add some analytical and strategic points, which go along with our proletarian artistic international agenda.

Therefore we are extremly glad to open our part of the show, with a special feature on

art&repression : international experiences and strategies: I        Saturday 12th FEB 20:00
@ Planet BOEM

participants:
übermorgen.com, Massai Mbili Art Centre, Otieno Gomba, African Maximalism,

Massai Mbili Art centre and Otieno Gomba:

Maasai Mbili Art Centre (M2) is a community based art group that was started in 2001, by two artists Otieno Gomba and Otieno Kota, who initially work as sign writers in Kibera.

Today Maasai Mbili has eight active members, and a group of six promising students/apspirant members closely connected to the core group. In 2003 M2 accquired a space, a two storey structure, originally a pub, and turned it into a studio and a gallery. The centre is situated along Kibera Drive, just After
Ayany Junction, and almost all the M2 activities are focused at Kiberan development, through community interaction.
Maasai Mbili is not yet registred as an organisation. Procedures have started, but is is an issue that has been pushed forward and postponed a number of times, earlier due to heavy workload, recently because of the turbulent post-election period.
Further info on M 2:  african maximalism: it’s a pity that we only exist in the future : maasai mbili centre

our thanks goes to Goethe Institute Nairobi for supporting Gomba’s trip.

Ubermorgen.com watch out their website: http://www.ubermorgen.com/

Otieno Gomba and ubermorgen.com are currently working together on http://woppow.net/

presentation will turn into party: (micro)RADIO BOEM SOUNDSYSTEM

MONDAY 14th
art&repression : police and psychosis: I

Let’s do a psychogeographical safari into the latest hot shit of  local TV reality shows. Anybody seen the new austrian production of „WEGA – Die Spezialeinheit“? Actually this TV show mirrors that Vienna is one of the safest cities world wide. Come watch and discuss how our police acts, when they try to save a cat from its psychotic owner.

During the exhibition, till 18th of March, our Cinema Club will happen always mondays. We’ll as well present some movies which deal with repression, but explore or feature recent examples of autonomous worker’s selforgansiation. Further details to be announced….

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Opening of the exhibition:
22nd of January 2010, 7pm.
Address:
Koppstrasse 27-29/K28,
1160 Vienna
Austria

Zampa map of the Hamburg art scene during the Gängeviertel action and controversial Subvision festival; WHW curatorial collective, Rene Block and Mr. Koc from the recent Istanbul Biennial; Serbian and Croatian post YU mythology and partisans; Eastern-European Body Check by ERSTE Foundation in Vienna, are just some of the subtitles from the newest Zampa di Leone comics and posters.

Participants of the Vienna workshop have the unique opportunity to join Zampa di Leone World Movement and to ZAMP IT UP with crazy beats from the synchronized peripheries!

This is for sure an open call for participation within Zampa di Leone workshop on 22nd of January from 2pm until 6pm, Koppstrasse 27-29/K28, 1160 Vienna, Austria.

Zampa di Leone comic workshop in Vienna aims to stress contemporary art production and it’s role in the context of tyranny of neoliberal capitalism and dictatorship of biedermeier kleinbürgerliche neofascism. The project under title Former West will be analysed by Zampa di Leone and his friendly participants. Personality of Gerald Matt will be one of the comic topics and the role of the Austrian foundation as Erste Bank and Kultur Kontak Austria.

All what you have to do is to send e-mail to zampadileone(at)gmail.com or to contact the organizer from Vienna at eroticunion(at)gmail.com. You are kindly obliged to confirm your participation and to write personal mail to Zampa di Leone about the intention of your participation.

AM: In the sphere of local contemporary art practice it seems that artists are not engaging with public space, hence the title as a provocation. But if you further interrogate local cultural production, and understand art in public space as the performance of cultural expression in public, than Nairobi is a goldmine.

a.n: What’s provocative about the title, and by the way, do you know the story about the gold of the socialists international? If it would have been found by the capitalists, it would have
turned in their hands, into coal.

AM: Of course the title suggests that art practice in public space does not exist, or is an almost utopian fantasy, but actually this is not the case. It is merely that the local institutions, which incidentally are almost exclusively controlled by foreign interests, do not showcase or represent this form of local art production.

a.n: Maybe, we get later back to the foreign interests, but what is your goal?

AM: Our goal is twofold, to disrupt the current practice of the local art institutions, and shift their focus to recognise a local cultural practice, which is simply not featured. However, neither do we seek simply to celebrate an ‘exotic’ art practice. By including these artists within this space, we also intend to challenge them, and to stimulate within them further questioning of their own practice.

a.n: And the danger that the gold could turn into coal?

AM: Than we crush it into diamonds.

a.n: Ok, can I be a bit polemic about that, and ask you, would you redistribute that diamonds, to the mothers of the people who went missing in that public space in the last two years?

AM: We are very aware of working in an environment, where thousands of young men simply disappear. We don’t think our show can solve that problem. But what our show can do, is to analyse what is permitted in public space, and stimulate an interdisciplinary discourse between artists, activists and theoreticians. So, in answer to your question, the wealth we distribute is the wealth of understanding.

a.n: But you know, I never met more than 30 people at openings here, and even although I’m not living here, I already have the impression that I know most of them.. but maybe I’m wrong.

AM: Well, that is exactly point. The artfield is limited, which is why we hope that this show can create a space for interdisciplinary discourse and cross-pollinate between different fields of knowledge. Regarding the field of Art, the time has long passed when galleries and exhibitions are about looking at well crafted objects. We understand our role as catalysts of ideas, connectors of different thoughts, creators of situations in which viewers themselves create and imagine alternative possibilities to the present.

a.n: I mean, this is not new, and to me sounds like you are simply exporting European avant-garde thought from the 1960’s and planting it in a new field. In fact, is this not simply the latest version of a long history of cultural imperialism? Where is the African in your Maximalism?

AM: (Laughter)… Whilst an accusation of Cultural Imperialism is to some extent valid, ultimately it is short-sighted. It is true that we use tools and strategies gleaned from Contemporary Art discourse, and this discourse does originate in the Global North. But, this is just what they are; tools, which can be abandoned if they don’t work. The last decade of global culture has not proved the theories of Cultural Homogenisation to be correct. People are cultural agents and chose and select from the mainstream of culture. Hiphop may have originated stateside but to see Kenyan hiphop as simply derivative of that culture is to misconceive contemporary culture.

a.n: Well, I’m not sure if I buy this… but I will hold further judgement until I see what you have to offer in the show. Afro Max, it’s been a pleasure.

AM: Karibu. See you on the 13th.