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Avelino Sala, Plan de fuga (Brexit), 2017. Ad hoc installation Piramidón Centro de Arte Barcelona
Course Public Address. Public Art as a space for dissent (Within the Walls / Outside of the Walls)
Course directed by Avelino Sala, with the curatorial collaboration of Fernado Gómez de la Cuesta.
Continuing with the specialised Art in the Public Space training programmes, Es Baluard commits to a permanent review within artistic actions in the areas of co-existence of citizens beyond the “white box” of the museum. Part of this is to approach the works and interventions in the public space with the aim of analysing their significance, conservation and dissemination, from their very production up to the relationship with the everyday observer-spectator.
In an age like this one – which is strained – the public dimension of art positions itself as a place or an encounter of freedom for thought, as it clearly possesses that almost marginal independence that distances itself from the grand official narratives to offer itself up as space that is, somehow, “dissident”. This dissident dimension allow us to tell “other tales”.
Ever since, amongst others, Krzysztof Wodiczko changed the concept of public art and its real dimension, that art has evolved through a series of derivations that make it transcendental in the age of “globalised biennal” and the “cloned collection” in an era when the mainstream turns art into something considered as “snob”.
Which is why treating the public space as a place of metaphorical struggle and resistance is one of the most important battles waged for contemporary creation.
Public art is a space for social and political dialogue, which is trying to regain the agora, the street, the square, as a place for the transmission of knowledge through artistic actions, in a setting which, without a doubt, seems indispensable to us.
Methodology: The course is run in 4 sessions lasting 4 hours, plus one further session for the public presentation of the workshop.
First session. Theoretical subjects to be developed:
- Social exercises after that called “rotondismo” (the proliferation of roundabouts)
- Historical review of public art
- Beyond minimalism
- From Land Art to the web
- Actions in the street. The social nature of art
- Is or isn’t there such a thing as useful art?
Second session:
- Succinct presentation of the personal work of the students
- Invitation to form work groups to develop the projects
- Pooling and advice
- The proposals will be presented in teams of 4 students
Third and fourth sessions:
- Work in the physical context of the “limits” and “outside the limits” of the walls of Es Baluard.
- Development and monitoring of the projects, first theoretically and then practically.
Final day:
- Closure of workshop and public presentation of the results from it in the context of the museum. They will be temporary interventions, innocuous for the building, spaces and artworks of the museum.
Materials: Each team will have a budget of 50 Euros to invest in materials to produce the temporary intervention.
- 28th, 29th, 30th, 31st March from 4.00 pm to 8.00 pm and 1st April from 10.00 am to 2.00 pm.
- Price: 50 Euros (25% discount for Amics d’Es Baluard).
- There is a maximum of 15 places on the course, and the minimum number of participants is 12 (if this quota is not reached, the course will not take place).
- The deadline for enrolment is 10th March 2017.
- To enrol, applicants must send a CV, a summary of their professional experience covering a maximum of half a page, a letter of intent and motivations for taking part in the workshop, around 5 images accompanied by a brief text describing their content to the address: activitats@esbaluard.org.
- Applicants will be informed of the results of the selection of the participants on 15th March.
