Thursday 28 February 2013

Artist-in-Lab Indo-Swiss Residency Exchange 2012/13

Announcing the names of the recipients of the Artist-in-Lab Indo-Swiss Residency which is supported by swissnex India and Pro Helvetia New Delhi.

Supported by swissnex India and Pro Helvetia – Swiss Arts Council

the artists-in-labs programme  
is a collaboration between the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) and the National Center for Biological Sciences, NCBS, in Bangalore, India.

This residency exchange programme will be conducted under the direction of the Artists in Labs research group at ZHdK.

Awardees for 2012/ 2013:

Neha Thakar, an artist from India, will be a resident at the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology (EAWAG), Zurich from 1 November 2012 - 31 January 2013 and 

Dominique Lämmli, an artist from Switzerland, will reside at the National Center for Biological Sciences, NCBS, in Bangalore, India from 4 December 2012- 28 February 2013.

Introduction

Art and science constitute two cultures, which have really grown apart. The Swiss Artistsinlabs program is a cultural program devoted to current debates and discourses that can help art and science to gain a closer understanding of each other. The intention of the ail program is to share common goals, to broaden the dialogue, generate ideas and raise awareness of the contributions both artists and scientists can make to the larger challenges of our time. Providing a research environment where these experiments can take place makes all the difference.

The ail co-operation with Swiss Science laboratories is a conscious attempt to encourage the development of the primary creative forces shared by both disciplines: the quest for interpretations of nature, matter and human desire as well as the interest to comprehend, explore, reveal, sustain, create and build.

Aims

The aims of the residency programme are:

to give artists the opportunity to be immersed inside the culture of scientific research in order to develop their interpretations and inspire their content.

to allow the artists to have an actual “hands on” access to the solid raw materials, pertinent debates and scientific tools to encourage unique potentials and allow them to attend relevant lectures and conferences held by the scientists themselves.

to help scientists gain some insight into the world of contemporary art, aesthetic development and the semiotics of communication that are used by artists in order to reach the general public.

to encourage further collaboration between both parties including an extension of discourse and an exchange of research practices and methodologies.

Focus

Science Disciplines: life sciences, physics, cognition, engineering and computing

Art Disciplines: art researchers-film, video, new media, sound art, sculpture, architecture, theatre and dance.

More: http://artistsinlabs.ch/lang/en/
Swiss musician Don Li to perform in New Delhi
‘Sound Art and Technology : An International Festival on Music, Art and Technology’.

Swiss composer and musician Don Li is going to be in India for ‘Sound Art and Technology : An International Festival on Music, Art and Technology’ which is scheduled to take place in Delhi this February.

Date: 20 & 21 February 2013 
Venue: Max Mueller Bhavan, New Delhi
Programme

Synopsis: S.A.T is a project dedicated to creativity, culture and technology. It is a collaborative international artistic project to be launched in India. At a time in the history of the arts where digital technology has revolutionized distribution, democratized access, and re-imagined the scope and scale with which an artist can create a vision and reach an audience, S.A.T is a new kind of arts and culture channel for a new kind of world.

The series will begin with a collection of specially choreographed music performances, curated artworks, panel discussions and live performances from artists/ academics/ curators from across the world. The Festival will work on integrating lesser-known musical traditions into the project. SAT is viewed as an important intervention in this direction. SAT will evolve an interdisciplinary framework for the creative interaction of artists with professionals from various fields.

Swiss musician Don Li 
Don Li is undoubtedly one of the visionary heads of the contemporary scene in music composition in Switzerland. His minimalism makes Li’s work fascinating, a trend that has been inspiring for numerous other musicians.

The phenomenon Orbital Garden is a synthesis of the arts. In business one talks of Corporate Identity, a brand name and a uniform product line. Here it simply has to do with a synthesis of the arts. At the centre of which stands Orbital Garden, initiated and developed by alto-saxophonist, clarinetist, composer, bandleader and organizer Don Li, a concept of musical reduction that correlates its impact to the sophisticated, exhaustive dialect between repetition and variation. In this synthesis of the arts, it reaches beyond the pure musical dimension and encompasses social, organizational and, not least, aesthetic facets.

Ensemble: Orbital Garden, 3001 - Bern, Switzerland 
President/ Artistic Director: Don Li, 3001 - Bern, Switzerland

Indian partners to attend Swiss Dance Days
Pro Helvetia is delighted to invite Anusha Lall & Abantee Dutta from Gati Dance Forum and Shiva Pathak & Raabiya Jayaram from Attakkalari to attend the Swiss Dance Days.

Pro Helvetia is delighted to invite Anusha Lall & Abantee Dutta from Gati Dance Forum, New Delhi and Shiva Pathak & Raabiya Jayaram from Attakkalari, Bangalore to attend the Swiss Dance Days scheduled to be held in Basel, Switzerland.
Writer in residence, Ruchir Joshi at iaab, Basel
Indian writer, Ruchir Joshi will be going for a writing residency to IAAB Basel as part of the Writer in Residence exchange programme.

Indian writer, Ruchir Joshi will go for a writing residency to IAAB Basel for 3 months as part of the pilot project of the Writer in Residence exchange programme between Pro Helvetia New Delhi and IAAB, Christoph Merian Stiftung.

Swiss Film at Fanatika International Documentary Festival
I love me - Actress with Down’s Syndrom by Andrea Pfalzgraf will be screened in Ahmedabad and Vadodara as part of the Fanatika International Theatre Documentary Festival.

I love me - Actress with Down’s Syndrom by Andrea Pfalzgraf will be screened in Ahmedabad and Vadodara as part of the Fanatika International Theatre Documentary Festival.

I Love Me – Actress with Down’s Syndrom by Andrea Pfalzgraf
Country: Switzerland 
Language: Swiss German

Training a woman with Down’s syndrome to be an actress? To be honest, I did not think it would really be possible. However, I grew curious when Zurich’s HORA Theatre (established by the Züriwerk Foundation) offered precisely this kind of course. It opened up a whole new world to me, thanks to then 18-year-old Julia Häusermann. She had just enrolled in this course in the summer of 2010.
One might think that shooting a film with a mentally handicapped protagonist is risky. It isn’t, though. It is, very simply, a gift. Julia taught me to live more in the present instead of always thinking about yesterday or tomorrow and, as a result, maybe forgetting about the now. This is the way Julia lives.

It took me while, however, to realize this. When we had our first interview I felt that our conversation was fun and going well. Suddenly she burst into bitter tears. I was at a loss, and the cameraman and I looked at each other in confusion. Concerned, I asked her what was wrong. “I was just remembering that Michael Jackson’s died,” the young woman sobbed in despair, tears spurting almost horizontally from her usually cheerful eyes.

When I pointed out that we were talking about her and that she was basically in good spirits, she suddenly smiled, and her misery was forgotten. That is typical of people with Down’s syndrome. It’s the moment that counts and the moment is always real, for better or worse. That’s something we experienced time and again over the past two years.

by Andrea Pfalzgraf
Hans Koch performs at Sound Reasons
An evening of live electronic music by Swiss musician Hans Koch and Ish S. The evening will feature collaborations and solo performances (edGeCut | diFfuSed beats).

An evening of live electronic music by Swiss musician Hans Koch and Ish S. The evening will feature collaborations and solo performances (edGeCut | diFfuSed beats).

Sound Reasons Festival (Live) 
An evening of live electronic music by Hans Koch and Ish S as a part of the 'Sound Reasons Festival'. The evening will feature collaborations and solo performances by Hans Koch and Ish S(edGeCut | diFfuSed beats). They will be improvising live in a solo/ duo and also re-interpreting works by difFuSed beats and edGeCut.

| Hans Koch| diFfuSed Beats | edGeCut | Ish S |
3 February I 7 pm onwards I Devi Art Foundation, Sirpur House Gurgaon 


'Sound Reasons' via this festival and various other productions will be trying to promote the contemporary transcultural strain of international electronic music and sound art in India by expanding awareness among the audience. As a part of a multidisciplinary domain for sound art and experimental electronic music - our objective at 'Sound Reasons' is to create Installations, Concerts/ Live performances along with workshops. There are various other Sound-installations and performances happening all over the City in the month of November. Please check soundreasons.in for more details and Dates plus info on other Performances

HANS KOCH
Hailing from Biel, reeds player Hans Koch has been a constant presence among improvised music’s global cream of the crop for over thirty years. Dropping a successful career as a classical clarinetist in mid-1970s Switzerland, he went ever further ahead on the path of improvisation, first exploring jazz-based idioms before venturing into more abstract forms of musical expression.

He has been working with everyone from Cecil Taylor to Fred Frith since the eighties. As a composer he has shaped the sound of Koch-Schütz-Studer since the beginning as well as working for radio-plays and film. Since the nineties he has been working with electronics as an extension of the saxes/clarinets as well as with sampling/sequencing. As a reed-player he is always working on his very own vocabulary and sound, which makes him a very unique voice on the actual scene. As we reach the end of the 2000s, Hans Koch stands as one of the foremost proponents of European improvisation, while still churning out some of the most explosive tunes around within the revered flagship of on-edge Swiss music, the Koch-Schuetz-Studer Trio. Instead of releases on prestigious labels like Intakt and ECM Koch has also been a pioneer in integrating electronic tools into his live performances, often using his laptop and software such as Max MSP to add unexpected twists and turns to his flights on the saxophone and the clarinet.

MORE: KOCH-SCHUETZ-STUDER INTAKT RECORDS

|edGeCut | diFfuSed beats | Ish S 
edGeCt is a electro Acoustic project by Ish S (Sound Reasons). The music can be described as a mixture of acoustic compositions arranged with synthetic electronic sounds that build crystalline shimmering layered music and sonic spaces. These live sets have their share of acoustic instrumentation ranging from Guitar and vocals to flute and percussions. Ish has studied Western Classical guitar and then moved into Latin American and Jazz music. These Influences and those of electronic music can be heard in the edGeCut ‘live sets’He has performed at the elecktron @ Fete De la Musiqe’ in Geneva, Art Basel and at F+F Schule fur Kunst und Medien Design in Zurich. Ish has installed sound as a solo Artist and in collaboration in the Action field Kodra, Greece / London College of Communication, London / Sarai-CSDS / Project 88, Mumbai etc Ish Shehrawat is a Composer,Guitar Player, sound artist and Producer from Delhi. He currently produces and composes music under 3 different projects, that are edGeCut, 4th World Orchestra and diFfuSeD beats (diF).
Swiss presence at India Art Fair 2013
Pro Helvetia presents Swiss video artists at the Video Lounge of the India Art Fair. The screening has been put together by Indian curators who were mentored by the Swiss curator, Mirjam Varadinis.

Pro Helvetia presents Swiss video artists at the Video Lounge of the India Art Fair. The screening has been put together by Avijna Bhattacharya and Rikimi Madhukaillya from India who have been mentored by the Swiss curator, Mirjam Varadinis.

Like the previous Edition, the 5th Edition of India Art Fair will host an exclusive Video Lounge where the visitors will have the opportunity to view video art by established and emerging artists from India and around the world. 

CURATED WALKS AT INDIA ART FAIR
India Art Fair 2013 has organised a range of curated walks for visitors. Individuals or groups will have the opportunity to explore the diverse art on display with students of art history. Swiss Curator, Mirjam Varadinis will be mentoring the students, and leading the Curated Walks Programme, supported by Pro Helvetia New Delhi.
Dates : 1st, 2nd and 3rd February 2013
Timings : 2:30, 4:00 and 5:30 pm Meeting Point : Information Desk

Mirjam Varadinis 
Mirjam Varadinis is an art historian, curator and writer based in Zürich, Switzerland. She has been a curator at Kunsthaus Zürich for the past ten years. Responsible for contemporary art at the Kunsthaus, Mirjam has curated many exhibitions including Aleksandra Mir: Switzerland and Other Islands (2006), Shifting Identities (2008), and Motion Picture(s) (2010). Mirjam has also co-curated the exhibition Broken Lines as a part of the annual art festival ‘Printemps de Septembre’ (2006) in Toulouse, France. She has edited ‘Parkett: 20 Years of Artists’ Collaborations’. As a curator she has many solo exhibitions to her credit, such as those of Rosa Barba, Adrian Paci, Mircea Cantor, Runa Islam, Tino Sehgal, Erik van Lieshout, Aleksandra Mir, Nedko Solakov, Urs Fischer, David Shrigley to name a few. In 2012, she co-curated ‘TRACK’ in Ghent (Belgium), together with Philippe Van Cauteren. In 2005 she launched the internet-platform www.azple.com in collaboration with Annie Wu.

Mirjam Varadinis is in India as the international jury member of the SKODA PRIZE 2012.

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Rikimi Madhukaillya is an independent curator and art writer. She has been researching on Modern and contemporary indian art with a focus of North eastern states. Worked with National Gallery of Modern Art and Osians- Connoisseur of Arts apart from the other activities. She has been teaching in various art institutes for the last couple of years. Currently she is an Asst. Professor at the Dept of Fine Arts, Kurukshetra University.

Avijna Bhattacharya is a freelance art writer, curator and observer currently working from Kolkata. Her involution with contemporary art began with her art schooling in Kala,bhavana , Santiniketan and Faculty of Fine Arts Baroda between the years 1998-2005, her observations and studies has been evolving ever since. Along with imagining curations, Avijna enjoys writing on art the most amid the miscellany of activities within and around the art world she has been involved in. She has been contributing articles, reviews and essays in exhibition catalogues and art magazines based in New Delhi and Kolkata since 2007.