Thursday 30 April 2009

Back from India

A beautiful insight into their travel to India and the varied experiences that they were subjected to - the exhibition 'Back from India' tells the stories of seven Swiss graphic novelists.

'Back from India' is an exhibition of work contributed by graphic novelists Andrea Caprez, Andreas Gefe, Christophe Badoux, Christoph Schuler, Kati Rickenbach, Michael Husmann Tschäni and Pascale Mira Tschäni on their return to Switzerland from India. The exhibition captures their impression of India and the experiences they had during their travels.

30 April - 17 May 2009
Exhibition at 14 Ecke Viadukt, Josefstrasse, 8005 Zurich

30 April at 1800 hrs
Book presentation -Kulbhushan Meets Stoeckli, a comic by Indian and Swiss graphic novelists

10 May - 1900 hrs
Christoph Schuler reads from his Indian diaries

16 May - 1900 to 0400 hrs
Bhangra Disco (DJ Andoine)

Opening Timings:
Thursday and Friday: 1700 - 2000 hrs
Saturday and Sunday: 1400 - 1800 hrs

To view details click here
Swiss Video Lounge

Bernhard Bischoff presents works of 8 Swiss video artists to a select audience at the Pro Helvetia New Delhi office on Monday 27 April at 7 pm.

Bernhard Bischoff presents works of 8 Swiss video artists to a select audience at the Pro Helvetia New Delhi office on Monday 27 April at 7 pm.
The presentation includes the works of:
Thomas Galler, Bernhard Huwiler, Reto Leibundgut, Andrea Loux, Laurent Schmid, Dominik Stauch, Margot Zanni and Com&Com

Details of the presentation by Bernhard Bischoff

Com&Com 
‹SIDE BY SIDE›, 2002, 4’30’’, 35mm, Loop Musik: 
Com&Com feat. Dieter Meier Courtesy Kunsthaus Zurich and Kunstmuseum Kt. Thurgau Com & Com is an artists duo, which does constantly fathom the borders of the „good“ taste in art. In perfectly elaborated parodies of genres the two artists question multilayered the system of art, resp. culture. Within the scope of their Swiss trilogy they stage the swift music video ‹Side by Side›, in which in cooperation with Dieter Meier (Yello) the alleged dream factory Formula One on one hand, on the other hand they appreciative pull its leg. (BB)

Thomas Galler 
‹Murder›, 2002, Video, Colour, Stereo sound, 2'27'', Loop Thomas G. is the master of appropriation. Often times he is working with ‹Found Footage› and generates with objects trouvés - be they medial or material - his own stories. For ‹Murder› he used clips from Stanley Kubricks ‹The Shining› and created from a know scene a new short story - brilliant.

Bernhard Huwiler 
‹0,4702›, 2001, 3'40", Loop In ‹0,4702› Huwiler is testing the capability of a video camera by letting her circle around him on a rope. 0,4702 amounts the slow motion coefficient, in such a way as to visualise for the first time the actually briskly dashing along landscapes. Insomuch it is an interesting side effect that the work becomes a self-portrait of the special class. Astonishing and fascinating, it is a masterpiece in assembly and motion.

Reto Leibundgut 
‹Wandstück›, 2007, 4’42’’, Loop Music: Dieter Seibt, Beat & Ernesto Feller, Cut: Diana Dodson Rhythmically tuned on the music a wall of wooden boards is growing. Reto Leibundgut, master in the use of garbage material has performance like nailed his ample collection of coloured wooden planks to the wall. Originated is a kind of an art collage, a “Work-in-Progress-Werk“ par excellence - and a wonderful, ephemeral wall structure / sculpture.

Andrea Loux 
‹Short Cuts: pilot (sublimation)›, 2008, 4’35’’, Loop Music: Dieter Seibt, Beat & Ernesto Feller, Cut: Diana Dodson A model aircraft pilot lets his aeroplane fly higher and higher. Indefatigable the aeroplane turns around, until it disappears in the continuum of space and time - just as the pilot does dissolve alike and gradually becomes a part of the sky.

Laurent Schmid 
‹Buzz›, 2008, video animation, 3’30’’, Loop Laurent Schmid knows how to put different layers together. With his text animations he evocates on one hand stellar constellations, which bear witness to a generally romantic understand, on the other hand the “single stars” become letters, which form to words, as a realisation of dreams and wishes.

Dominik Stauch 
‹Radar Love›, 2004, DVD, 2’20’’, Loop (Drums performed by Tom Beck) A swift circle animation from Dominik Stauch. Indefatigably the drums make the rhythm, the concentric circles attract everyone. Almost hypnotic there’s nothing else to do, than stare in the middle and loose the relation between space an time.

Margot Zanni 
‹Grosses Solo for Ahmed›, 2007, video animation, 6 Min., Loop A wonderful animation in a lively square of Kairo/Egypt. She took out all cars an human beings, exept one single person – a utopy of a relaxed place. 
Total duration of the show 30 min 24 sec.   
For more information on Bernhard Bischoff visit www.videokunst.ch
Artist in Residence Om Soorya's work at Kunst Halle

Indian artist Om Soorya, currently in Switzerland on the artist in residence programme, exhibits his recent work at Kunst Halle, St. Gallen.

Kunst Halle St Gallen is pleased to present 
the work of the Indian artist Om Soorya in the lobby of the Kunst Halle St. Gallen. 

Within the artist in residence program of Pro Helvetia, Om Soorya spent the last two months in St. Gallen. Om Soorya’s series of watercolours, «Silence-Breathless», which deals with the slavery in his country and its impact on today’s India, will be exhibited until 31 May.
Presentation of work and bar: Wednesday, 6 May 2009, 6 – 8 p.m.
The artist will be present.

Om Soorya’s work (*1977, India) is concerned with the history of India and especially the urbanisation of the country. The artist interweaves these topics with his own past, creating dreamlike images. His latest exhibitions took place in Shanghai (2009), New Delhi, Mumbai (2008) and New York (2007).

Breathless silence; the forgotten folk lines…
Om Soorya, a young emerging artist from India, will be in Kunst Halle until 30 May 2009. A Kerela born artist, who now lives and works in Hyderabad, Om’s works are surreal dream-like landscapes that question what is real and what is perceived.

Born in 1977, the Kerala based artist’s works underline the fact that aesthetics are as important to him as content. Om Soorya is known for his surreal landscapes occupied by both positive and negative energies that he depicts in many fascinating forms. The artist’s usage of pigment is intuitive, albeit fluid. His rich tones coupled with lines varying from watery blurs seem much like a twilight zone.

"The project I am engaged with here is a kind of extension of works what I have been doing for a while. Inherently, this body of work will look to the certain rural aspects of my life. It’s a small autobiographical unwritten history of a certain locality where I was spent my childhood in north of Kerala/India.   It is in a miniature format, and the medium is water color on paper. Over here I travel through my past to locate myself, to reach to my route as an artist as well to search the serenity of the past where I was very close to the nature. When I look back to my childhood, I see a lot of visual possibilities. It’s not just nostalgic exercise, but I evolve myself to seek out the contradiction between my present urban life and the local memoir.

It is a combination of personal history, stories; folk elements and socio-political-cultural history of a particular time of a locality. It may be a very illustrative fictional way of representing intimate history.  For me there is no other way of beholding it. Ultimately, it shares an idea of local perceptiveness with the global perception. ( two images from this series are attached)"

Om Soorya - 2009 / St. Gallen, Switzerland
Image 1: A thin red line rooted in the history…., water color on paper, 32x24cm, 2009
Image 2: The men; they all took bath together in the same canal, water color on paper, 32x24cm,2009
Swiss artist Nina Weber

Swiss artist Nina Weber, currently on a residency shares work that she has done at Vyom Centre in Jaipur. [dated April 2009]

Pro Helvetia and Vyom Arts Centre cordially invite you to an exhibition of work by Nina Weber, artist-in-residence from Switzerland

Smt. Kiran Soni Gupta (IAS) Divisional Commissioner, Jaipur will inaugurate the exhibition at 6:30 pm on Wednesday 29 April 2009 at Sudarshan Art Gallery, Jawahar Kala Kendra, J.L.N. Marg, Jaipur

The exhibition will remain open to the public till 5 May 2009 between 11:00 am and 7:00 pm daily.

Nina Weber, the young artist from Zurich has a degree in Arts from the ZHdK (Zurich University of Arts). She is known for her ink drawings, installations, sculptures and paintings. Her multifaceted talent is infused with sensitivity that merges the man-made world and the world of nature. Her imagery is taken from both these worlds and as she merges the two worlds, she evokes a symbolic world that is real as well has a dreamlike quality. Nevertheless it is a commentary on the state of things.

As an artist-in-residence since December 2008 at the Vyom Arts Centre, Jaipur, she has been painting images that have a different cultural context. These images have been taken from life in the Pink City as seen through her eyes. She is fascinated by the temples at crossroads, the images of Shiva and Kali, the easy pace of life with monkeys, dogs, cows, camels and elephants interwoven into daily life. The simplistic images of Hanuman or Balaji look like an abstract sculpture to her. She is fascinated by the spontaneous nature of the city where the world of animals coexists peacefully with humans. Religion is still another aspect of life that surprises Nina with its animated presence in the life of the people here. God is not a distant entity for an Indian. He is now and here, as a part of life, invoked easily like an approachable friend.

These observations have inspired her vibrant paintings and black ink drawings. The homogeneous nature of Indian life is expressed in her drawings that are populated with people, plants, flowers, animals and gods. Back at home, her vocabulary symbolised a world, where perfection had taken over beauty of nature. Here in India, and in Jaipur, the living and inclusive nature of life expresses itself as a positive comment.

Mridul Bhasin Jaipur, April 09