artmap.com
 
DOREEN MENDE
 

THE 'AND': PLACE OF ACTION

Cinema Clash Continuum, a conference-festival by Studium Generale / Gerrit Rietveld Academie: Gabriëlle Schleijpen (Chief Curator) and Bert Taken (Co-Curator), Amsterdam 2011
Program of the conference-festival Cinema Clash Continuum from March 28 to April 1, 2011
Conference-festival March 28 – April 1, 2011
CINEMA CLASH CONTINUUM: FILM & HISTORY IN THE AGE OF GODARD
Rietveld Academy, Amsterdam

THE 'AND': PLACE OF ACTION
With Filipa César, Jean-Pierre Gorin, The Otolith Group, Catarina Simão.
April 1, 2011 from 1.30–10.30PM
Curated by Doreen Mende

Recently on a street in Berlin. From my kitchen window I saw a group of people: some of them, wearing a blue jacket and cap, were holding up a banner — the kind of protest banner I have seen in the same street many times before, since I live in a street where the leftist party and labour unions often organize demonstrations. I couldn’t read what was written on the banner. It was clearly not hand-made, and again, it reminded me of previous demonstrations I had witnessed. The traffic light turned green, the group crossed the street and it appeared as if they’d move on with their protest. But only now, when the small crowd dispersed in different directions, I realized that the ‘blue’ group was part of an advertisement campaign. They had applied the visual instruments of protest; they had used the image of protest as an advertising strategy.

We think we’re already participating in a revolution just by watching its images. But that would be too easy. Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and an increasing number of biennales and exhibition spaces demand that something should be exposed: we are living in a time of an excess in exhibiting that is monitored by economics. We need to be clear about the fact that exhibitions of images — in films, shows, newspapers, in the cinema, on the street, on the Internet — turn those images into a manifestation which can be both a trademark and a revolutionary instrument. How can we clearly distinguish what is what in this blurred relation? The posters in the street won’t be our means of action. Withdrawing our images from the public sphere won’t help us. We need to speak out and to exhibit images. We need to be clear about the conditions in which an image is presented in order to understand that the image does not represent an elsewhere, but that it produces the real at the very moment of its exposure, including us who are watching it. We can learn from the films of Jean-Luc Godard, Anne-Marie Miévielle and Jean- Pierre Gorin that reflection on the means of exposure changes the image from an information carrier to an arena for the production of knowledge. The AND between the manifestation AND the insecurity of an image is our place of action. It reminds us that making images AND displaying them is “not a show, but a struggle” (Patricia Lumumba, 1968).

For this program Doreen Mende has invited:

Filipa César (Portugal) is an artist and filmmaker whose work reflects on the porous nature of the relationship between real-memory and cinema-memory. Her installations suggest possible settings for an expanded production of moving images, which actively engage the spectator in his or her role as perceiver. César has recently exhibited at the SF MOMA, San Francisco 2009, 12th Architecture Biennial, Venice; 29th São Paulo Biennial 2010 and Manifesta 8, Cartagena.

Jean-Pierre Gorin (France) is a French filmmaker best known for his work with Jean-Luc Godard. He was a student of Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault and Jacques Lacan, who influenced the film projects with Godard. In 1968, Gorin and Godard founded the collective Dziga Vertov Group. After leaving France in 1975, he became a member of the faculty of Visual Arts at the University of California in San Diego. Gorin has continued to make films — most notably a Southern California trilogy of essay films.

The Otolith Group is an artist led collective founded by Anjalika Sagar and Kodwo Eshun in London in 2002. The Group’s work is formally engaged with exploring the legacies and potentialities of documentary practice, the essay film, postcolonial archives, cosmopolitan modernisms and science-fiction. Apart from numerous group exhibitions, their work is on display in a large-scale solo show at MACBA/Barcelona until May 2011. In 2010 The Otolith Group were nominated for the tenth Turner Prize.

Catarina Simão (Portugal) is a Portuguese architect and independent researcher. In 2009 she initiated the on-going project Off Screen — on the Mozambique Film Archive. It was presented at Atelier Re.al in Lisbon, Serralves Museum in Porto, at the Dockanema 1th Cinema Symposium in Maputo and recently at Manifesta 8, Cartagena. She is the author of articles and other contributions associated to her project topic, such as political images and archival and relational practices involving cognitive processes.

APRIL 1
THE 'AND': PLACE OF ACTION
13.30 – 14.00 Introduction Doreen Mende
14.00 – 15.00 Open Film Library Off Screen with Catarina Simão
15.00 – 16.00 Screening for discussion with Filipa César
16.00 – 16.30 BREAK
16.30 – 18.00 Performance lecture by The Otolith Group
18.00 – 20.15 DINNER
20.15 – 22.30 Cinematic Event with Jean-Pierre Gorin
22.30 – END OF PROGRAM

Please find the entire program here:
studiumgenerale.rietveldacademie.nl
www.rietveldacademie.nl

TICKETS
It is required to register for the day programs of choice prior to the program day as seats are limited. All ticket sales and program reservations can be made at: www.rietveldacademie.nl

Rietveld Students / Faculty All Rietveld students / faculty are entitled to 2 free tickets available for 2 day-programs of choice. If Rietveld Students/Faculty would like to attend more than 2 day-programs, they are required to purchase additional tickets:
Single Day Ticket: € 5.00
Five Day Package: € 10.00

General public Persons interested in attending the Cinema Clash Continuum conference-festival are required to purchase a Single Day Ticket which gives access to one day-program of choice or a Five Day Package which gives access to five day-programs of choice:
Single Day Ticket: € 10.00
Five Day Package: € 35.00

Dinner Ticket During the day, coffee and snacks will be available at the canteen. From 18.00 – 19.30, a dinner buffet will be available each day of the week. Students and teachers can purchase dinner tickets at the academy the week preceding the conference-festival. The General Public can purchase dinner tickets at the Rietveld website.
Dinner Ticket: € 5.00

Studium Generale / Gerrit Rietveld Academie
Academic Year 2010 / 2011
CINEMA CLASH CONTINUUM
Film and History in the Age of Godard
Conference-festival March 28 – April 1

CURATOR IN CHIEF: Gabriëlle Schleijpen
CO-CURATOR: Bert Taken
GUEST CURATORS: Jeffrey Babcock, Solange de Boer, Inti Guerrero, If I Can’t Dance with Wendelien van Oldenborgh, Stefan Majakowski, Doreen Mende, Martine Neddam, Patricia Pisters, Erik Viskil
PRODUCTION: Marika Wanders
RESEARCH: Nikos Doulos
WEBSITE: Sarah Charalambides
COMMUNICATION: Wieneke Mulder
DESIGN: Camilla Martinsen & Anthony Salvador
FACILITY MANAGER: Willem Rieder
CATERING CANTEEN: Eric Kammeron
CATERING GUESTS: Barbara Paternotte
TRAVEL ARRANGEMENTS: Hemminkways Publication
COMPILATION: Gabriëlle Schleijpen, Bert Taken
FINAL EDIT & CORRECTIONS: Walter van der Star
PRINTING: robstolk®
BINDING: Agia & Lith
PAPER: Reviva Color 120g.

CCCCAHIER will be launched during the final exhibition
of the Gerrit Rietveld Academie: July 7 – 10, 2011