Fostering and facilitating contingency
October 18–20, 2019
Norwegian premiere: Notes on a Memorial
October 18, 6pm
Film screening followed by a conversation between Jonas Dahlberg and Ketil Jacobsen
Kunstnernes Hus, Wergelandsveien 17, 0167 Oslo
World premiere: Crimes of the future: A film about a film about a book about a city
October 18, 7:30pm
Film screening followed by a conversation with the artist, Javier Izquierdo
Kunstnernes Hus, Wergelandsveien 17, 0167 Oslo
Carole Douillard: The Viewers
October 19, 1–3pm
Performance with presentation in front of the Y-Block
Akersgata 44, 0180 Oslo
Part II: Oslo Collected Works - OSV
October 19, 5pm
Vernissage with artists Jan Freuchen, Sigurd Tenningen and Jonas Høgli Major
Økernsenteret, Økernveien 145, 0580 Oslo
Intet er stort, intet er lite (Nothing is big, nothing is small)
October 20, 1pm
Performace of Intet er stort, intet er lite (Nothing is big, nothing is small) by Julien Bismuth
Oslo, Norway
The observatory of progress
October 20, 3–4pm
Presentation and launch of Adrián Balseca’s publication, The observatory for progress
We invite—we do not commission. We work with art that addresses specific situations and contexts—we do not “mediate” between artworks and audiences. Our audience comprises random passers-by—not a pre-determined audience. We explore, question, disrupt, and embrace public space and what happens in it—we do not treat public space as an alternative exhibition space.
osloBIENNALEN First Edition 2019-2024 is a curated proposal to set up and activate a new institutional biennial model—praxis and infrastructure aimed at fostering and facilitating art practices that engage with the contingency, latency, flux, and vulnerability of public space and the public sphere.
On October 18 and 19, osloBIENNALEN invites you to a series of public encounters with ongoing, new and future projects.
View the full October opening weekend programme here.
osloBIENNALEN First Edition 2019-2024, curated by Eva González-Sancho Bodero and Per Gunnar Eeg-Tverbakk, is and is not a biennial—the term “biennial” is necessary but inadequate. While it suggests the usual rhetoric of the periodic event and fulfils the host city’s initial commission, the evolving five-year programme offers a new model designed to foster the making, display and discussion of art in public space and the public sphere. In this sense, the biennial’s main concerns are to set up and activate infrastructures and modus operandi; to adopt flexible, sensitive, research-based and collaborative approaches to art production and city contexts; and to pay special attention to the Oslo and Norwegian art milieus, placing new resources at their disposal.
This enterprise cannot avoid revisiting pre-existing biennial models and, of course, the mass of theory and experience generated by the long history of art practices in public space. But the main curatorial task has been to define and implement methodologies, infrastructures and ways of working that function at a practical level, while providing competent and sensitive responses to complex demands. These, together with a unique five-year time frame, aim to help artists address uncompromisingly the contingency and mutability that define public space/sphere. The extended time frame allows us to include structures and narratives that stretch beyond the traditional biennial event. Short-lived, long-lived, episodic, cyclic, gradually changing or disappearing works—all are included in the programme.
The First Edition also plans to leave the city of Oslo a legacy of resources—artists’ studios, film and radio units—that could continue to operate after this edition of the biennial closes.
osloBIENNALEN First Edition 2019-2024 is organised around four founding ventures, or “pillars,” concerned with art production, public outreach, institutional collaboration, and an art collection in public space. These are not themes but the means made available to artists, to art in the making, to audiences, to institutions, society, politics, and cultural policy:
Pillar 1. Art Production within a Locality
When osloBIENNALEN invites an artist, this includes an offer of studio and production facilities, as well as support for research and networking. The biennial is opening a film production unit. The first outcome is Crimes of the future, a film by Javier Izquierdo about the film made by Henning Carlsen in 1966 on Knut Hamsun’s 1890 novel Hunger—a film about a film about a book about a city—Oslo. The second and third productions will be by Knut Åsdam and Dora García.
Pillar 2. Addressing the Myriad
We are operating in public space and the works on display address non-constituted audiences comprising an unknown and myriad set of passers-by. Each of the works in the biennial is accompanied by a specially-designed public outreach program. Inclusion and the active involvement of members of the public lie at the heart of some works in the biennial, determining their evolution and outcome; one example is the project by Mônica Nador and Bruno Oliveira. We have also invited agents and voices to design projects that generate readings and insights into the biennial and the individual works. Invitees include Michelangelo Miccolis, Belén Santillán, Benjamin Bardinet and Mikaela Assolent.
Pillar 3. New Institutional Ecologies
osloBIENNALEN First Edition 2019-2024 works in collaboration with other institutions to foster new modes of art production and to influence cultural policy. Partners involved in production and development include: Kunstnernes Hus (where Javier Izquierdo and Jonas Dahlberg’s films will be screened on October 18); Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera, Milano (who co-presented Marianne Heier’s performance And their Spirits Live On); Deichman, Oslo Public Libraries; Ekebergparken, Oslo; Kungliga Konsthögskolan, Stockholm; Le Magasin des Horizons, Grenoble; Matter of Art Biennial, Prague; NMBU-Norwegian University of Life Sciences: Faculty of Landscape and Society; Nordic Black Theatre; OsloMet, Faculty of Technology, Art and Design, Department of Art, Design and Drama; Oslo domkirke/Oslo biskop; Oslo Open; Oslo kulturskole; Pikenepå Broen, Kirkenes; Prosjekts kolenkunstskole; Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm; Sporveien Oslo AS, Stiftelsen Edvard Munchs Atelier; Publics Helsinki; and Ultima, Oslo Festival of Contemporary Music.
Pillar 4. A Collection for the Passer-by
osloBIENNALEN First Edition 2019-2024 is reflecting on a purchasing policy for art in public space, especially immaterial art practices such as performance, sound pieces, ephemeral text-based proposals and situations. These have rarely entered municipal collections, including the Oslo City Art Collection. We remember earlier avant-garde practices—the dadaists, surrealists, situationists—often highly political, which have never properly taken their place in the cities where they emerged. Could we somehow re-activate these non-objectual works? How might we preserve, collect, re-present, and experience them?
osloBIENNALEN First Edition 2019-24 opened in May with 17 projects, some of which are ongoing with new parts appearing as time moves forward. On October 18 and 19, eight new works are launching by artists Adrián Balseca, Marcelo Cidade, Jonas Dahlberg, Oliver Godow, Katja Høst, Javier Izquierdo, Alexander Rishaug and Knut Åsdam. In addition, several of the works launched as part of the biennial’s opening in May will evolve. These include projects by Mikaela Assolent, Benjamin Bardinet, Julien Bismuth, Carole Douillard, Ed D’Souza, Mette Edvardsen, Jan Freuchen, Jonas Høgli Major and Sigurd Tenningen, Hlynur Hallsson, Rose Hammer, Mônica Nador and Bruno Oliveira and Lisa Tan.
Curated by Eva González-Sancho Bodero and Per Gunnar Eeg-Tverbakk, osloBIENNALEN First Edition 2019-2024 is initiated and financed by Oslo Agency for Cultural Affairs, and is free to all.
