Cleotronica 08 March Program

/ Cleotronica 08 March Newsletter /

Cleotronica 08 Project # 4
The Silent Ornamental Revolution
A Public Art Project by Jan Robert Leegte (NL)
Date: Viewable starting 9 March 2008
Location: Selected public locations all over Alexandria, Egypt

The Silent Ornamental Revolution is a public art project that uses a series of minimal posters created by Jan Robert Leegte based on his work and text developed in Vienna in 2006, it builds on the idea of the ornament as "sublime" intervention, the ornaments Leegte readapts are derived from popular computer interfaces such as the Windows operating system. The works made in 2006 were video collages simulation ideas of ornamental interventions. The project in Alexandria is a true intervention, using modular posters to build endless ornamental patterns. There will be two types of posters, one based on the artist’s "selection" series, and the other based on his "scrollbar" series, using bevels. Basically any urban structure will be selectable, and any surface can be transformed to a minimal or hysterically ornamented facade. Art students from Alexandria will play a vital role in assisting Leegte with this series of interventions in public space. Links to the original text by Leegte can be found here: www.leegte.org/works/text/ornaments/index.htm
Bio
Jan Robert Leegte (1973) studied Fine Arts at the Willem de Kooning Academy in Rotterdam after having studied Architecture at the University of Delft. Inspired by artists like Bruce Nauman and Fischli & Weiss, Leegte probes the surface of our surrounding world, aiming to reveal the underlying materials. Fascinated by the world behind the computer screen, he explored the sculptural possibilities of the Internet as from 1997. In 2002 he shifted back to the gallery space, taking along his newly discovered favorite materials with him. Recently Leegte is exploring more "embedded" possibilities out of the gallery space into the endlessly deep contexts of the outside world. His work has been exhibited at a widespread selection of international shows and festivals. Leegte lives and works in Amsterdam. Website: www.leegte.org

Cleotronica 08 Project # 5
Stammer: A Lecture in Theory
A Live Performance and Video Installation by Shady El Noshokaty (EG)
Dates
Performance: Stammer Live Performance by Shady El Noshokaty, 9 March, Starts 7 pm
Exhibition: Stammer Video Installation Exhibition: 9 -16 March opening directly after live performance
Location: Alexandria Contemporary Arts Forum (ACAF), 10 Hussein Hassab Street, Azarita, Alexandria

The property dualism theory asserts that humans are made of only physical substances; these physical substances are the carriers of two kinds of properties, physical properties and mental properties. El Noshokaty’s new performance and related video portrays an educator (El Noshokaty himself) at a decisive moment in a theory lecture he is delivering. Personal emotions, desires and symbolisms interfere with the logical stream of thought usually attributed to lectures. This interference causes an overlapping of the mental properties into the physical, jamming the educator’s speech and teaching abilities and causing the closest effect in humans to when a digital satellite receiver delivers a poor signal leading to the pixilation and freezing of the picture, thus the phrase El Noshokaty uses in the lecture “The Mind is a Digital Computer”
Bio
Shady El Noshokaty (1971) is a Cairo based artist and a teacher at the Faculty of Art Education, Helwan University. With a Fulbright grant, he studied avant-garde cinema and video art at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. As of 2000, El Noshokaty organized and supervised the annual experimental media art workshop in the Faculty of Art Education until its 5th edition in 2005. His work has been exhibited in numerous local and international institutions including the Kunstmuseum Bonn, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, and the Hayward Gallery, London.

Cleotronica 08 Project # 6
Tactical Media Club Alexandria
A Participatory Club for Tactical Media Moderated by Joanne Richardson (RO) and Francesca Bria (IT)
Dates
CLUB MEETINGS: 20-22 March 2008 at ACAF
Lecture1: Tactical Media: Past, Present, and Future by Joanne Richardson, Friday 21 March, 7 pm
Lecture 2: Social Media, Shared Culture, and the Hacker Movement in Italy by Francesca Bria, Sunday 23 March, 7 pm
Location: Alexandria Contemporary Arts Forum (ACAF), 10 Hussein Hassab Street, Azarita, Alexandria

Tactical Media is a concept and set of practices that emerged around the Next Five Minutes festivals in Amsterdam from 1993 to 2003. What is common to these practices, that are now practiced worldwide, is the artistic use of media technologies to subvert power. As part of the Cleotronica 2008 festival Alexandria Contemporary Arts Forum (ACAF) will set up a transient club for 'Tactical Media' inside its space. The club seeks to collectively explore 'Tactical Media' practices in the different contexts of Europe and Egypt, and conduct brainstorming sessions that investigate the possibility of new intersections between art, media, activism, and theory. Artists, activists, and collectives are invited to be members of the club and participate in its discussion and debate group meetings that will be moderated by Joanne Richardson (Romania) and Francesca Bria (Italy). To become a member and participate in the club’s sessions please send us a brief paragraph about yourself and your interests or your collective in English or Arabic to office@acafspace.org, please include your complete contact info and write "club" in the subject box. The meetings will be carried out on the 20, 21, and 22 of March. In addition to the club meetings Joanne Richardson will be delivering a public lecture on the past, present and future of Tactical Media at ACAF on Friday 21 March, while Francesca Bria will talk about social media, shared culture and the hacker movement in Italy on Sunday 23 March, both lectures will feature live Arabic translation and start at 7 pm.
Bios
Joanne Richardson
Born in Bucharest, grew up in New York, currently living between Cluj, Romania and Berlin. Founder of D Media (www.dmedia.ro) in Romania, an NGO for the production and dissemination of art and digital culture. Editor of Subsol webzine (subsol.c3.hu), and author of essays on social movements, postcommunism, immaterial labor, copyleft, tactical media, the history of the avant-gardes, and experimental film & video in Eastern Europe. Recent videos on nationalism, delocalization, migration, activism, precarity and borders.
Francesca Bria
Film Maker, journalist and Independent Network Activist. Born and currently living in Rome . She teaches digital media and video journalism in Rome and she is active as a free lance video journalist.She is counsultant and expert on access to knowledge policy for the Region of Lazio and the European Commission. She has been coordinating an international cooperation project between Italy and Brazil on Digital Culture and she’s currently coordinating a cooperation project on free software in Venezuela. She is the author of different video documentaries and short experimental films on digital media technology, free knowledge, politics, precarity, migration and social justice. She's active in different networking and grassroot projects for the promotion of shared culture and free technology.

Cleotronica 08 Project # 7
RECYCLIZER
A Workshop on Sampling in Animation and Solo Show by Jan van Nuenen (NL)
Dates
Workshop: Sampling Animation Workshop 29-31 March 2008
Exhibition: Jan van Nuenen Solo Show 28 March – 6 April, Opening: Friday 28 March 7 pm
Lecture: Sampling in Contemporary Animation, Sunday 30 March 7 pm
Location: Alexandria Contemporary Arts Forum (ACAF), 10 Hussein Hassab Street, Azarita, Alexandria

RECYCLIZER is a 3 part project by Jan van Nuenen. The exhibition showcases screenings of van Nuenen’s sample-constructed animated worlds of automatons, works that can be seen as the descendants of Bosch aesthetics and imagery in the digital age. The workshop on 29, 30, 31 will concentrate on creating a collectively made animated video that will be put up on You Tube, the video will be created using samples collected by the workshop’s participants. Please apply to the Workshop by sending a brief e-mail that includes your CV/Bio to office@acafspace.org , write “workshop” in subject box, basic knowledge of some graphics/animation programs required. Finally the talk on 30 March will summarize the idea and culture of sampling in Animation and its industry today, live Arabic translation will be available.
Bio
Jan van Nuenen (1978) is a video artist and animator based in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. He studied audio-visual design at the art academy St. Joost in Breda, the Netherlands. He has been working on short, experimental animation films and video-installations since 2002. His works are mainly animated collages of found-footage video and photographical material or samples, cut up, combined and edited with the computer and different types of animation software. The films are characterized by a complex and combined action of loops, repetitions and rhythms, where sound plays a vital role. His works have been shown at different international film, video and art festivals. Van Nuenen also creates electronic music some of which is used in his films. Website: www.janvannuenen.com/

Alexandria Contemporary Arts Forum (ACAF)
10 Hussein Hassab Street, Flat 6, Azarita, Alexandria, Egypt
T: +20 (0)3 480 41 45 E: office@acafspace.org
Opening times: Tuesday – Sunday, 3 – 9 pm, Closed on Mondays and most official holidays