exhibition and conference june 2010, brussels

renee green, irit rogoff, hans ulrich obrist, dieter lesage & centrifugal

EARN (European Artistic Research Network) presents The Academy Strikes Back, Sint-Lukas Brussels University College of Art and Design. [4-5/6/10]. The Academy Strikes Back is the concluding presentation of a two-year project exploring the current academization of art education. The project takes place within the context of the European Artistic Research Network and was developed by Jan Cools (Sint-Lukas, Brussels) and Henk Slager (maHKU, Utrecht). The project’s starting point is the importance of artistic research for formulating competencies, leaning outcomes and didactic strategies in art education. Previous events within this project include ‘A Certain Ma-Ness’, (Amsterdam in March 2008) with a.o. Simon Sheikh, Jan Verwoert, Clementine Deliss, Mick Wilson, Bart Verschaffel, and ‘Becoming Bologna’, (IUAV, June 2009) with a keynote by Daniel Birnbaum, that took place within the framework of the 53rd Venice Biennale.

During ‘The Academy Strikes Back’ the specificity of the Academy as a research environment is at the forefront of our enquiry and debate. How can artistic (doctoral) research contribute to the overall research environment at the Academy? To investigate this, three doctoral researchers (Jeremiah Day, Clodagh Emoe, Paul Landon) have been invited to do workshops, based on their own research projects, for the Brussels master students. Documentation of the various ways that (doctoral) research can be embedded in the structure of the Graduate School is on display in the Sint-Lukas Gallery, June 5 – 20, 2010.

As a consequence of the institutionalization of the artistic research environment, it is inevitable that the debate about the specificity of the Academy is being brought back into the Academy where it most urgently belongs. The symposium will elaborate on this by asking four specialists the following sub-questions:

• Can the academicized Art Academy still offer a viable space and platform for the experimental development of a critical art practice?
• Is there an affirmative relationship between institutionalized artistic research and the art scene?
• How transparent is ‘peer reviewing’ in the art world and what role can it play in academized art education?
• How can the outcomes of artistic research be disseminated?

programme

June 4: 14-18

Jan Cools (Sint Lukas Brussels), Henk Slager
(maHKU, Utrecht): Introductions

Renee Green (Dean Graduate School San Francisco Art Institute): Hail the invisible College or What Can Matter Now?
Jeremiah Day Researcher maHKU, Utrecht
Moderator: Gertrud Sandqvist (Professor Malmo Art Academy)

Irit Rogoff (Professor Goldsmith’s College, London): Practicing Research/Singularising Knowledge
Susan Kelly, Taru Elving (Centrifugal) The Centrifugal Book of Europe
Moderator: Mick Wilson (Dean GradCAM, Dublin)

June 4: 19-21

Opening Parallel Exhibition: Sint-Lukasgalerie, Haachtsesteenweg 138, Brussels www.sintlukas.be

June 5: 10-13

Hans Ulrich Obrist (Co-Director Exhibtions Serpentine
Gallery, London): Peer Reviewed Art
Paul Landon: Researcher Finnish Academy of Fine Art,
Helsinki
Moderator: Hans de Wolf, Free University Brussels

June 5: 14-17

Dieter Lesage (Professor Erasmus University College
Brussels): Supplementality
Clodagh Emoe: Researcher GradCAM, Dublin
Moderator: John Aiken, Director Slade School of Fine
Art, London
Location Symposium: Auditorium Sint-Lukas, Address: Groenstraat 162-184, Brussels

More information: www.artresearch.eu

Reservations: theacademystrikesback@sintlukas.be

The Academy Strikes Back is part of an ongoing and unique trans-European experiment in arts research organised by EARN in association with Centrifugal and led by GradCAM, Ireland. This third phase of the project builds upon, and extends, the examination and critical contestation of the archival paradigm in artistic research and curatorial practice initiated at the exhibitions ‘Critique of Archival Reason’ (curated Henk Slager, RHA Gallery, Dublin, 2010) and ‘Re : Public’ (curated Daniel Jewesbury, TBG, Dublin, 2010) which were held in conjunction with the conference ‘Arts Research: Publics and Purposes’ (Dublin, 2010). The second phaze of this project took place in Helsinki in April 2010 with ‘Tables of Thought’ (curated by Jan Kaila and Henk Slager, Kuva, Helsinki) and the accompanying symposium.

The Brussels events also constitute a phase of the ‘Artist as Citizen’ project is co-organised by Sint-Lukas in collaboration with EARN (European Artistic Research Network) and associated partners including: The Finnish Academy of Fine Arts (Helsinki), GradCAM (Dublin), maHKU (Utrecht Graduate School of Visual Art and Design), Malmo Art Academy (Malmo), Slade School of Fine Art (London), Sint-Lukas Brussels University College of Art and Design, IUAV (Venice), Academy of Fine Arts (Vienna), University of Gothenburg and The School of Fine Art (Leeds). Further phases of the project will take place in Zagreb (Centrifugal) in summer 2010.

EARN was established in 2004 and exists to share and exchange knowledge and experience in artistic research; foster mobility, exchange and dialogue among art researchers; promote wider dissemination of art research; and enable global connectivity and exchange for art research. ‘The Academy Strikes Back’ will also see the lexpansion of EARN’s new website resource for artistic research www.artresearch.eu

Phase 4 of The Artist as Citizen will take place in Zagreb in June 2010 under the auspices of Centrifugal.

This project is in part funded by the EC-EACEA Culture 2000–2007: ‘Artist as Citizen’ project co-ordinated by GradCAM.