N° 3 2009 June / July
Brazilian art is very popular in London right now. This April frieze did a feature on Rivane Neuenschwander; London galleries are showing a great many Brazilian artists this year; add to that the growing institutional interest (Cildo Meireles in Tate Modern, Neuenschwander is South London Gallery) and the hype is complete.
The Brazilian cultural invasion taking place in the Netherlands this summer has a somewhat different pre-history. As befits good Dutch tradition , the market is dictating the movements in art, but the government. Along with Russia and others, Brazil is a cultural priority country, which means that the government puts extra money into cultural exchange with that country, as it has done for some time now with China. For these reasons, various exhibitions giving a broad picture of Brazilian cultural life are being shown in Rotterdam and Sittard over the next few months.
At a time when the world desires art to be more socially involved, the attention being placed op Brazilian is not inopportune. In hardly any other country in the world art has so greatly interwoven itself with a social agenda, as it has in Brazil the country of Hélio Oiticica and Lygia Clark. This ambition also shines through undiminished, abeit with reservations, in the work of the youngest generation, the artists in their thirties portrayed in this issue (who are not being shown in Rotterdam and Sittard, by the way).
Social engagement is also the central theme of other articles. Rebelle, the large exhibition on art and feminism in Arnhem that shows how women the world over are still involved with female emancipation, is discussed at length. As is the Venice Biennale, where Daniel Birnbaum curated anexhibition with the dreamy title Making Worlds.
04/06/09 Jonas Ohlsson
Jonas Ohlsson doesn’t need Europe for his art any more. Just back from a long stay in Rio de Janeiro, thanks to the Fonds BKVB, he says that from now on he’ll get his inspiration from the rest of the world. Even if there’s not much art to be found in such ‘Hottentot’ areas, topics are a dime a dozen.
13/07/09 Henk Slager
Daniel Birnbaum, rector of the Städelschule in Frankfurt, curator of Portikus Contemproary Art Centre and sought-after curator for biennial exhibitions around the world, is artistic director for the central exhibition of the 53rd Venice Biennial, entitled Making Worlds. Henk Slager travelled to Frankfurt to speak with Birnbaum on the background to this summer’s most important exhibition.
13/07/09 Luk Lambrecht
Luk Lambrecht discusses the presentation of Jef Geys at the Belgian pavilion at the Venice Biennale.
Dutch pavilion: Fiona Tan
13/07/09 Erik van Tuijn
Fiona Tan’s international career took off when Okwui Enwezor presented her at Documenta 11 as an artist capable of handling identity and background in a form that is both political and poetic. This summer, her exhibition at the Dutch pavilion in Venice, entitled Disorient, may well prove Enwezor right.
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10/08/09 Christel Vesters
Language, with all its complexities and various manifestations, is the research domain of the Serbian-born artist Katarina Zdjelar, inhabitant of the Serbian pavilion at the current Venice Biennale.
