24 August–2 September 2012
The exhibitions will continue throughout the autumn
Opening: Friday 24 August
Press/professional preview: Thursday 23 August
Venues
Kunsthal Charlottenborg
Den Frie Centre of Contemporary Art
Kunstforeningen GL STRAND
Nikolaj, Copenhagen Contemporary Art Center
Overgaden Institute of Contemporary Art
+ Various locations around the centre of Copenhagen
Participating artists
Jananne Al-Ani (IR), Kutlug Ataman (TR), Yto Barrada (MA/FR), Mohamed Bourouissa (FR), Rejane Cantoni & Leonardo Crescenti (BR), Dias & Riedweg (BR/CH), Song Dong (CN) Latifa Eckakhch (FR/MA), Klas Eriksson (SE), Ruth Ewan (UK), Søren Thilo Funder (DK), Yuan Gong (CN), Lise Harlev (DK), Jeanne Van Heeswijk (NL), Jeppe Hein (DK), Sofie Hesselholdt & Vibeke Mejlvang (DK), Invisible Playground (DE), Isaac Julien (UK), J&K (DK/DE), Otto Karvonen (FI), Joachim Koester (DK), Katarzyna Kozyra (PL), Magnús Logi Kristinsson (IS), les gens d’Uterpan (FR), Ann Lislegaard (DK), Rafael Lozano-Hemmer (MX/CA), Manifest.AR (various nationalities), Marcello Maloberti (IT), Heike Mutter & Ulrich Genth (DE), Carsten Nicolai (DE), Damián Ortega (MX), Lea Porsager (DK), Arturas Raila (LI), Joanna Rajkowska (PL), Raqs Media Collective (IN), Yorgos Sapountzis (GR), Kimsooja (KR/ US), Hito Steyerl (DE), Superflex (DK), Pascale Marthine Tayou (CM/BE), Vladimir Tomić (BA/DK), Georg Wechwerth (DE), Andro Wekua (GE/CH), and Wooloo (DK).
In August the Copenhagen Art Festival will launch an ambitious programme of contemporary art on the theme of ‘communities’, with works by more than 40 emerging and established artists from Denmark and around the world. The Festival will consist of exhibitions in central Copenhagen, as well as a range of art projects in public spaces around the city centre. The programme launches on 24 August with a packed, ten-day line-up of events including performances, workshops, artists’ talks, seminars, film screenings, and much more. The exhibitions will continue after the initial ten festival days and can be experienced throughout the autumn.
Co-curated and organised by the five Copenhagen art centres, the festival features a wide array of exhibitions all addressing the festival’s underlying theme of communities. At Kunsthal Charlottenborg, a major survey exhibition by Joachim Koester and a solo show by Ruth Ewan invite the audience to explore notions of alternative communities. Concepts of communities and their relation to memory and history are reflected in the exhibition at Den Frie Centre of Contemporary Art. At Kunstforeningen GL STRAND, ten artists relate the theme of communities to the impact of globalisation on local and global societies and their mutual interdependence. At Nikolaj, Copenhagen Contemporary Art Center the relationship between individual and community is addressed by nine artists through the depiction or staging of situations of communication, while crucial aspects of cultural heritage and history writing are explored in two separate exhibitions by Yorgos Sapountzis and Hito Steyerl at Overgaden Institute of Contemporary Art.
In addition to the exhibitions, a wide-range of installations and temporary projects will spread over the inner city of Copenhagen, engaging with a variety of different publics in the ten festival days and beyond. As part of a major outdoor commission Jeppe Hein will, in collaboration with a number of other artists, explore the common, public space through a transformation of one of Copenhagen’s main squares into a dynamic space of social interaction and participation with amusements, machines, rides, cooking, talks, and performances, drawing inspiration from old fashioned markets and fairs.
Festival partners
A number of institutional partners have developed new projects with Copenhagen Art Festival, in a collaborative venture across disciplines. The partners include: Danish Film Institute, Danish Architecture Centre, Loppen, The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, SNYK, Danish Art Workshops, The Factory of Art and Design, and Arken Museum of Modern Art.
Supporters
Copenhagen Art Festival has been commissioned by the Danish Arts Council and is supported by the City of Copenhagen – The Culture and Leisure Committee, The Capital Region of Denmark, the Ministry of Culture Denmark, Nordea-fonden, the Obel Family Foundation, Nykredit Foundation, the George Jorck and Emma Jorck Foundation, Nordic Culture Point, the Beckett Foundation and the Danish Composers’ Society’s Production Pool, and KODA’s Fund for Social and Cultural Purposes.
