Month: December 2013

UncategorizedLeave a comment

Bergen Assembly: Monday Begins on Saturday

Agnieszka Gratza

This review of Bergen Assembly, Bergen’s inaugural triennial, appeared in Flash Art: Bergen’s inaugural triennial did not come out of the blue. First mooted in 2007, the idea was then debated at the 2009 Bergen Biennial Conference, a Bergen Kunsthall initiative designed to give more visibility, on the art-world map at least, to Norway’s second city. Titled “To Biennial or Not to Biennial?”, the conference scrutinized the biennial format as a whole and yielded the serviceable Biennial Reader (2010). The question at its heart was answered in the affirmative. Somewhat perversely, though, the answer took the form of a triennial: … Continue reading Bergen Assembly: Monday Begins on Saturday

UncategorizedLeave a comment

BMW Tate Live: Charles Atlas

Agnieszka Gratza

This piece, based on an interview with Charles Atlas, appeared in Flash Art: Charles Atlas, Fractions (1), 1978. Video, color and b&w, sound 32 Mins 59 Secs. Collaboration with Merce Cunningham. Courtesy Vilma Gold, London.   Programmed as part of the “Performance Events” strand of the four-year BMW Tate Live series, now in its second year, Charles Atlas’s nine-channel video installation MC9 (2012) and live multimedia collaborations with the dancer and choreographer duo Ce­cilia Bengolea and François Chaignaud, based in Paris, and with performance artist Johanna Constantine from New York, were the last performances to be staged in the Tanks … Continue reading BMW Tate Live: Charles Atlas

UncategorizedLeave a comment

Every Which Way

Agnieszka Gratza

This review of Rashaun Michell’s and Silas Riener’s Way In was posted on artforum.com: Rashaun Mitchell & Silas Riener, Way In, 2013. Performance view, Danspace Project, New York, November 2013. Davison Scandrett, Rashaun Mitchell, Silas Riener, and Claudia La Rocco. Photo: Ian Douglas. IN A FOUR-WAY “conversation” with his collaborator Silas Riener, dance critic Claudia La Rocco, and lighting designer Davison Scandrett, posted on Bomblog on the eve of Way In’s premiere, choreographer and dancer Rashaun Mitchell said: “I’m always thinking about what’s the way into this and out of this.” What follows are four ways into the piece I … Continue reading Every Which Way

UncategorizedLeave a comment

Atelier Van Lieshout

Agnieszka Gratza

This review of an Atelier Van Lieshout show at La Friche la Belle de mai was posted on artforum.com: View of “The Butcher,” 2013. “The Butcher” is the first installment in the New Tribal Labyrinth trilogy, the latest Gesamtkunstwerk by the Rotterdam-based collective Atelier Van Lieshout in the greatly expanded exhibition space at Marseille’s La Friche la Belle de Mai, which has been spruced up like the rest of the city to mark its term as the 2013 European Capital of Culture. The work comprises large-scale sculptural installations inspired by the built environment the Industrial Revolution left behind; agriculture, industry, … Continue reading Atelier Van Lieshout