Shrink 01995, Nemo Observatorium 02002 & Archaeologies at IOMA

08.05.2019 - 28.07.2019

IOMA
Beijing (ROC)

Nemo Observatorium 02002 - Styrofoam particles are blown around in a big transparent PVC cylinder by 5 strong fans. Visitors can take place one by one on the armchair in the middle of the whirlpool or observe from the outside. On the chair, in the eye of the storm it is calm and safe.Spectacular at first sight, this installation turns out to mesmerise as a kind of meditation machine. One can follow the seemingly cyclic patterns, focus on the different layers of 3D pixels or listen to its waterfall sound. One could call it a training device, challenging the visitor to stay centred and find peace in a fast changing environment. After a while the space seems to expand and one's sense of time deludes.

Shrink 01995 - Two large, transparent plastic sheets and a device that gradually sucks the air out from between them leave the body vacuum-packed and vertically suspended. The transparent tube inserted between the two surfaces allows the person inside the installation to regulate the flow of air. As a result of the increasing pressure between the plastic sheets, the surface of the packed body gradually freezes into multiple micro-folds. For the duration of the performance the person inside moves slowly and changes positions, which vary from an almost embryonic position to one resembling a crucified body.
At IOMA Beijing there will be 5 Shrinks and the bodies of 5 performers.

The Archaeologies are remains of the creation process of various projects. Lawrence Malstaf constructs nearly all projects from A to Z his own studio. This requires a lot of technical research often through a challenging process of trial and error. Yet it is precisely in these errors he finds inspiration and ideas for new projects. 
With the care of an archaeologist he presents artefacts and traces of these errors, objects found on the floor and in the corners of his studio and he exhibits these artefacts as a pseudo-archaeological documentation. Each cabinet documents a different installation presented in a video. 
Next to exhibitions, several installations have been integrated in stage-performances. The text fragments on the drawings are quotes from these theatre- and dance performances. 

Curated by Chen Yunbing

Speculative Futures Salon

26.04.2019

BOZAR - Council Room
Brussels (B)

The future is post-human and noisy. What do performances on the limits of the human body teach us? What are the insights generated by exploring earth systems? Or from exploring the digital world? What do observations from the intersection of law and computer science add to the ongoing discourse?

Programme
17:00  Welcome by Marleen Wynants (Crosstalks)
17:05  Stelarc (Performance arts)
17:25  Mireille Hildebrandt (Law & Philosophy, VUB) 
17:45  Break
18:00  Raphaël Stevens (writer, curator Tendencies ‘19)
18:10  Kris Verdonck (Visual arts, theatre, architecture)
18:20  Jerry Galle (Digital arts)
18:30  Open discussion 

The Speculative Futures Salon kicks off the expo Tendencies '19.The Overview Effect at BOZAR, organised in the frame of the I Love Science Festival 2019. At 19:30, participants of the salon are invited to the opening of this expo in BOZAR, Rotonde Bertouille & BOZAR LAB.

Free entrance
Registration

DETAIL

26.04.2019 - 09.06.2019

Tendencies '19 - The Overview Effect
BOZAR, Brussels (B)

The TENDENCIES exhibition focuses on works that question scientific and technological innovations as much as they incorporate them. For this fourth edition, it looks at our relationship with possible futures, be they dystopian or utopian. 

The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new.
(Samuel Beckett, Murphy)
In the installation DETAIL, a large and massive boulder hangs on the ceiling. It is hanging on a steel cable, on a ball bearing, allowing it to fully turn around its axis. The ball bearing is put in motion by a steel wheel rotated by a motor which takes its energy from solar panels. The whole chain leads to a relatively simple situation: whenever the sun shines, the boulder turns around its axis. Once the sun shines, and therefore the stone starts to revolve, the mechanism is simultaneously unrelenting: the fatalism of a world that has to and will turn. A mobile with sunlight. A surreal image with an undertone of danger and yet fascinating at the same time. 

The whole (complicated) technical construction has no other goal than to have the “poetry” of a heavy colossus float and turn around. DETAIL is in this sense a pointless use of knowledge and material which makes it even all the more alienating. The question can also be put forward as to whether many other developments that we call ‘technical progress’ really do help the world. The destructive potential of ever greater, faster, more efficient and automatic algorithms, processors, motors and fire power assert their influence on a daily basis in wars and in the depletion of our planet. Where is technological knowledge taking us and does it make us able to handle the problems of our age for the most part caused by ‘technological progress’? DETAIL is then also a stationary situation: frozen, hanging in the air, turning in circles in a vacuum.

The TENDENCIES exhibition focuses on works that question scientific and technological innovations as much as they incorporate them. For this fourth edition, it looks at our relationship with possible futures, be they dystopian or utopian. Curated by Raphaël Stevens.

TENDENCIES '19
Kris Verdonck

SPECTRAL MUSIC - LECTURE-PERFORMANCE BY ANNELIES VAN PARYS & GOEYVAERTS TRIO

03.04.2019

Concertgebouw Brugge
Brugge (B)

For centuries, composers searched the sonorous world for unknown and untouched territory. 'Spectral' composers explored sound itself, examining every possible gradation of pitch and timbre: not just high and low, and long and short, but also deep, into and beyond the core... Annelies Van Parys is such a spectral composer. In this lecture-performance – together with musicologist Klaas Coulembier and the Goeyvaerts Trio– she reveals the secrets of her compositions.

Concertgebouw Brugge

A Sense of Gravity at STRP Festival

30.03.2019 - 07.04.2019

STRP Biennale
Eindhoven (NL)

A Sense of Gravity premieres at STRP Festival on 30 March 2019. This immersive installation offers you the sensational bodily experience of defying gravity.

The project A Sense of Gravity started with Teun Vonk questioning: How can I challenge the logic of gravity, of the bodily perception of gravity, with a machine or installation? Can I expand the boundaries of our everyday perception of gravity? 

A Sense of Gravity is based on artistic research and interdisciplinary collaborations, blending the boundaries between science, technology, design and visual art

While being immersed in the installation, the viewer experiences a bodily sensation of weightlessness. This experience causes a new perspective and perception of gravity on an individual level. With a Sense of Gravity, Teun Vonk creates awareness of our human sensibility and new perspectives on the relevance of our physical being in the digital culture of the future.

https://strp.nl/program/a-sense-of-gravity
https://www.teunvonk.nl/a-sense-of-gravity/

Cloud Piano in CYBERNETIC CONSCIOUSNESS [?] QUANTUM HORIZON

27.03.2019 - 19.05.2019

Itau Cultural
São Paulo (BR)

cloud piano (2014) plays the keys of a piano based on the movements and shapes of the clouds. A camera pointed at the sky captures video of the clouds. Custom software uses the video of the clouds in real-time to articulate a robotic device that presses the corresponding keys on the piano. The system is set in motion to function as if the clouds are pressing the keys on the piano as they move across the sky and change shape. The resulting sound is generated from the unique key patterns created by ethereal forms that build, sweep, fluctuate and dissipate in the sky.

http://www.itaucultural.org.br
http://www.dwbowen.com/cloud-piano

ANNELIES VAN PARYS RECIEVES THE KLARA FOR BEST COMPOSER AND FOR MUSIC PERSONALITY OF 2018

22.03.2019

Klarafestival
Flagey, Brussels (B)

On Friday, March 22, 2019, The Klara’s - Classical Music Awards were awarded for the 9th time. 
Annelies Van Parys receives The Klara for Best Composer ánd Music Personality of 2018 from Klara manager Chantal Pattyn.

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Spheres 02015 & Utopia 02018

28.02.2019

Baile do Sarongue
Rio de Janeiro (BR)

SPHERES 02015 - Large white spheres float around in a quiet and dark space. They seem to defy gravity as they rise and fall in slow motion like fragile planets or unknown deep sea creatures. A performer is activating the spheres in an endless Sisyphian choreography. 

UTOPIA 02018 - Utopia is a large kinetic structure composed of lightweight aluminium tubes hanging from thin wires. Via a mechanism of small counterweights and motors it becomes an organic cloud that transforms itself slowly through different states of unstable equilibrium. 
Utopia is a site specific work with variable dimensions and is constructed mainly with local materials. 

http://lawrencemalstaf.com/_work/spheres.html
http://lawrencemalstaf.com/_work/utopia.html

USHER

14.02.2019 - 10.03.2019

Folkoperan
Stockholm (SE)

The unfinished opera USHER by Claude Debussy has now been completed by Belgian composer Annelies Van Parys. It was commissioned by Folkoperan and Staatsoper unter den Linden in Berlin, where it premiered on October 12th. The production will open at Folkoperan with a Swedish cast on February 14th, 2019.

https://www.anneliesvanparys.be/newsletters/13/
https://www.folkoperan.se/english/usher

Photo ©Mats Bäcker

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Double Compass - solo exhibition

31.01.2019 - 05.05.2019

TETEM
Enschede (NL)

Compass is an orientation machine to wear around your waist. It directs you left and right while walking. It guides you through virtual corridors, rooms and doors programmed in the physical exhibition space, or any location. The apparatus imposes an attraction or repulsion on your waist, like you are in a magnetic field. You can explore this environment and discover a tactile architecture. The machine is programmed to make you follow an invisible map but you can choose between resisting to the machine or giving in and letting yourself be guided.

For the solo exhibition Double Compass at TETEM, Lawrence Malstaf developed a second machine, both Compasses not only follow an invisible map, but also interact with each other.

TETEM