[aha] Fwd: Opening -- OURS: Democracy in the Age of Branding -- Parsons/the Vera List Center for Art and Politics

[Dedalus]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Carin Kuoni <KuoniC at newschool.edu>
Date: 2008/10/14
Subject: Opening -- OURS: Democracy in the Age of Branding -- Parsons/the
Vera List Center for Art and Politics
To:


Please join us for exhibition reception, workshop, prize presentation,
and a performance over the next few days.

TOMORROW
Exhibition opening reception: Wednesday, October 15, 6 - 9 p.m.
"OURS: Democracy in the Age of Branding"
The Sheila C. Johnson Design Center @ Parsons The New School for
Design
66 Fifth Avenue at 13th Street, New York City

Exhibition organized by Parsons The New School for Design, in
collaboration with the Vera List Center for Art and Politics

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 16
Miguel Luciano
Charrette (solution-driven workshop) with Parsons class (open to the
public): 9:00 a.m. - 2:40 p.m.
Prize presentation: 6:30 - 8:00 p.m., with Parsons faculty Charles
Goldman and Carlos Teixeira
both in the gallery

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 19
Yael Bartana, Wild Seeds in America, 2008
Performance with 12 students, sound equipment, and mats
Union Square South, 10:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.
New work, commissioned by Parsons for OURS

More information below, or at www.branding-democracy.org.


Miguel Luciano, "Cuando las Gallinas Mean"
Luciano's work  considers self-censorship and self-imposed silence.
The piece in this show refers to a Puerto Rican saying meant to silence
children: "You can speak again when the hens pee." And chickens
never pee-except for the one in Luciano's work, an repurposed vending
machine. After the viewer inserts a quarter, the plastic hen rotates,
pees, and releases one of 500 eggs, containing prizes.

On Thursday, these prizes that express unspoken thoughts will be
designed and created in a charrette (a solution-driven workshop) with
Parsons students who will be asked to answer one basic question: "What
do you feel unable to express?" With computers and semi-automatic
button making machines, the students will produce right in the gallery
buttons bearing their messages. The buttons are then deposited in
Luciano's installation piece, where they eventually find their way to
unsuspecting "consumers."

At 6:30 p.m., Luciano, the students, and Parsons faculty members
Charles Goldman and Carlos Teixeira will officially unveil the prize
buttons.


Yael Bartana, "Wild Seeds in America"
Union Square South, Sunday, Oct. 19, 10:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.

In the first "Wild Seeds," Yael Bartana filmed a group of 18-year-old
Israeli pacifists playing a game called the "Evacuation of Gilad's
Colony," based on Israel's forced removal of Jewish settlers from
the Occupied Territories.
In "Wild Seeds in America," the game is repeated, but this time as a
commissioned performance against the urban backdrop of New York City,
with New School students who learn the original context of the game in
progressive stages. The experiment is the portrait of a community that
declares its ideology in opposition to the policy of the state.


Exhibition:
On the eve of the U.S. presidential elections, Parsons The New School
for Design, in collaboration with the Vera List Center for Art and
Politics at The New School, presents an interdisciplinary exhibition
investigating democracy as a global brand. Contributions by 40
participants feature online works, installations, sculptures,
photography, video and film as well as panels, lectures, performances,
and charrettes.

Participants:
Yael Bartana
Erick Beltran
Alexis Bhagat
Paul Chan
Joseph DeLappe
Alexandra Domanovic
Sam Durant
Kota Ezawa
Andrea Geyer
Liam Gillick
Sharon Hayes
Susan Hiller
Ashley Hunt
I Approve This Message
Institute for Infinitely Small Things
Emma Kay
Komar & Melamid
Asaf Koriat
Runo Lagomarsino
Steve Lambert
Les Liens Invisibles
Ligorano/Reese
Miguel Luciano
Michael Mandiberg
Emery Martin
Aleksandra Mir
Carlos Motta
Dave Muller
Timo Nasseri
Ariel Orozco
Trevor Paglen
PETLab
Nadine Robinson
Anri Sala
Hank Willis Thomas
Johan Tiren
Brian Tolle
Judi Werthein
Wooloo Productions
The Yes Men
Carey Young

Curators
Carin Kuoni, exhibition curator
Marisa Olson, Web component curator
Bartholomew Ryan, curatorial assistant
Jakob Schillinger, curatorial assistant

Exhibition graphics and design (see attached)
Project Projects

"OURS: Democracy in the Age of Branding" examines the desires generated
and promoted by democracy as a brand-such as choice, participation,
freedom of expression, a sense of belonging, and the promise of
individual success, all embodied in the notion of "liberty"-and
looks at how and where these desires find fulfillment or are displaced.
The exhibition also investigates both aesthetic and political systems of
representation developed in response to these desires, as well as those
power structures that run parallel to a democratic government.



-- 
"Ci sono cretini che hanno visto la Madonna e ci sono cretini che non hanno
visto la Madonna.
Io sono un cretino che la Madonna non l'ha vista mai.
Tutto consiste in questo, vedere la Madonna o non vederla."

email: dedalus at autistici.org
http://www.alterazione.net

about my artivity:
http://www.lesliensinvisibles.org
http://www.alterazione.net/n/d3dalus-artivity/