maandag 23 november 2015

High performance photohumor & more

Or something like that. The original point of departure was a misfired proposal for the symposium photography performing humor which has been postponed... having a background in all these concepts, Patrick Morarescu and I thought we might do something with it and decided to open a small investigative studio at Buktapaktop in Brussels in advance of said symposium... we even got friends to fly in from Switzerland and Germany for what ended up being a bit of Belgian shut- & lockdown tourism...
Anyway, we had prepared some ludicrous questions based on Barthe’s Camera Lucida, referring to the ‘affective turn’ mentioned in the symposium’s open call, as well as various investigations into the ‘Augenblick’ (blink-of-eye-moment) by such as Karl-Heinz Bohrer (Ästhetische Negativität) and Vilém Flusser (Bildmischung) as well as our own hare-brained ideas concerning the subject, object, ocular operator...

Luck would have it that the run-up to our slapstick operation would be marred by the terror attacks in Paris, reminding us as Charlie Hebdo did - that being funny can cost you dear... but is it a reason to stop? No- so rather than postponing as so many, we decided to go ahead and wing it. The small impromptu studio was based on basic historic models, using daylight and diffusion through drapes & curtains, some props and attitudes... or as one sitter said, nomadic studios as one still finds in far-flung places and which used to wander about our fairground circuits... 

Perhaps because of the lockdown a lot of the sitters opted for the new fashion of covering your face, everyone is beginning to hide behind veils and headdress, balaclava’s and bataclans.... except those who are about to blow themselves up... a different kind of blow-up than we considered in the 60’s... even the kids decided democratically not to participate for fear of having themselves displayed on facelook and/or other unsavory social media... now that imagery has become so free-for-all (everyone pays), no-one wants it any more... 

(one of P.M.’s projects is ‘performing grounds’ in which no humans figure but which speaks of human activity and intervention in the landscape and architecture of our public space – maybe that will be all we can  document (doculent?) in the future... without permission)

After a rather slow start the studio warmed up with the presence of friends, and an interesting series of discreet portraits were produced... the second part of the operation was curtailed somewhat by the fact there was no longer a need for a preparatory discussion for the upcoming symposium, and essentially boiled down to a short (presumably comic) performative send-off of the proceedings after which some socializing and banter rounded off the evening, before heading off into the uncertain night.


Heinrich O

zaterdag 16 mei 2015

Back on track (river) barge/plot

High time to update or rathe resuscitate this channel, having been off on a tangent again ….and still now,
- just hanging on… and getting things done by fluke. 
As it is Gruzemayer has an office as it were, to redress the gap after the 'former offices' were closed... tat's quite a bit of dust - years ago... what eight or so? anyway after an introductory get together the first effort will be a sort of informal info-office dealing with the activities of a friendly boat indeed, the Tenace, on tour through Belgium along what's laft of a once extensive and efficient canal system.






see also  'Tenace on Tour'



We will be accompanying the good boat through the province of Hainaut and perhaps even rekindle an old project while we're at it
Die Landschaft / a project by PDC & DMM...  but that is still a big question... more wishful thinking i guess...
anyway the good boat Tenace is already on it't way and will be ascending at Ronquières on, yet ascension sunday… but it seems the musicians couldn’t make it

 so it’s now slated for monday the 18th of may

oops, news just in - no ascension concert, need to move on, sorry, check site for next move



after that plod on water-wise past La Louvière, and the the next boat-lift Strepy-Thieu, where new and old meet…



after that Mons, visiting the goings-on of this year’s cultural capital including a project by Lise Duclaux at the ‘Carrosse’  home for mentally and phiscally disadvantaged at St Symphorien, just on the city limits… part of an overall participation outsider art project for a show called ‘Monsens’ opening at the BAM on june 20th…



( see also sites liseduclaux and monsens for more and update info...)



...but back to our musical barge Tenace - it will be picking up and disgorging passengers and bicycle followers and then continue along the canal Nimy-Blaton-Peronnes, intervening with wildcard-wildcat art along the way, a bit like hobo-signs and such, to Peruwelz, where a longer stay of two weeks and activities of all sorts will take place, supporded by the very interestingly active local art centre ‘Arrêt 59’ (across from the train station) - and there will be a sort of info-expo-office at the rue de Roucourt 67 (Dépendance interdépendante du bureau G... Depinterdep)…


more soon