NEWS
German voters go to the polls this weekend to decide who will govern them for the next four years. Ahead of Sunday's poll, many citizens are still considering who they will vote for. Now a new movement seems to be gaining their confidence. The economy has dominated the election campaign, but surprisingly culture may shape its outcome. In many galleries, museums and theaters around Berlin so-called cultural pre-elections are taking place. These pre-elections are held in an art context only - one week prior to the federal ones. Artists, writers and culture professionals are invited to contribute with their opinions and votes which will be widely published 36 hours before the official elections begin. Their ideals and vision are expected with a lot of interest by eligible voters and may have a rare impact on their decision. As the problems to be solved by the new government are global, the pre-elections are not limited by nationality. The popularity of the pre-elections and their highly anticipated results have led many politicians to attend art exhibitions, concerts and cultural events. Theaters have announced generous donations, art galleries have recorded a boom of sales to politicians, thereby making a passionate and engaged impression, in a last bid to influence the cultural pre-elections.
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Zeigen. An Audio Tour through Berlin by Karin Sander
Temporäre Kunsthalle Berlin
5 Dec 2009 - 10 Jan 2010
PRE-ELECTIONS BERLIN 2009
The pre-elections take part in an art context prior to the federal elections, and present their results 36 hours before the official elections begin. The project offers a real opportunity to interfere with the political course that will lead the country for the next four years. Artists, writers and culture professionals are invited to contribute with their opinions, visions and votes. The pre-elections are not limited by nationality, as the problems to be solved are global.
Dates: 20-25 September 2009, 10 am to 6 pm
Venue: Artnews Projects, Brunnenstr. 190, 10119 Berlin
The results of the pre-elections will be presented to the press on: Friday, 25 September 2009, 8 pm
The German federal elections take part on: Sunday, 27 September 2009, 8 am to 6 pm
The polling station is at Artnews Projects, former Kunstbank, where the 'Elections for Foregners' were held in 2005. The cultural pre-elections are an ongoing development, questioning the fundaments of representative democracy and exploring a possible rare impact of art on politics.
Organised by Vlado Velkov in cooperation with the Transnational Republic.
www.pre-elections.org
THE BUTTERFLY
"The flapping of a single butterfly's wing today produces a tiny change in the state of the atmosphere. Over a period of time, what the atmosphere actually does diverges from what it would have done. So, in a month's time, a tornado that would have devastated the Indonesian coast doesn't happen. Or maybe one that wasn't going to happen, does." *
This phenomenon, common to chaos theory, is also known as a sensitive dependence on initial conditions. Just a small change in these conditions can drastically change the long-term behaviour of a system. Chaos theory is describing apparently disordered systems, but actually it is about finding the underlying order in their random data.
Today’s economical chaos features a new world order that is out or order. Looking for solutions, this exhibition is exploring the transition of our society, and our position in it. The Butterfly is trying to accent on the challenging role of art in our environment, and to promote artworks with social circumstances. All works refer to the process of democratic elections and the hope for change.
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Draft for an exhibition that should have been realised in the US during the presidential elections on November 4, 2008. "The Butterfly" is the second exhibition of the cycle "Chaos and Order", following "The New World" at Artnews Projects in Berlin.
* Ian Stewart, Does God Play Dice? The Mathematics of Chaos, 1989
THE NEW WORLD
"The philosophers have only interpreted the World in various ways - the point however is to change it." Karl Marx
1908 Lenin describes matter as an objective reality, existing independently of human consciousness and reflected by our senses. Following this theory we can suppose that the world around us is only our personal subjective perception of reality, as we can change the world through changing our perception of it and sharing the new perspectives with our environment.
When the term New World originates in the 15th century it refers to the Americas. Depending on the sphere of discourse it can describe Australasia too, as Europe was the center of an empire, and the New World was its colony. Today Hardt and Negri depict a new empire without a territorial center of power. From Europe to the US, and now towards Asia, the center is blending in transition, for a new discourse to come.
This exhibition presents ten artistic positions that are exploring the transition of our social environment, and our perception of it. Looking for circumstances, they create potentials within the art world that should reach the real world one day.
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"The New World" is the first exhibition of the cycle "Chaos and Order", curated by Vlado Velkov.
Nicolai Angelov, Michel de Broin, Vasco da Gamma, Leopold Kessler, Timo Nasseri, Ariel Orozco, Baldvin Ringsted, Marcus Steinweg, Vlado Velkov, Anton Vidokle
www.artnews.org/projects
SOMETIME SOMEWHERE
Die Arbeit von Vlado Velkov entstammt der Glaube, dass Kunst die Welt verändern kann. Seine Serie von Installationen und Aktionen bezieht sich auf dem geopolitischen Wandel, der sein eigenes Leben durch die Wende und Globalisierung geprägt hat. Konsequent entwickelt er Strategien für eine neue Welt, die unsere Geographie und Geschichte verändern oder zu verändern scheinen. "Das Problem" steht im Mittelpunkt der künstlerischen Recherche, wobei seine langjährigen Projekte sich durch aktuelle Ereignisse ergänzen, um neue/alte Wahrheitssysteme zu hinterfragen.
Vlado Velkov, 1977 in Plovdiv, Bulgarien geboren, lebt und arbeitet seit 1999 in Berlin. Mit der Installation "Die Neue Weltordnung" absolvierte er 2006 sein Studium an der Universität der Künste Berlin.
Text zur Ausstellung im Kunstverein Arnsberg (mit Fiete Stolte) 2008
ELECTIONS FOR FOREIGNERS 2005
At the election day, 18 September 2005, a polling station will be installed at the Kunstbank. Here, foreigners living in Berlin, can cast their ballots on copies of the official ballots. The project would like to involve these people who are denied the right to vote, instead of isolating them.
In the evening the ballots will be counted and the result will be published. The After Election Party will follow and discuss the outcome of both elections. The project is organized by Vlado Velkov and the Transnational Republic.
The Bulgarian artist Vlado Velkov lives and works in Berlin since 1999 and is not allowed to vote. His project "The New World Order" was exhibited at Künstlerhaus Bethanien 2004. Velkov is laureate of the Network Baltic Contest.
The Transnational Republic was proclaimed in 2001 and is fighting for democracy in global politics. The project positions itself between art, activism and politics; the Transnational Republic currently has around 3,600 citizens from around 80 nations. Additionally, the Transnational Republic will install an Immigration Office as well as a Bank. At the Immigration Office, everybody can receive a transnational ID card; at the counter of the Central Bank of the United Transnational Republics national currencies can be exchanged against the transnational currency Payola.
The project is curated by Christiane von Gilsa, project director of the Kunstbank. The Kunstbank is the exhibition place of the senate scholarship holders of fine arts. A criterion for receiving this scholarship, is the artist’s residency in Berlin – yet many of the scholarship holders are not German. In the Kunstbank, Berlin based artists of many different national origins exhibit their work, making the multicultural character of the Berlin art scene apparent. Looking through its huge windows, one sees "Amerika" across the street - as a symbol for the hopes and dreams of so many immigrants.
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Die SPD liegt mit 40,5 Prozent vorn, knapp dahinter folgen die Grünen mit 38,2. Nur 6,7 Prozent für die CDU, welche aber noch vor der Linkspartei (4,5) und der FDP (2,2) landet. Sogar die Anarchistische Pogo-Partei (APPD) ist mit 4,5 Prozent vertreten. So haben Berlins Ausländer am Sonntag gewählt. Das dürfen sie zwar eigentlich nicht, aber die Galerie Kunstbank in Mitte hatte eine symbolische Wahl für in Berlin lebende Ausländer ohne Wahlberechtigung veranstaltet. Die größtenteils aus der Berliner Kunstszene stammenden Wähler sollen nicht vom politischen Geschehen isoliert werden, so die Veranstalter. Berliner Ausländer aus 21 verschiedenen Ländern beteiligten sich an dieser Ersatzwahl. Die Wahlbeteiligung von 0,01 Prozent lässt allerdings Zweifel an der Repräsentativität des Ergebnisses aufkommen. Dafür passten alle aktiven WählerInnen noch in die Kunstbank, als dort am Abend eine standesgemäße After-Wahl-Party stieg.
taz 20.09.2005
VLADO VELKOV
www.artnews.org/vladovelkov
velkov@artnews.org
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