W I T N A S

CRITIQUE JOURNAL ISSUE #5 2011

Contributors to Issue #5

Espen Aasheim is a norwegian beer brewer. His passion is brewing low-alcohol-english style porters.

Xueyin Chen is a designer by training and works as an administrator for art and design projects. She is currently study-ing museology at the University of Gothenburg.

Mark Frygell is an artist from Northern Sweden. Educated at Academy of Fine Art, Umeå, Sweden and Academy of Fine Art, Vienna, Austria.

Patrik Haggren has a BA in Ethnology. He is currently studying for a master in Museums Studies at Gothenburg Univer-sity.Laura Hatfield is a Canadian artist and musician, currently working towards a Master’s degree in International Museum Studies at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

Sara Lindeborg is an artist and part of the collaboration Martini Projects. Currently doing her MFA at Valand School of Fine Arts, Gothenburg Sweden.

Cover and poster by Espen Aasheim

If you are interested in contributing to the journal or have any other inquires please contact us at:

editors.witnas@gmail.com

http://www.witnas.org

WITNAS Issue #5

Words from the editors

Tip of the pen

On Decentralization – Some thoughts on cultural production in the contemporary Chinese context

Kulenovic Collection

Signals from the woods: Research, knowledge and synchronicity

All of the Above, John Armleder, Palais de Tokyo

Index

WITNAS board and editors:Chris JohnsenSara LindeborgAdrien Siberchicot

WITNAS advisor:Matthew Rana

page 3

page 4

page 7

page 11

page 13

page 14

page 15

Decentralization

“What is the new art scene?” is more then ever a crucial question addressed to a community of artists, cultural work-ers and citizens, trying to aim different types of inquiries.WITNAS#5 will articulate the contributions around the idea of decentralization. The discussions taking place within the art scene often return to a local issue: the position of Goth-enburg in a presupposed larger or global art world. Mar-ginal, apart, far away are recurring words when it comes to define the position of the city. However, one could talk about decentralization, parallelism or alternative, with then a different approach to the situation of the city.

In the issue, we would like to examine this potential shift. What are the possibilities of creation in a decentralize area? Where are the boundaries between the presupposed cen-tralized and decentralized area? Where and how art and other fields designated as collaborative, social or “non-art” are crossing each others?

The diversity of the contributions in the present issue re-flects the difficulties and the multiple layers of decentrali-zation. The local scene is emphasized in Sara Lindeborg’s review with a show at one of Gothenburg’s newer artist-run spaces called Vita Rosen. Xueyin Chen and Patrik Haggren will take us outside of Gothenburg. Xueyin Chen’s contribu-tion examines the contemporary art scene in China, con-fronting the recent and powerful Chinese middle class with the concept of immaterial labor. Patrik Haggren proposes a review of the show “All of the above” at Palais de Tokyo in Paris. It is a carte blanche by John Armleder, where the art-ist is asked to take the role of the curator. Laura Hatfield’s chronicle takes us back to Sweden for a journey to Karlskro-na where she visited the Kulenovic collection, a mysterious collection of prestigious artworks. The last contribution is an essayistic journey by Mark Frygell starting from Istanbul. His text focuses on the wide notion of gentrification and how art is directly connected to this urban phenomenon.

Finally as a bonus, we collected an Informal index of Inde-pendent/Artist-Run Initiatives in Gothenburg.

Chris JohnsenSara LindeborgAdrien Siberchicot

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Tip of the pen

To call the population of strangers in the midst of which we live “society” is such a usurpation that even the sociolo-gists wonder if they should abandon a concept that was, for a century, their bread and butter. Now they prefer the metaphor of a network to describe the connection of cyber-netic solitudes, the intermeshing of weak interactions under names like “colleague,” “contact,” “buddy,” acquaintance,” or “date.” Such networks sometimes condense into a mi-lieu, where nothing is shared but codes, and where nothing is played out except the incessant recomposition of iden-tity. ― The Invisible Committee, The Coming Insurrection (L’insurrection Qui Vient, Semiotext(e), 2008 (p.25)

Despite the fact that we are entangled in an increasingly broad practice of art, today there is a separation between the practice of the artist as a social being and the artist as a craftsperson. Here, I mean craftsperson in the broadest of sense, since even language and ideas can be attached to craft. What is an idea and how will it be received within a context? As you get entangled with this, the craftsmanship of institutional thought and communication within it begins. I am assured that we have a somewhat de-romanticized idea about art today, that we can discuss the field as one among many. The importance of fine art has obviously become the importance of a specific group of people relating to and un

derstanding this craft. I would like to focus on the way artists choose a location for their practice and how it can be done in different ways, especially in relation to concepts of gentri-fication, artist-run and off-spaces.

New work and new areasIn the search for the cheap space, that ‘off-space’ organ-izers crave (as largely self-funded organizations), we move away from the established meccas of our field; from Pren-zlaur Berg to Neu Köln, from Söder to Tensta. Nevertheless it seems as if the art-scene, together with various sub-cul-tural movements, play a role as colonizers and explorers of the urban landscape for future investment.

In the ‘60s and ‘70s, the Manhattan lofts in New York’s SoHo district became the home of artists and hippies that needed housing and space to work. This almost legendary place ended up with the eviction of the artists that made it famous, together with a big group of less wealthy origi-nal inhabitants. Even though the ones who became more commercially successful could afford to stay, the whole plat-form that created a unique breeding ground for culture was demolished in order to give space for established artists, firms, shops and hotels. This illustrates a strong tendency everywhere artists and culturally engaged people enter a

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low-priced area to be able to realize projects; culture goes in like storm troops, raises property values and then gets evicted. It is funny though, how neither artists, nor punks or hippies seem to learn from this, but instead enter the same trap over and over again. Get a cheap space, get a good crowd, build a nice scene and then get kicked out when the rent shoots out the roof. Today it has become a big issue in Sweden, when government support for the arts is fail-ing in favor of corporate interest and sponsorship. Despite this, it becomes less interesting to discuss how ‘the market’ is doing things and instead try to focus on the projects we materialize. The sponsorship of companies acts in differ-ent ways, both direct and indirect: direct in the way of pure sponsorship, general in the way of an increased amount of people visiting fine art spaces in the vicinity of specific com-mercial centers. Artists today have a much bigger window for exposure. The question is, what does this mean for us?

The decentralizing artist within a centralized economyWe can see that the biggest change in gentrification the last twenty years is the growing interest in preserving an area’s ‘alternative vibe’ for a segment of specific tourists and sub-cultures – not as a ‘here and now’, but more as a ‘theater of a space’ representing the original situation. Fewer people are interested in cathedrals, more are interested in exotic urban areas. What we often refer to as ‘decentralization’ is actually just another way of constructing new ground for ex-panding centralized economic structures.

Speaking traditionally, established economic culture (shops, restaurants, bars etc.) seeks to occupy spaces that have entered an era of gentrification. On the other hand, groups of artists usually have a tendency to start abandoning these areas as soon as a new gentrified culture has fully bloomed. The major galleries and spaces stay and the small off-spac-es and alternative projects seek new feeding ground – new architecture and social structures – fresh material to work with, and of course, cheap rent. These meeting grounds for people interested in the same field create many options, occasions and spaces for discussion, as well as mutual understanding within a shared background of common lan-guage codes. I find it much easier to discuss the things I am interested in with a fellow painter than a car salesman. My practice becomes more fulfilled within its own field, just as with a scientist or a journalist. I can work more with things I am interested in. I can even work when I go out to have a drink (and it is not even exhausting). To have a context/crowd and then work geographically outside of it can create new, interesting things for specific groups to explore. Yet, at the risk of sounding pessimistic and dull, I can sense that this casual method of working lacks in many ways, espe-cially for us as artists.

As campuses around the globe start to create fused, in-terdisciplinary areas for architects, designers and artists, I hesitate to embrace this new cooperation. I agree that the

fields of architecture and design are not simply tools of com-mercialism. I also think, as many artists do, that the problem would be the same if we worked with economists or librar-ians. But how do we, or anyone, gain from this seclusion into areas that get branded ‘cultural worker habitats’ or ‘al-ternative communities’? Moreover, do we want to work with methods that allow this kind of ghettoization to exist? The geographical grouping of cultural workers is in itself coun-terproductive if we are trying to create something that has social impact, critical effect or educational qualities.

Istanbul, art-tourism and the structuring of surround-ings I recently visited Istanbul and the areas around Tak-sim square, one of the most popular spaces for artists and musicians in the city. The hostel we were housed in was owned by two black-block, anarcho-syndicalists who used their profits to create their own village outside of the city. When we spoke, they seemed to find pleasure in the area as a culturally active space filled with artists and activists from around the world. Still, after some discussion I under-stood that the history of the area itself was quite compli-cated. The hostel owners were displeased by how recent changes had obliterated the positive aspects of the area as well as the negative. I was told that seven years ago the ten blocks surrounding the hostel was part of a slum containing a wide array of subculture and rising expression. According to them, a mix of queers, punks, mafia and drug dealers co-existed while “minding their own business”. Al-though the area was fueled by criminality and alternative economies, the subculture of the area itself turned out to become one of the hotspots for people that wanted to ex-periment with alternatives ways of life, much like Christiania in Copenhagen. Similar to Christiana, the fame of the small ten block area attracted abroad attention and ‘alternative’ tourists on the lookout for excitement; not to mention art-ists that wanted to start working and base themselves in this environment. As Istanbul’s mayor noticed the attention the area was receiving and its growing notoriety, the area was reworked and reconstructed. Money stopped flowing into the alternative economies of criminals and black market profiteers, and was instead re-routed into the city’s taxation system. Soon enough, buildings were being torn down, bars opened, galleries and off-spaces were established and, well... hostels were built. The original population moved to lower rent areas but the cultural workers and western im-migrants remained; creating a reminiscence of the original area but with the added flare to attract more of the same alternative visitors. While I was there, the area remained rustic and worn down – old and romantic, but reconstructed, almost like a Disneyland providing artists and other cultural explorers a slightly more sophisticated version of the fake bazars occupied by another branch of travelers elsewhere in the city. It was a place that you could visit and stay if you wanted. Otherwise, just go to some shows and hang out at the local art-bar; a clear example of cultural gentrification and building of artist colonies, much like an anamorphic ver-

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sion of ‘Google Plex’.

Later on the trip, a local writer, journalist and social anthro-pologist showed us around recent architectural projects. Just a few blocks from a truly Manhattan-inspired area, we entered a ‘slum-city’ surrounded by apartment buildings. Our guide told us that inhabitants of the slum areas built their houses there, and if a state supervisor accepted its ar-chitectural qualities, the owner of the building was given the lot. What would commonly happen was that the owner of the house would tear it down and get an offer by a building company to construct a new one at the half the price. The old owner would then live in one apartment, rent the rest and use the basement as a small sweat-shop where other people inhabiting the slums would produce, let’s say, the tip of a pen. This tip would then be shipped to the building owner’s previous workplace. In other words, the production of a factory was being partially moved into the slums. I can’t help but look at this as a metaphor for the off-space, with the off-space producing the tip of the pen and the institutions being the factory.

What option is there?What options do we have if we do not want to produce the tip of the pen? Institutions have a strength and stability con-nected to them that avant-garde or artist-run spaces do not. This is not to say that the concept ‘off-space’ lacks rational-ity or structure, but rather, that it is too dependent on a sur-rounding system of personal finance. But maybe it actually could be independent as a separate way of working with art where we as artists can survive? With off-spaces, I see an interest in experimentation as a major strength; this is also what makes them – at least most of the time – stay more interesting than more established spaces which are typically more risk-averse. Off-spaces usually do not distin-guish themselves by producing amazing work, but rather, by creating amazing experiments and diverse situations. Off-spaces are concerned with the question of ‘how do we actually make art and become artists’, instead of merely saying, ‘this is art, enjoy’. Concerning the off-space as a de-centralizing force, its power comes not from a geographical change of scenery for the art-crowd, but from experimental platform where we can try to create a strong foothold for

off-space institutions to grow and actually be an alternative instead of a casual weekend activity. In Istanbul, artists are joining together with other firms and organizations, renting whole buildings together. In this way, artists are structuring development themselves, being part of a local community by making work for the area they in-habit. With a decentralized way of working and an under-standing of how their practice is affecting and modeling the landscape, they seemed to quite effectively act against an increasingly homogenous neighborhood. The artists didn’t seem to be worried about falling out of institutions or art-scenes, but instead were interested in building concrete foundations for new ways to make art, as well as expand-ing who it can communicate with by giving a local definition of their practice. Oda Projesi (http://odaprojesi.blogspot.com/), is one example of an artist group running various art collaborations as well as a printed magazine and a coopera-tive space with tenants from different disciplines. We have to remember here that Turkey in general, and Istanbul in particular, is extremely gentrified and neoliberal in terms of economic policies, which in turn, makes alternatives very in-teresting. In an e-mail conversation with John Seabrook Bill Gates wrote “The digital revolution is all about facilitation--creating tools to make things easy.” (“E-mail to Bill”, The New YorkerJanuary 10, 1994). I guess this is why things happen like they do. Time is spent making art, time is spent showing art and in a culturally homogeneous geographical space, the time spent can be spent more efficiently or economi-cally. But what would happen if we counteract this and start denouncing time and the dream of the globe-trotting-every-where-and-nowhere-artist, in favor of the artist as just one piece in a long-running, time-consuming puzzle, in search of something stable? I would like to see houses consisting of studios, a cinema, a cook book producer, a cleaning firm and a day care center sharing space and engaging in dis-cussion – not by moving a new economic and cultural class in, but by working with what actually is around. For me, this seems to be a central role of the artist. What else could we hope for than to engage in a broad social context and create work within it? In a time of globalism the mainly local artist can make some very interesting things.

Mark Frygell

Related Reading“Maybe it would be better if we worked in groups of three” Essay in two parts, Liam Gillick 2009 “Less is Bore, Against the new seriousness” Interview with Mark Leckey, Art Basel 40 2009 “The coming insurrection” The invisible committee, Semiotext(e) 2008

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On Decentralization – Some thoughts on cultural production in the

contemporary Chinese context

In August 2008, around the same time as the Olympics, I moved from New York to Beijing and started working with cultural productions – first in a contemporary art center, later in a gallery, and then with film production and distribution. Since then I’ve been trying to figure out the organizational structure of cultural production in contemporary China, and trying to understand what it means to be a cultural producer in this context. In just these few years, I saw exhibitions, biennales, and galleries popping up everywhere. Despite a brief dip during the financial crisis, auction records were set and broken – Zhang Xiaogang’s painting Forever Last-ing Love (1988) was sold for upward of 7.5 million euro at Sotheby’s Hong Kong this spring – and collectors, such as Yu Deyao, and Guan Yi, are planning to open more pri-vate museums. At the same time, government censorship remains – it is not uncommon to see the police showing up at contemporary art exhibitions, for example; film pro-duction and distribution are also extremely difficult; not to mention the recent series of actions against artist Ai Weiwei. Yet, the government also backs commercial film studios to recruit celebrities and tell the Chinese Communist Party’s history via widely distributed films like The Founding of a Republic (2009), and a hefty amount of money was spent to broadcast massive advertisements to promote China in New York’s Times Square. As a single-party state goes through a decentralization process in the framework of capi-talization and globalization, what does it mean for cultural production?

Though the shift away from state-control has no doubt been beneficial in some respects, the concerns I have with this process of decentralization via privatization have to do with consumption and standardization. When the target audi-ence we try to reach, the places that are ‘happening’, and the knowledge and information we seek to acquire are in-creasingly homogenized, does that in itself form another center?

The contemporary Chinese context is complex. For cultural producers working within governmental frameworks, cul-tural production carries multiple layers of importance for the Chinese government. Beyond the labor-intensive industries that prop up China’s economy today, the creative industry (alongside high-technology) is seen as a potential sector for new economic growth. Cultural products are seen to have the potential to attract consumers not only internationally, but also from within China’s expanding middle class and the newly rich who have started acquiring Louis Vuittons, Lamborghinis, jades and artworks. On a regional level, cul-tural institutions such as opera houses and museums have become landmarks that cities can use in marketing cam-

paigns, flaunting a cosmopolitan image in order to attract an elite workforce and investors, while raising real estate prices kick gentrification into gear. At the same time, cultural productions serve an ideological agenda for the Chinese government. Internally, they are wonderful propaganda tools. Externally, they could serve a nationalist agenda via “soft power” strategies, as in the case of the Chinese pavil-ion at the Venice Biennale in 2011. Titled “Pervasion of Chi-nese Flavors”, the project was curated by Peng Feng – vice dean of the Aesthetics and Educational Research Center at Peking University, and featured of installations by Cai Zhisong, Liang Yuanwei, Pan Gongkai, Yang Maoyuan, and Yuan Gong – each taking a ‘traditional Chinese scent’ as a departure point of their work. The project was criticized for being nationalistic by various cultural practitioners in China, most vocal were art critics Cui Cancan and Duan Jun . With Ai Weiwei still held by the government at the time the Biennale opened, international media such as the Financial Times, also questioned the conservatism on the curator and the artists’ part .

On the other hand, the international art market also af-fects cultural production in the contemporary Chinese con-text. Commercial galleries and art spaces have opened up possibilities beyond governmental channels. Simultane-ously, pressures for financial success and the desire for international prestige also push these venues to integrate themselves within the international art scene via art fairs, auctions, and networking with collectors, art critics and cu-rators. The gallery that I worked for was newly established, and already had strategic plans to participate in various re-gional and international art fairs, including ARCO and Art Basel. There was also quite a bit of hot money in the art market speculating on Chinese Contemporary Art – evident in the rapid increase of prices of artworks. The increased flow of hot money has reached the extent that financial in-vestment products have been created based solely on the speculation of artworks.

In his article “Immaterial Labour”, Maurizio Lazzarato notes that immaterial labour produces first and foremost a social relation. The raw material in this case is subjectivity and the ideological environment in which this subjectivity lives and reproduces. Lazzarato uses the “Aesthetic Model” of author, reproduction and reception to illustrate how immate-rial labour functions in a capitalist framework . He argues that, as industry mobilizes communication and marketing strategies to gather information, the public (the addressee of ideological production) becomes “a constitutive element of the production process” , constructing a market via a creative process involving both producer and the consumer. As reproduction becomes a mass reproduction organized according to the imperatives of profitability, authorship loses its individual dimension and becomes part of an industri-ally organized production process. The ideological product tends to assume the form of a commodity, and becomes the

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intersection where human power, knowledge, and action meet, and produce “new stratifications of reality”.

The collectors, curators and critics my colleagues and I tried to reach via channels such as exhibitions, publications, fairs, auctions, events, symposiums, lectures, chit-chat, advice and questions, their likes, dislikes, tastes, and ideals, have consciously or unconsciously become part of the cultural products we produced. The Chinese context contains mul-tiple players and a variety of agendas, and one must keep in mind that cultural producers do not necessarily address a single target audience. The Chinese government could ad-dress itself to international investors or the country’s urban elites, for example, just as the regional government would. Yet these addressees often overlap with art market practi-tioners’ target audience.

I must say these ‘audience-centered’ strategies have brought some surreal moments. To see a gallery filled with Salvador Dalí’s works in an art fair in Shanghai counts as one of them. Supposedly, Dalí would sell well to the newly rich, as he is well known enough in China and his works easily recognizable – perfect to flaunt as status symbols. Indeed, I later learned that almost all the works displayed were sold. Perhaps it is less comical when cultural produc-tions, and the context in which these productions occur, seem increasingly similar. I’ve seen countless artworks and exhibitions that were influenced by, or made in correspond-ence with Western-centric art history and art theory canons; some exploit market gains by catering to specific political views – pro- or anti- Chinese government, for example – while many galleries and auction houses correspond to the memories, tastes and preferences of the rising upper middle class in China. At the same time, Chinese collec-tors start to show up en masse in Sotheby’s and Christies, Venice and Basel. I am not here to argue for a separate, ‘Chinese’, nationalistic art canon – not at all. But as one ‘center’ decentralizes, only to give way to cultural produc-tions following another ‘center’, isn’t it also cause for alarm?Lazzarato attempts to place the capitalist in an ecology of cultural production. “Economics”, he argues, can “only ap-propriate the forms and products of this cooperation”. As the capitalist “does not produce the forms and contents of im-material labor…for economics there remains only the pos-sibility of managing and regulating the activity of immaterial labor and creating some devices for control and creation control and creation of the public /consumer by means of the control of communication and information technologies and their organizational processes.”

In the contemporary Chinese context, while it is true that forms and contents of cultural production lay in the hands of cultural producers influenced by target audiences com-posed of government bureaucrats and/or high-end consum-ers, it is sometimes also difficult to draw clear lines between the figures of the ‘capitalist’ and the ‘author’. Some cultural

producers, through familiarity with the target audience (on personal level, or through access to relevant information), were able to become entrepreneurs themselves. Artists, too, can become hot commodities once they gain interna-tional recognition, or achieve high prices with their artworks, affording them the power to choose gallerists to work with, on their terms. Some ‘capitalists’, as they become familiar with cultural production, also occasionally take on the role of content provider, responding to the audience’s interest in art investment by writing on the topic, curating shows, or establishing their own museums.

If these ‘success stories’ sound too good to be true, they probably are. It is unarguable that China’s emergent class of cultural entrepreneurs, no matter what ideological agen-da they serve, has a great deal of control in the organiza-tional process and flow of information, via their choice of target audience, producer, venue or distribution channel. Lazzarato notes that both postindustrial enterprise and economy are founded on the manipulation of information. The prerequisite of these ‘success stories’ is the submission to a capitalistic production structure and the manipulation and flow of information. Aren’t censorship, self-censorship and the increasing similarity of cultural production – their forms as well as their contexts – proof of just that?What possibilities are left, then, for cultural producers in China? Some are very good at navigating this capitalist structure to bring ideological products forward – many col-lectors and foundations even support them. But what op-tions are available for those who do not wish to submit? Could we also expand the audience we target, beyond gal-leries, museums, biennales, auction houses, Venice, and Basel, and into, say, suburbs, malls, factories, farms, and villages? Could we, instead of turning the margins of a cos-mopolitan center into commodities, relocate these centers? Could we, through knowledge sharing, decentralize infor-mation and diversify its distribution channels? Could the au-dience become producers themselves?

Xueyin Chen

REFERENCES 崔崔崔. “崔崔崔崔崔——2011崔崔崔崔崔崔崔崔崔.” 崔崔崔崔. 10 June 2011. Web. 23 Nov. 2011. <http://blog.artintern.net/blogs/articleinfo/can/218264>. 崔崔. “崔崔崔崔崔——2011崔崔崔崔崔崔崔.” 崔崔崔崔. 20 Mar. 2011. Web. 23 Nov. 2011. <http://blog.artintern.net/blogs/articlein-fo/duanjun/193809>. Lazzarato, Maurizio. “Immaterial Labour.” Radical Thoughts in Italy: A Potential Politics (Theory Out of Bounds). Ed. Paolo Virno, Michael Hardt. University of Minnesota Press, 1996. 132-147. Spence, Rachel. “Chinese Pavilion.” FT.com. Financial Times, 03 June 2011. Web. 23 Nov. 2011. <http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/58f2a33c-8d56-11e0-bf23-00144feab49a.html>.

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Kulenovic Collection

Sometimes visiting a museum is less about the exhibitions and more about the experience. Perhaps you’ve had an ex-perience like the one I’m talking about; maybe you’ve been to Paris and visited the Louvre, only to find the droves of visitors piled around the Mona Lisa flashing cameras more fascinating than the painting itself; maybe, in Los Angeles, you questioned your own sanity at the Museum of Juras-sic Technology? Sometimes, the museum encounter is one that is curated by chance and timing.

On a recent visit to Karlskrona, Sweden, I stumbled upon The Kulenovic Collection, a museum that opened in 2009 and is housed underground in a former water tower in the city centre. It is owned and operated by Bosnian expatriate and artist, Rizah Kulenovic, heir to the collection of original masterworks passed down from his family who started the collection five hundred years ago. The collection consists of art spanning 5000 years of history, including works by

Raphael, Rembrandt, Leonardo, Caravaggio, and other canonized giants like Matisse, Picasso, Kandinsky, Con-stable, Bruegels and Van Gogh, amongst a large body of ancient ceramics. One would imagine that a collection of this magnitude would draw crowds and employ numerous security guards and staff, but that is not the case. During my visit, my partner and I were the only two visitors in the entire museum.

The entrance to the museum is actually the entrance to a restaurant and café, so upon entering, it is unclear where to go to see the collection. We were greeted by a man who jumped from his seat exclaiming, “Oh! The museum!” lead-ing us downstairs to view the collection for the modest en-trance fee of 50 kronor. The man opened up the doors to a round basement room full of paintings and objects. It was immediately apparent that the museum’s methods of dis-play were unconventional; artworks hung on brick walls of

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a basement room with very little emphasis on museologi-cal preservation standards and security measures. Printed email correspondence, digital reproductions, books and random artifacts are presented alongside the artworks. These modes of display and care may lead one to believe that it couldn’t possibly be true that a collection of this cali-bre would be housed so nonchalantly in the centre of a Swedish naval harbour town. But then again, in the hands of a private owner, anything is possible.

Within five minutes of our visit, we learned that the man who let us in was Rizah Kulenovic himself. He gave us a tour consisting of explanations and theories that proved the works in the collection were authentic – even though we had not given him any indication that we doubted their authentic-ity. He also instructed us on precisely where to stand when viewing the paintings. While looking at the painting, Nativity (date unknown, c. 16th century) by Leonardo da Vinci, posi-tioned above a fake flower in a vase, we were told to follow a half moon grid on the floor and look at how the eyes fol-lowed our every movement. My partner leaned over to me and whispered, “Do you think this is for real? I feel like we’ve just entered a book.”

We continued to look around and just before leaving the museum, Mr. Kulenovic told us that he was also a famous artist who had recently been asked to have a show in New York. Glancing out of a door in the museum, I noticed a small art studio. I tried to see the work inside, but it was too dark and the only things I could recognize were reproduc-tions, an easel, and some tubes of paint.

After our visit, my partner and I walked around the city aim-lessly looking for a place to have dinner. We came upon a restaurant called Montmartre that looked promising. The minute we walked inside, I noticed painted reproductions of famous artworks, hung salon style, all over the walls. I im-mediately thought my brain was playing tricks on me, as the artwork felt like a continuation of the museum I had just left. I glanced closely at one work and noticed the signature on the bottom right read, ‘RizaK’. I could not believe it. It was a work by Rizah Kulenovic! While we enjoyed our dinner, we couldn’t stop talking about the museum and whether or not the works were real, if Kulenovic painted them, or if it had any connection to the restaurant. At the very end of our meal, while paying the bill, we noticed the staff were wear-ing shirts that read ‘Kulenovic Collection’.

Later that evening, I found out that Rizah Kulenovic’s broth-er operated the restaurant and the mystery was more or less solved. I am still not sure about the legitimacy of the artworks in question, but I am certain that the experience of visiting the Kulenovic Collection was about as authentic as it gets.

Laura Hatfield

Signals from the woods:Research, knowledge and synchronicity

Unfamiliar with the phenomenon of Sasquatch – but slightly more with that of a ‘research center’ – I was pleased to read about the project, ‘Sasquatch Research Center GBG Con-vention No.1’, and its ‘improper’ and somewhat unexpected way of combining these two phenomena under the roof of an artist-run space. The space, Vita Rosen, is mainly used as studio and consists of two smaller white cubish rooms located in a house about to be torn down near Stigberg-storget.

During three days, David Kaleva Karlsson and Johan Björck’s project of forming a society around the Sasquatch – also known as ‘Bigfoot’, the folkloric ape-like creature that has been ‘sighted’ since the 19th century and widely depict-ed in Canadian and U.S. culture – featured a combination of painting, drawing and sculpture as well as a series of infor-mal talks that collected stories and ‘traces’ of the phenom-enon. A twenty-minute performance by the two artists dur-ing the opening night also featured several of these ‘traces’, including a composition that combined repetitive drumming on a tree stump ‘instrument’ with found audio recordings of ‘Bigfoot’, which the artists mixed together into a sound piece. An obvious ‘70s style played out in the performance, and the topics were raised with a certain crude or trippy aesthetic that put the concept of forming a society within a strong nostalgia for this period in general.

On the second day of the ‘convention’ Laura Piasta, stu-dent at Umeå Academy of Fine Arts, presented a historical overview of Sasquatch in British Columbia, from different modes of representation in Canadian folklore culture until today. The main idea of her presentation was the relation-ship between nature and culture; or, to be more specific, the understanding of Sasquatch as a metaphor for something in-between. As a counterbalance, Sebastian Wahlforss, also a student at Umeå Academy of Fine Arts, brought up notions such as ‘paranormal’ or ‘parallel worlds’, terms that traditionally refer to the limits of science, or what is outside

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science’s capacity to measure. Wahlforss also brought up Carl Jung’s term, synchronicity (which basically means an experience of meaningful occult coincidence), the notion of hypnagogia (meaning the transition state between wakeful-ness and sleep), and studies made on the natural psyche-delic dimethyltryptamine, or DMT.

To claim a ‘center’ in what’s understood as the ‘margin’ is maybe a well-tried recipe, but I would say it fits in different ways in this case. The coincidence of a fine arts research center opening at Valand on the 10th October, just a week before the Sasquatch Research Center, is specifically inter-esting as part of the picture. As we know, more scientifically oriented terms such as ‘research’ and ‘inquiry’ have been internalized into the everyday language of art education as a silent, common agreement within fine art institutions. The Sasquatch Research Center could therefore be understood as reactionary: a re-action to the dominating discourse within established institutions in Gothenburg. Or, it could be seen as a parallel development and a symptom of broader social and economic changes. Anyway, it certainly raises questions about knowledge production, such as, what is a research center in the first place?

Looking back on the history of the notion of artistic research, Tom Holert describes the movement from Asger Jorn’s claim in 1955 that “artistic research is identical with human science”, to Allan Kaprow’s notion of ‘avant-garde think tanks’ preached since 1964, and Isabelle Graw’s argument in the 1990s that research meant:

“the construction of a reality in which imaginary problems, as problems of the imaginary, can serve as models subject to experimental treatment. The beholder is invited to engage the artists’ frequently idiosyncratic research endeavors in all their aspects and details, but is also free to limit herself to contemplating the aesthetic form in which the objects of re-search are presented.”

Asking whether research is art or not, is not the right ques-tion to me. Rather, it’s what do you do with it that counts; knowledge, then what? What do you do with it? By putting

an artist-run space and an institution in parallel, I want to emphasize questions about where the ‘signal’ is coming from, and who is receiving it. Moreover, who wants you to receive it? They might be collected signals from Bigfoot’s woods, or they might be signals from the State Education Department. They might even be coming from somewhere else. One could of course get deeper into the global politics of university economics and ask, who funds an institution-al artistic research center? What does the sender expect from its receiver? What is the message received? How is it measured? Who benefits from the knowledge produced in fine art research centers? As a response to questions such as these, ‘Bigfoot’ might be the optimal metaphor for possibilities. Combining a folk-lore myth with the nonetheless obscure concept ‘research center’ is a way of calling the hierarchies surrounding knowl-edge and knowledge production into question. One inter-esting detail about the presentations at the Sasquatch Re-search Center was how the two artists, the initiators of this project and the ones who invited people for these lectures, themselves took part in learning from these two lectures. They were a part of the audience, instead of performing the role of ‘teachers’. Which, I must say, was a rather ‘flat’ peda-gogical approach in the sense that the project became part of a learning process together with the audience, not only delivered to or for the audience. In other words, the exhibi-tion became more about forming a temporary community, rather than a site for education.

One could understand the concept behind the “Sasquatch Research Center GBG Convention No.1” with a grain of salt, as an ironic play with these ideas. But I prefer to un-derstand it very seriously, as a critical comment to present conditions. It might be old news, but once again, a ‘bloom-ing’ pop-up community is in the periphery.

Sara Lindeborg

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All of the AboveJohn Armleder

Palais de Tokyo, Oct. 18th - Dec. 31st 2011

Throughout this year, Palais de Tokyo is under construction. As the institution tells its visitors, the physical restriction of this circumstance can be seen as an incitement to creativ-ity. And yet, the situation is plastic, allowing for alterations of the very nature of the site. This has not failed to enter into the exhibitions underway in the interim spaces and rooms that remain open to the public. In one such space is ‘All of the Above’, an exhibition curated by artist John Armleder. Located in the former auditorium, the exhibition is part of Palais de Tokyo’s Carte Blanche series which, according to the show’s literature, has the ambition to “map the artist’s brain, desires, and influences” in order to “forge aesthetic links from a novel angle.” As a definition of the unlimited au-thority given to the artist, these words rely on their self-evi-dence not to contradict themselves. Yet, when questioned, their call for the artist’s intellectual, libidinal and art-historical investments overdetermine the exhibition’s meaning.

Armleder – a long-time opponent of the rationality, coher-ence and posterity found within galleries and museums – is often associated with neo-geometric conceptualism. He is a performance artist and painter sprung from the fluxus move-ment, continuously working between art and design, and expanding his conceptual approaches from installation to exhibition. Following John Cage, Armleder prefers chance methods of display, and works such as the famous furniture-and-painting installations, which anticipate art’s fading from memory into decor, have served to further deconstruct the artistic subject. He is also known for his wall paintings that

have their own take on site-specificity: rather than overcom-ing the artwork as a decorative commodity, the wall paint-ings strive to achieve this goal by becoming part of the mi-lieu from the beginning.

Like most of Armleder’s own work, the majority of the art-works on view are without titles. Yet, no matter how much they serve to illustrate the (inevitable) demise of the art ob-ject, they remain a collection of prominent artworks from the 1960s onward. As a follow up to ‘None of the Above’, Armleder’s 2004 exhibition at the Swiss Institute in New York, the exhibition also presents the works of 30 artists. Yet, while ‘None of the Above’ scattered small and immate-rial works across the spaces of the gallery, ‘All of the Above’ collects larger works in different mediums. The installation includes as its chronological and referential starting point two assemblages by Bruce Conner and Wallace Bernman. Further on there is a photograph from Laurie Simmons’ New York Picture project (1976 - 2002), and Untitled (1966 - 1969) a geometric abstract painting by Danish abstract painter Poul Gernes who was known for his refusal to let his person be associated to his works and who, at the end of his career did only wall paintings. Elsewhere were several of Al-lan McCollum’s Surrogate Paintings (1987 - 1992), Michael Smith’s parodic pastiche video Go for it, Mike (1984), and Untitled (2002), a sculpture by contemporary Swiss artist Valentin Carron, whose work uses art-historical forms and symbols that have become disassociated from their crea-tors and their signifying function.

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This collection of sculptures, prints, drawings, paintings and videos are clustered on three levels of scaffolding in the back of the room, not only causing the works to screen each other but also restricting the perspective of the viewer. Works on the furthest and highest level are impossible to see in their entirety, indeed making them part of the back-drop. Across from the chaotic installation, which is lit by fluorescent bulbs, are two rows of benches that further fix the room’s theatricality. While this may encourage visitors to view the exhibition from a fixed, seated position, this ar-rangement nevertheless frustrates any wish for an optimal view, either of the exhibition as whole or of singular works. In this sense, the instinctive relation between viewer and work is elegantly obstructed, and is never more clear than when one is sitting on one of the benches. As visitors move to find favorable points of view and multiply the fragmented experience, the benches stand behind them as a reminder of the privileged position that has been abandoned.

Armleder’s institutional critique is problematic, however, in that it does not engage with the situation of carte blanche itself, nor its enfolding into the construction of place. His curating seems to say that the point at which art becomes a real life-project is when it is realized as decor. But by not taking this act of profanity against artworks to its full conclu-sion – or taking seriously the institutional imperative to map the artist’s reason and desire – Armleder’s humble critical approach loses its antagonism.

Patrik Haggren

Informal Index of Independent/Artist-Run Initiatives in Göteborg

Compiled with the help of Johan Landgren, Beatrice Marklund and Matthew Rana

3:e VåningenSockerbruket 9, 414 51 http://3vaningen.seinfo@3vaningen.se

AtalanteÖvre Husargatan 1, 411 22 http://www.atalante.org/atalante@atalante.org

Bezdomny AteljéerTredje Långgatan 13A 413 03http://tredjelanggatan13a.wordpress.com/

Clandestino InstitutTredje Långgatan 13b, 413 03 http://clandestinoinstitut.org/info@bwanaclub.org

Dånk Collectivehttp://daonk.org/info@daonk.org

DIYhttp://www.d-i-y.securatorgruppendiy@gmail.com

Galleri 54Kastellgatan 7, 413 07http://www.galleri54.comgalleri54@natverkstan.net

Galleri BoxKastellgatan 10, 411 22http://www.galleribox.seinfo@galleribox.se

Galleri KC Erik Dahlbergsgatan 6, 411 26http://www.kc-vast.se/kc-vast@konstnarcentrum.org

Galleri OROKarl johansgatan 146, 414 51 http://www.orosmoment.comhej@orosmoment.com

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Geigerhttp://geigermusik.sehttp://www.facebook.com/geigermusikgeiger@geigermusik.se

Göteborgs konstförening Södra Vägen 2, 412 54 info@goteborgskonstforening.org

HitÄlvsborgsgatan 52, 414 72 http://www.h-i-t.se/info@h-i-t.se

Kolonihttp://www.kolonigbg.se/http://www.myspace.com/kolonigbg

MAP - Mobile Art ProductionTeatergatan 36, 411 35 www.mobileartproduction.se

Martini ProjectsSkårs Led 2, 412 63 http://martiniprojects.tumblr.com/martiniprojects@gmail.com

Skup Palet @ Hey, it’s Enrico Palazzo!Sockerbruket 20-22 415 51 http://skuppalet.org/info@skuppalet.org

Vita RosenBangatan 10, 414 63 http://vitarosen.tumblr.com/

VARV Böckerhttp://www.varv.orginfo@varv.org

Whose Museum? http://www.whosemuseum.orginfo@whosemuseum.org

WITNAShttp://www.witnas.org

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