250th anniversary: symposia, workshops, performances, and Graduate Show

This summer the Hochschule für bildende Künste Hamburg (HFBK Hamburg) celebrates its 250th anniversary. Founded by the Patriotische Gesellschaft (Patriotic Society) in 1767 as Germany’s first vocational training school for the improvement of artistic drawing, today HFBK Hamburg is known for its broad-minded higher artistic and scientific education with notable alumni as well as famous professors like Martin Kippenberger, Sigmar Polke, Hanne Darboven, Daniel Richter, Dieter Rams, Jonathan Meese, Rebecca Horn, Fatih Akin or Wim Wenders and Marina Abramović. Since the 1960s HFBK Hamburg is known as one of the art schools that is setting the tone, needless to say not only in Germany.

To mark the occasion, in a week of celebration from July 11 until July 16, 2017, HFBK Hamburg is going to look at two central aspects of the university: its international network, and its emphasis on artistic and theory-based work. Besides a variety of four symposia discussing current themes in research, the central focus will be on the artistic projects by professors and students in an exchange with international partner universities within the Art School Alliance (ASA).

For the week’s festival called ASA@work, HFBK Hamburg has invited all current and perspective partners in the so called Art School Alliance (ASA), founded in 2010, to Hamburg—a professor and three students from each partner university—to take part in joint workshops. As initiator of the ASA program, HFBK has for many years promoted the intensive exchange of ideas between domestic and international art students, engaging numerous high-caliber art schools worldwide.

At the same time, from July 13 until July 16, 2017, HFBK Hamburg hosts its annual Graduate Show: around 130 graduates from the classes of internationally acclaimed lecturers such as Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Thomas Demand, Jutta Koether, Michaela Melián, Matt Mullican, Marjetica Potrč, Anselm Reyle, Angela Schanelec, and Andreas Slominski present their final works in the departments of Sculpture, Stage Design, Design, Film, Painting/Drawing, Time-based Media, and Graphic Art/Typography/Photography.

Art
HFBK Graduate Show
Opening with awarding of the Karl H. Ditze Prize for the best final work
July 13, 7pm / Exhibition: July 14–16

International guests
Art School Alliance @ work
Workshop presentations of HFBK students and faculty together with our ASA partner institutions:
School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Tufts University, Boston / Universidad del Cine, Buenos Aires / School of the Art Institute, Chicago / China Academy of Art, Hangzhou / Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Jerusalem / Department of Art, Goldsmiths, University of London / California Institute of the Arts, Los Angeles / School of Art, Yale University, New Haven / Bard College, New York / School of Art + Design, Purchase College, New York / Department of Cultural Design, Kindai University, Osaka / École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts de Paris / San Francisco Art Institute / Institute of Design, China Academy of Art, Shanghai / Akademie der bildenden Künste Wien
Opening: July 13, 7pm / Presentation: July 14–16

Symposia
Individuality/Dividuation: An Epistemological Perspective
Symposium with Martin Burckhardt, Rey Chow, Thomas Keenan, Gordon Knox
Concept: Michaela Ott / July 11

O Superman
Symposium marking the departure from the HFBK of Michael Diers and Wim Wenders, with: Barbara Albert, Laurie Anderson, Michael Baute, Monica Bonvicini, Adam Broomberg, Thomas Demand, Michael Diers, Peter Geimer, Thomas Heise, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Ulrike Pfeiffer, Philipp Ruch, Angela Schanelec, Beat Wyss
Concept: Michael Diers, Luise Donschen, Wim Wenders / July 11–12

Survival Rate 4%—the latest reports from the frontline of the art academy
Symposium with Diedrich Diederichsen, Walter Grasskamp, Annette Tietenberg, Wolfgang Ullrich, Bettina Uppenkamp
Concept: Werner Büttner / July 14

Mapping (with) Plants
Symposium with Marie-Luise Angerer, Jimmie Durham, Petra Lange-Berndt, Sara Lindeborg, Pia Rönicke
Concept: Hanne Loreck / July 15

For more information: www.hfbk-hamburg.de/250years/

Generously funded by: Behörde für Wissenschaft, Forschung und Gleichstellung der Freien und Hansestadt Hamburg, Alfred Toepfer Stiftung F.V.S., Hubertus Wald Stiftung, Karl H. Ditze Stiftung, Leinemann-Stiftung für Bildung und Kunst, Rudolf Augstein Stiftung