Cambo Wide DS-350 Lens system

Cambo Wide DS-350 Lens system

Cambo Photographic introduces a new addition to the well-designed Cambo Wide DS camera system.

Introducing Schneider’s new DIGITARXL 5,6/35mm lens, designed for excellent performance optimised for digital high-end photography in a dedicated lens mount combined with a universal mount for many digital camera backs on the existing Cambo Wide DS body, Cambo offers a unique camera for the architectural shooter who needs perspective control in combination with digital wide angle photography.

Cambo Wide DS-350

Front view with 35 Digitar Lens 

Photo (c) Cambo

Cambo Wide DS-350

Rear view with Leaf Valeo 22

Photo (c) Cambo

The Cambo Wide DS-350 is a complete camera that accepts digital backs such as Leaf, PhaseOne, Imacon, EyeLike or Sinar with mounts for Hasselblad V-series, Hasselblad H-1, Mamiya 645AFD or Contax 645 compatible backs. The ideal chipsize is the current appr. 4x5 cm format (22 megapixel). The Wide DS ’s double shift allows for combined vertical and horizontal movements for perspective control. The movement in the “filmplane” even offers the possibility for stitching images together utilising the maximum viewing angle Schneider’s Digitar 35 XL offers up to 90 mm of image circle (102o) with high optical resolution, which allows for up to 20 mm shift in any direction without loss of image quality.

Most of the recent digital backs offer portability with built-in storage and image review, which offers great opportunities in combination with Cambo’s Wide DS system for interior, exterior and landscape photography and high resolution images for the demanding professional photographer.

This new Lens system is fully compatible with the existing Wide DS body, existing users of the Cambo Wide DS system can aquire the adaptation as a separate item to add to their equipment.

Designed and manufactured by
Cambo Fotografische Industrie B.V.
Web site: www.cambo.com

Eizo New LCD Monitor at Photokina 2004

EIZO Introduces ColorEdge CG220 LCD Monitor at Photokina 2004

22.2-inch wide screen monitor covers Adobe® RGB color space

Cologne, Germany, September 28, 2004

Eizo Nanao Corporation ("EIZO") is unveiling its ColorEdge CG220 LCD monitor featuring 100% support for the Adobe RGB color space at Photokina 2004, one of the world’s leading trade fairs for the photographic and imaging sectors.

The wide color gamut of the ColorEdge CG220 provides a vast range of displayable colors compared to conventional monitors, which typically cover the smaller sRGB color space.

To ensure suitability for complex imaging tasks and color management, EIZO has equipped the ColorEdge CG220 with several features such as improved rendering of dark grayscale tones, emulation of the color characteristics of other monitors, and black level adjustment.

The CG220 and other EIZO ColorEdge products are on display at Photokina 2004 in Hall 10.1 Booth B048.

Corel Painter IX

Corel annonce la sortie prochaine de Corel Painter IX, première application de peinture et d’illustration Natural-Media. Elle sera disponible dès octobre en version anglaise. Pour de nombreux artistes, qu’ils travaillent dans les beaux-arts ou qu’ils soient cinématographes, développeurs de jeux, concepteurs, illustrateurs ou photographes, Corel Painter apparaît comme une référence. On l'aurait imaginé, chez Corel, on insiste sur l'aspect irremplacable du logiciel : “ Les professionnels nous répètent qu’il n’y a simplement pas d’alternative à Corel Painter, car cette application est la seule à leur offrir la puissance et la polyvalence nécessaires pour créer des chefs d’oeuvre et se faire un nom ”, affirme ainsi Nick Davies, directeur des produits graphiques chez Corel. “ Corel Painter IX relève la barre des performances en ce sens qu’elle propose des outils qui redéfinissent l’art numérique, favorisent la créativité et simplifient le flux de travail. Les professionnels de l’image ont donc tout à gagner, qu’ils soient d’inspiration traditionnelle ou numérique ”, ajoute Davies.

Ce qui est certain, c'est que la nouvelle version de Painter est riche en nouveautés et en amélioration. Et cela ne pourra que ravir ses utilisateurs. Voici ce qu'on peut relever :

Painter IX permet un gain d'efficacité

• Vitesse d’exécution améliorée : Plus rapide, Corel Painter IX offre des styles ou pinceaux qui fonctionnent en moyenne deux ou dix fois plus vite.
• Nouvel écran de bienvenue : Conçu pour faciliter la mise en route, cet écran vous accueille au démarrage et donne accès, entre autres, à la galerie principale de Corel Painter IX et aux réglages de la sensibilité à la pression.
• Nouveauté et amélioration - Palettes Options de styles : Arrimées à tous les réglages et commandes, ces palettes vous permettent de modifier à la volée paramètres et variables en faisant glisser simplement les curseurs, sans perturber votre flux de travail.
• Nouveauté - Réglage Images/seconde : Avec cette commande, les animateurs peuvent tester la fréquence d’images, régler celle-ci et même prévisualiser les images à une cadence comprise entre 1 et 40 images par seconde.
• Nouveauté - Raccourcis sur mesure permettant de baliser le parcours utilisé en personnalisant aussi bien les raccourcis clavier que votre flux de travail.

Painter IX offre des outils permettant des gains en terme de créativité

• Nouveauté - Huiles de l’artiste : Ce système de peinture marque une amélioration dans l’art numérique puisque qu'il tend à confèrer aux créations le naturel et la texture des peintures traditionnelles à l’huile.
• Nouveauté - Magnétiser le tracé : Peindre ou dessiner une courbe ou une forme parfaite n’est plus une corvée si vous magnétisez le tracé. En effet, cette fonction vous permet de créer des images de qualité, genre faites à la main, en contraignant rapidement un trait de pinceau le long d’une forme ou d’un tracé vectoriel.
• Amélioration - Aquarelle numérique : Corel Painter IX apporte à l’aquarelle numérique des améliorations notables. Résultat : la peinture reste humide d’une session à l’autre pour le bonheur des artistes qui, plus que jamais, peuvent quasiment manipuler l’aquarelle numérique de la même manière qu’une peinture à l’aquarelle.
• Nouveauté - Duplication rapide : Idéale pour les photographes et conçue pour transformer des photos en peinture, cette fonction accélère la duplication des images en réduisant à un simple clic les cinq étapes complexes du processus.

Des améliorations sont également à noter du point de vue compatibilité

• On remarque ainsi une prise en charge améliorée d’Adobe Photoshop : Adobe Photoshop et Corel Painter font bon ménage, c’est-à-dire que les fichiers enregistrés au format PSD s’ouvrent dans Corel Painter, sans altérer ni plans, ni masques de plan ni canaux alpha. De même, il est possible d’ajouter de nouveaux plans au plan sélectionné, de plier les plans aux modes de fusion différents et de masquer ou d’afficher plusieurs plans en les faisant glisser simplement.
• Prise en charge améliorée également des tablettes graphiques de Wacom : Corel Painter IX accueille la gamme complète des tablettes de Wacom, en particulier Intuos 3, le tout nouveau modèle, dont les bandes sensibles peuvent être configurées pour contrôler la taille du pinceau, le zoom et de nombreuses autres fonctions, sans passer par le clavier.
• La gestion des couleurs est aussi améliorée : Gérant les profils standard ICC 4.0, Corel Painter IX permet de garantir la correspondance des couleurs tant à l’écran qu’à la sortie.

Voici le contenu du coffret : Corel Painter IX pour Mac et Windows, bibliothèques d’éléments uniques (dégradés, jets, motifs, photos, textures de papier, styles) y compris la nouvelle catégorie de styles Huiles de l’artiste, guide pratique de Corel Painter IX avec des didacticiels montés par des professionnels de l’image et Guide de l’utilisateur (en format PDF).

Corel Painter IX, version anglaise, peut être pré-commandée depuis le site de Corel www.corel.fr et auprès des partenaires Corel. Le prix de détail conseillé est de 379 € pour la version complète, 149 € pour la mise à jour et 84 € pour la version éducation (hors TVA). La version française, italienne et allemande sera disponible début 2005.

Les noms des marques et des produits cités sont protégés - Illustration (c) Corel - Tous droits réservés

Contax U4R Digital Camera

Contax U4R - Features

A Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar T* 5.8-17.4mm f/2.8-f/4.7 Lens

The Contax U4R offers a Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar T* 5.8-17.4mm f2.8-4.7 lens (equivalent to approx. 38mm to 115mm in 35mm film format) consisting of 6 elements in 6 groups and includes three aspheric and two high index lens elements. This Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar T* 5.8-17.4mm lens has been developed specifically for digital usage and achieves outstanding color reproduction and rich gradations. In addition, Carl Zeiss’ special multi-layer T* coating dramatically reduces flare and ghosting which results is crisp, ultra sharp images. For greater creative control, 28mm filters can be used via the included filter adapter.

The U4R also incorporates a 3x optical zoom and 6x digital zoom for a maximum of 18x total zoom and includes up to 8x digital zoom in play back mode.

RTUNE’s High Speed Image Processing System Enables High Speed Continuous Shooting At 3.3 Frames Per Second

The Contax U4R provides high speed continuous shooting up to a maximum 3.3 frames per second up to the full capacity of memory card (*1) at the highest resolution, thanks to Kyocera’s RTUNE image processing system. Even during continuous shooting, the LCD monitor displays in real time. The Contax U4R starts up in less than 0.9 seconds and features a shutter lag time of approx. 0.07 seconds (*2), giving the camera the title of being one of the fastest performing cameras available. The performance of the Contax U4R also eliminates the stress that photographers endured in the past caused by waiting for the camera to start up or being able to capture an image at any moment due to long shutter lag time. The U4R is ready when you are to seize the exact moment and capture images at anytime without fail.

*1) When using a high speed SD card formatted by the camera with. The high speed SD cards of which full performance have been confirmed are listed on Kyocera global site (http://www.kyocera.com). Depending on shooting conditions, the memory may not be fully utilized. The speed of continuous shooting or movie shooting depends on shooting conditions, camera settings and memory card conditions.

*2) The time from locking focus via the shutter release button and releasing the shutter to capture the image.

High Resolution 4.0 million effective pixel, 1/2.7 Inch CCD With Improved Image Gradation Thanks to “RTUNE”

Contax U4R uses a CCD with 4,230,000 gross pixels (1/2.7 square pixels, using an original color filter) as an image pickup device. By adjusting RGB color balance of the signals from the CCD at the analog front end, color noise is minimized which is easily created in the A/D conversion. The A/D conversion provides 16-bit internal processing to minimize a lack of data and then outputs as 12-bit data to the next image processor. In doing so, drastically reduces a wide range of noise generated in a captured image and is reproduced with natural colors and a fine array of gradations.

Easy-Framing Body Is Only 19mm (.55 inches) Thin

At only 19mm thin and rounded edge design the U4R can easily fit into a shirt pocket or bag for easy of portability. The covers are made of magnesium and the front panels are covered with genuine leather for superior grip ability and are available in three elegant color variations (black, indigo, and camel). The “Easy-Framing Body” with rotating lens allow you to find a comfortable position to shoot in a variety of photographic situations such as self-portrait, low/high angle and macro mode shooting.

Enhanced Continuous AF Shooting Function Stays Focused Even On Moving Subjects

The Enhanced Continuous AF shooting function that has been incorporated into the Contax U4R, enabling it to lock onto virtually any moving subjects for precise focus. It provides superlative performance under conditions which were previously difficult to capture images, such as children playing or pets whose actions are unpredictable. With Enhanced Continuous AF, the Contax U4R can capture continuous images at up to 2 frames per a second until the memory is filled (*1).

*1) When using a high speed SD card formatted by the camera with. The high speed SD cards of which full performance have been confirmed are listed on Kyocera global site (http://www.kyocera.com). Depending on shooting conditions, the memory may not be fully utilized. The speed of continuous shooting or movie shooting depends on shooting conditions, camera settings and memory card conditions.

Increased Focusing Accuracy With 9-point Multi AF Function

For increased focusing accuracy and convenience of use, the Contax U4R incorporates a 9-point Multi AF function. The 9-point Multi AF Function is the perfect solution especially with subjects that are not centrally located in the composition. With the 9-point Multi AF system, the U4R automatically selects focus via one of the nine focusing points for precise focusing accuracy. This ensures increased focusing accuracy. Digital photographers who would like to control the focusing point, the U4R also includes Spot AF for user control.

Easy View 2-inch LCD Monitor With Continuous Zoom Playback And Group Mode

The large, Easy View 2-inch LCD monitor makes it simple to compose an image which is one of the most important elements of digital photography. In addition, the large two inch LCD is also perfect for viewing captured images, movies and it also makes it extremely easy to navigate the menu selections. Images that are captured RTUNE’s Continuous Shooting mode can be viewed in a big way. After capturing a series of images in continuous mode, the photographer can zoom in on one of their continuous shots in playback mode and then scroll through the rest of the images captured in the series at the same magnification. This is extremely important when checking for that perfect image. In addition when multiple continuous captured image series wish to be viewed, the i4R makes it easier. In group mode, the first image of each group is shown for easy selection of a continuously captured series. This is extremely helpful when viewing two or more continuously captured image series.

Easy Charger USB Cradle

With the Easy Charge USB Cradle, the user no longer needs to be concerned about plugging an ac adapter into the camera each time the battery needs to be charged or a USB cable to transfer images. With the Easy Charge USB Cradle user hooks it up once to an ac outlet and to a personal computer via the supplied USB cable. Once the Easy Charge USB Cradle is connected to an outlet and computer, whenever the camera needs to be charged, it is just placed in the cradle for charging. When captured images need to be transferred from the camera, the camera is just placed in the Easy Charge USB Cradle for convenient transfer of images.

Superfine, VGA Movies With Audio

Movies with audio (30 frames per second) can be shot up to the maximum capacity of the memory card with easy operation (*4). The recorded file is in AVI format and you can easily played back and seen in superfine movies without image dropouts at 30 frames per second on the U4R’s two inch liquid crystal monitor or a personal computer. (To play back your movies on a personal computer, it is necessary to install QuickTime 4.1 or later.)

*4) High speed continuous shooting up to the full memory capacity is possible when using a high speed SD card formatted by the camera with. The high speed SD cards of which full performance have been confirmed are listed on Kyocera global site (http://www.kyocera.com). Depending on shooting conditions, the memory may not be fully utilized. The speed of continuous shooting depends on shooting conditions, camera settings and memory card conditions.

Eight Scene Modes For Any Situation

The Contax U4R offers 8 predefined scene modes that enable the camera to make the most just about any photographic setting according to the situation. The 8 modes scene modes include, Sport Action, Portrait, Night Portrait, Sunset, Twilight, Night View, Black and White and Sepia. For example, in Sport mode and Continuous AF, the decisive moment like a goal in an athletic meet can be captured.

Customizable Single and Multi Image Startup Screen

The Contax U4R incorporates a user, customizable startup screen that allows them to select a favorite image that has been captured as their startup screen whenever the camera is powered on. In addition, the Contax U4R includes a Multi Startup Screen feature. With the Multi Startup Screen, 10 separate images or continuous captured images can appear as a movie within the approximately one second camera startup time.

In Camera Image Resize Mode

With the Contax U4R is easy to resize an image to 320 x 240 pixels or 160 x 120 pixels after it has been taken, and save it so that it can be use with a PDA or sent via e-mail. You can also crop the area to be resized from the whole image, quarter or one-sixteenth.

Pictbridge Compatible, The Industry Standard For Printing Images

The Contax U4R supports PictBridge technology, the industry standard for printing digital images. By directly connecting the U4R via its USB cable to a PictBridge printer that supports the PictBridge, images can be printed directly from the printer without the use of a personal computer. You can also make changes in settings for the prints as well, such as the number of images to be printed.

Hi-Speed USB 2.0

The Contax U4R meets High-Speed USB 2.0 standard by allowing large amounts of image data to be transferred to a personal computer. Due to the advent of high resolution still images and movies and large capacity memory cards, the demand of speed data is essential. Adopting Hi-Speed USB 2.0 standard with a maximum transfer speed of 480Mb/s, one can handle large image files on a personal computer as comfortably as an external hard disc drive. Of course, personal computer using USB1.1 standard also can be used (the transfer speed is limited by USB specification of the personal computer). The installation of a USB driver is not needed, except Windows98 and 98SE.

Using CONTAX U4R with a personal computer

Windows requirements:OS: Preinstalled with Microsoft Windows 98, Windows 98 SE, Windows Me, Windows 2000 Professional, Windows XP Home Edition or Professional. Performance is not guaranteed if these operating systems are upgraded. System requirements, 64MB memory or more, USB terminal and CD-ROM drive. For Microsoft Windows 98 and Windows 98 SE, a USB driver is needed. The USB driver is included on the CD-ROM that comes with the camera.

Macintosh requirements:OS: Preinstalled with Mac OS 9.0 to 9.2 or OS X v.10.3 (excluding the OS X server). Performance is not guaranteed if these operating systems are upgraded. Equipment should have a built-in USB terminal and CD-ROM drive.

Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and other countries.QuickTime, Macintosh and Mac OS are registered trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc. in the United States. Other company names and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

Photos (c) Kyocera - All rights reserved

2004 Shanghai Biennale - Shanghai Art Museum - Techniques of the Visible - Participating artists

2004 Shanghai 5 Biennale

Techniques of the Visible

Shanghai Art Museum

September 29 - November 27, 2004

The Exhibition

Since its first edition in 1994, the Shanghai Biennale has been China"s first and foremost international exhibition for contemporary art. Continuing this commitment to contemporary artistic practice, the theme of the 2004 Shanghai Biennale, Ying Xiang Sheng Cun, “Techniques of the Visible”, will focus on the close relationship between art, science, and technology, in particular how art has revealed the interdependent social and political forces that produce and subject technology and humanity.

By bringing together the work of more than 120 artists from Asia, Africa, North America, Latin America and Europe, the curators have worked towards a diversity of approaches to technology, revealed both through the number of artist projects exhibited and the variety of sites in which these installations are located.

The exhibition space of the Shanghai Art Museum is divided into five areas, focusing on projects dealing with spaces of visual production and consumption: the film studio, the dark room, the theatre, the painting studio and the cinema. In the Museum, the contemporary practices range from traditional forms, to photography and film. To emphasize the multiple interrogations by artists towards technology by bringing together practices from around the world, the curators of the 2004 Biennale have expanded beyond the main venue of the Shanghai Museum.  The dispersal of these projects in the public spaces outside the Museum reveals an effort made by the curators to highlight a multifaceted approach to the theme of the Biennale.

In the People’s Park, located beside the Museum, more than ten installation spaces will be constructed to act as Media Houses for projects that investigate the relationship between technology and human action.  The works exhibited here will utilize every possible new media method. 

A more historical dimension of the theme of the Biennale will be investigated in an exhibition geared towards the establishment of a Museum of Chinese Photography in Shanghai.  The exhibition will look at the development of photography in simultaneity with the emergence of Modernism in China.  Pictures and captions representing historical documents of Chinese photography will be displayed in a corridor of more than 100 meters in length, set up in the People’s Park.

International Film & Video

In addition to the exhibitions in the Museum and People’s Park, a program of International Film & Video will also be shown at the Auditorium of Shanghai Art Museum (4th Floor, 325 West Nanjing Road).  Divided into three sections: experimental short films by contemporary artists (including a special screening for Hong Kong Short Art Film); Chinese independent films 2000-2004; and Chinese documentaries, the Opening Screening of this program will be at 6:30 pm on Wednesday September 29th, featuring the films of Yoko Ono. A timetable of screenings will be available on the website www.shanghaibiennale.com.

International Symposium

Along with the exhibitions, the Shanghai Art Museum will host an International Symposium on September 29 and 30, bringing together distinguished scholars, curators, critics and contemporary artists. This two-day symposium will provide a space for the development and concerns revealed by the main theme of the 2004 Biennale. Taken from Chinese terminology of ying xiang and sheng chun, the concept emerges from an interest in the technology-based visual products that retain critical historical and emotive references. Ying Xian Sheng Cun suggests that artistic practice engaging with “technology” is inherently placing itself within a historical continuum, where cultural metaphor becomes critical to its understanding. The Symposium will also take place in the Auditorium of Shanghai Art Museum (4th Floor, 325 West Nanjing Road). 

Opening Gala

An Opening Gala will be held on the 28th of September in the People’s Park adjacent to the Shanghai Art Museum, to coincide with the famous Mid-Autumn Festival. This night will include performances and multi-media installations by twenty artists, as well as internationally recognised D.Js and V.Js.

Public Lectures

A Public Lectures program will also be announced, scheduled to take place between September 28 and November 27, where curators, scholars and participating artists will be invited to discuss the exhibitions and other key topics related to issues of technology and art.

A catalogue with contribution of the curators and the works in the exhibition will be available, together with a Guide for the Public.

2004 Shanghai Biennale Participating artists 

including Film and Video 

(listed alphabetically)

Tariq Alvi, Rotterdam, London

Tiong Ang, Amsterdam

Big Dipper Group (Tang Yingshan \ Sun Zhezheng \ Wang Kai \ Yan Fenglin), Beijing \ Nanjing \ Shanghai \ Wuxi

Miguel Rio Branco, Rio de Janeiro

Tania Bruguera, Havana, Chicago

Robert Cahen, Paris

Chen Haiyan, Hangzhou

Chen Jieren, Taipei

Chen Shunzhu, Taipei

Chen Xiaoyun, Hangzhou

N + N  Corsino (Nicole & Norbert Corsino), Marseille

Mauricio Dias \ Walter Riedweg, Rio de Janeiro

Gonzalo Diaz, Santiago (Chile)

Stan Douglas, Vancouver

Touhami Ennadre, Paris

Kota Ezawa, San Francisco

Feng Jiangzhou, Beijing

Feng Mengbo, Beijing

Feng Qianyu, Yangjiang (Guangdong)

Fu Yu \ Jia Haiqing, Beijing

Coco Fusco, New York

Gan Chao \ Liang Zi, Shanghai

Geng Jianyi, Hangzhou

Maruch Santiz Gomez, San Juan Chamula (Mexico)

Group Muro Sur, ( Represented by: Voluspa Jarpa \ Josefina Guilisasti ), Santiago (Chile)

Gu Xiong, Vancouver

He Jianjun, Beijing

Hong Donglu, Taipei

Hong Kong Art Centre \ Videotage, Hong Kong

Hou Bo, Beijing

Hu Jieming, Shanghai

Hung  Keung, Hong Kong

Jia Zhangke, Beijing

Jiang Yue, Beijing

Choi Jong Bum, Seoul

Philipp Lachenman, Cologne

Ladder to Heaven Group ( Jiang Zhi, Cao Fei, Yang Fudong, Chen Xiaoyun ), Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Shanghai, Hangzhou

Yuri Leiderman, Moscow , Cologne

Mee Ping Leung, Hong Kong

Li Tianbing, Hu-an ( Fujian )

Li Xiao, Beijing

Li Yang, Beijing

Shu-Min Lin, New York

Liu Bingjian, Beijing

Liu Wei, Beijing

Liu Zheng, Beijing

Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Montréal, Madrid

Lu Chunsheng, Shanghai

Oswaldo Macia, London

Fabian Marcaccio, New York

Sebastian Diaz Morales, Comodoro Rivadavia ( Argentina )

Ni Haifeng, Amsterdam

Nibroll (Represented by Takahashi Keisuke), Tokyo

Jun Nguyen-Hatsushiba, Ho Chi Minh City

Khyentse Norbu, Paro ( Bhutan )

Ellen Pau, Hong Kong

Park Junebum, Seoul

Vong Phaophanit, London

Keith Piper, London

Qiu Shihua, Shenzhen

Qiu Ting, Beijing

Qiu Zhijie, Beijing

Kerim Ragimov, St. Petersburg

Rong Rong \ Inri, Beijing, Tokyo

Michal Rovner, Tel Aviv, New York

Graciela Sacco, Rosario ( Argentina )

Berni Searle, Johannesburg 

Shao Yinong \ Mu Chen, Beijing

Cindy Sherman, New York

Karla Solano, San José (Costa Rica)

SS Creative Group (Represented by Zhu Qingsheng \ Russell Pensyl), Beijing

Su Xia, Guangzhou

Sun Liang, Shanghai

Vivan Sundaram, New Delhi

Trinh T. Minh-ha, Berkeley (California)

Tsai Wen-yin, New York

Tseng Kwong Chi, New York

Humberto Velez, Manchester

Julia Ventura, Lisbon, Amsterdam

Bill Viola, Los Angeles

Jeff Wall, Vancouver

Wang Bo, Beijing

Wang Hui, Beijing

Wang Jianwei’s Group ( Shi Qing \ Wang Wei ), Beijing

Wang Ningde, Guangzhou

Wang Qiang \ Suzuki Ryoko, Beijing, Hokkaido

Wang Xiaoshuai, Beijing

Wang Youshen, Beijing

Wei Xing, Kunming

Wu Ershan, Beijing

Wu Quan, Beijing

Xiao Yu, Beijing

Xu Xiaobing, Beijing

Miranba Ngai Tsui, Hong Kong

Xu Zhen, Shanghai

Yang Fudong, Shanghai

Young Hay, Hong Kong

Yoko Ono, New York

Yu Hong, Beijing

The Mapping of Yanchuan Country Paper-cuttings, Beijing, Yanchuan ( Shanxi )

Yue Minjun, Beijing

Zhang Hui, Beijing

Zhang Peili, Hangzhou

Zhang Xiaogang, Beijing, Chengdu

Zhao Gang, Chengdu

Zhou Hao \ Ji Jianghong, Guangzhou

Zhou Tiehai, Shanghai

Curators

Xu Jiang (Head Curator) was born in Fujian, China. He is currently the President of China Academy of Art, and the Vice Chairman of Chinese Artists Association. As a practicing artist he held one-man shows in Berlin, Hong Kong and Hamburg. His work was also exhibited during the first Guangzhou Triennial (2002), the 14th Asian International Art Exhibition (1999), The 24th San Paolo Biennale (1998), the 1st Shanghai Biennale (1996) and the 1st Asian Pacific Triennial (1993). He has curated and contributed to the international events such as "The Living in Time" (Berlin) and "Edge of the Earth - Migration of Asian Contemporary Art and Regional Politics" (Tokyo, Bangkok, Istanbul, Teheran, Hangzhou).

Sebastian Lopez was born in Argentina. He is currently the General Director of the Gate Foundation, Amsterdam. He taught at the Art History Institutes in Amsterdam and at Leiden University. He has already curated and co-curated quite a lot of exhibitions including East International; The Democracy Show; Talking Back to the Media; A City-A World; Art > Work > Nature; Not a Chinese Show and A Short History of Dutch Video Art in Amsterdam (the latter one toured to San José, Madrid and Zagreb). He has also contributed to exhibitions such as Latin American Artists in Europe. Creativity Between Cultures, 1945-1982, (Venice). He is the editor of Van het Post-Modernisme (On Post-Modernism) and Talking Back to the Media, among others. He also contributes to Third Text(London); Camera Austria(Vienna), Lápiz(Madrid); Kunstforum and Neue Bildende Kunst(Berlin).

Zheng Shengtian was born in China and taught at the China Academy of Art. He is currently the managing editor of an English magazine called Yishu - Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art (published in Taipei), and a Board member of the Vancouver International Center for Contemporary Asian Art. As an independent curator his curatorial work over the past few years has included Jiangnan - Modern and Contemporary Chinese Art Exhibitions (Vancouver), The Art of Proletarian Cultural Revolution (Vancouver, Toronto, Winnipeg), and Shanghai Modern ( Munich). He has also frequently contributed frequently to periodicals and catalogues about contemporary Chinese and Asian art. He was the Vice Director of the Academic Committee for the 2nd Shanghai Biennale and a committee member of the 4th Shanghai Biennale.

Zhang Qing was born in Suzhou, China. He is currently one of the curators of the Shanghai Art Museum and the head of Shanghai Biennale's Office. He was chosen as one of the "Best Curators in China" in 2000 by CCTV and other 49 Media organizations. He has curated or co-curated exhibitions such as City_Net Asia 2003 (Seoul), Art of Cai Guoqiang (Shanghai), Junction - Architectural Experiment of Contemporary Chinese Art (Shanghai). As a member of the editorial board of Art China, a bi-monthly periodical, he has frequently contributed to essays and interviews on contemporary Chinese art and has published a book Chinese Art, 1990-1992. He was the co-curator of the 3rd Shanghai Biennale.

Directed by the Shanghai Municipal Culture Broadcasting Film & TV Administrative Bureau

Organized by the Shanghai Art Museum and East Morning Newspaper, Shanghai

Co-organized by Zhejiang Hisun Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd., Dongjie Advertising & Media Co., Ltd., Shanghai People’s Park Management Company

SHANGHAI BIENNALE

Shanghai Art Museum 

325 W Nanjing Road, Shanghai

www.shanghaibiennale.com

Anish Kapoor, Massimo Minini Gallery, Brescia

Anish Kapoor

Massimo Minini Gallery, Brescia

September 25 - December 23 2004

Massimo Minini Gallery presents a large Anish Kapoor’s installation which was specially created for the gallery. The English artist’s sculpture explores the surrounding space and changes the viewer’s perception, as the work involves the whole environment.

  

Like the enormous sculptures installed in the Baltic Flour Mills in Gateshead, in piazza del Plebiscito in Naples and in the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern in London, also on this occasion the artist makes use of plastic material, black pvc. The viewers can experience the sculpture from a close point of view and interact with it being fascinated and attracted by its flexuous form.

 

Anish Kapoor’s works blur the boundaries between object and architecture and show an open character that results in a dialogue between fullness and emptiness, inside and outside, concavity and convex, tension and balance. The vacuum is a metaphor of creation and plays an essential role in sculptural forms with a sensual, almost uterine character, that embodies protective places, spots of existence. The viewer is captivated by this synthesis of sensuality and materiality, where the quality, dimension and colour of matter radiate energy that you can hardly escape.

 

This is Anish Kapoor’s third one-man exhibition at the Massimo Minini Gallery, the previous ones date back to 1996 and 1998.

Galleria Massimo Minini

Via Apollonio 68 – (I) 25128 Brescia

www.galleriaminini.it

Katie Grinnan, Wade Guyton, Christina Mackie, Bojan Sarcevic, Paul Sietsema, Hiroshi Sugito @ Modern Art Oxford - "Real World: The dissolving space of experience"

Real World

The dissolving space of experience

Katie Grinnan, Wade Guyton, Christina Mackie, Bojan Sarcevic, Paul Sietsema, Hiroshi Sugito

Modern Art Oxford

25 September - 28 November 2004

Six artists working internationally reconsider the nature of the sculptural object and its relationship to space in this new exhibition at Modern Art Oxford. The work of Katie Grinnan, Wade Guyton, Christina Mackie, Bojan Sarcevic, Paul Sietsema and Hiroshi Sugito engages with the articulation of image, information, and cultural and social economies that shape contemporary perception. Their built up and assembled objects, structures and spatial scenarios suggest new artistic attitudes in which indeterminacy, resistance and the convergence of multiple spheres of experience are the new creative conditions for understanding space and the way we inhabit it.

Katie Grinnan [b. 1970, Richmond, lives in Los Angeles] creates complex and fantastical sculptures from photographs, found, moulded and modelled objects. Distorted space, actual space and remembered space are activated and collapsed into new constructed forms. In Real World, the artist presents a new sculptural work consisting of dissolving figures, magic brews, and a New Age constructivist tower which she will install in the galleries.

Wade Guyton [b. 1972, Hammond, Tennessee, lives in New York City] describes his sculptures and drawings as Ôacts of protestÕ. The relationship between image and object is central to his work which ranges from crossed out images of vernacular architecture and modernist abstract sculpture to elegant plywood constructions and vast impenetrable objects.

Christina Mackie [b. 1958, Oxford, lives in London] describes her mixed media installations of sculpted and assembled objects, drawings and videos as paintings. Her elaborate works articulate interests in parallel worlds of knowledge and experience and the points at which they intersect. Integral to her installations is the experience of the viewer, which is often orchestrated around structural props and stages.

In his compelling sculptural explorations Paul Sietsema [b. 1968, lives in Los Angeles] unravels and reconfigures relationships between spaces and the objects inhabiting them. His mesmeric film, Empire (2002), presented at the Whitney Museum of American Art in 2003 and included in Real World, is a journey through historically specific spaces from the eighteenth century rococo interior of the Hôtel Soubise in Paris, to the 1960s modernist apartment of art critic Clement Greenberg. The figures and interiors, all seemingly real but in fact meticulously crafted by the artist, fade in and out of an absorbing prismatic haze. Drawings and a new sculptural work relating to Empire will also be presented in the exhibition.

At the heart of the work of Bojan Sarcevic [b. 1974, Belgrade, lives in Berlin] is a displacement of materials, places, people and things to create situations that are dysfunctional or incongruous. Moving between sculpture, architecture, photography and film, his works are melancholy encounters between object, space and viewer. The exhibition includes Sarcevic's large-scale sculpture, Ou la main nÕentre pas, la chaleur sÕinsue (Where the hand doesn't enter, heat infuses) (2002) and 1954 (2004), a series of 78 photographic collages in which the artist has incised and reassembled views of modernist interiors with a fractured appliquŽ of image and forms.

Hiroshi Sugito [b. 1970, Nagoya, lives in Nagoya] makes enigmatic paintings in which images and spaces float in a visual reverie of remembered experience. Trained by Yoshitomo Nara in the school of traditional Japanese painting, Hiroshi Sugito builds up his images of vaporous views of dreamlike interiors and hazy sea and landscapes through a meticulous process of layering and covering over. Working from the minute to the monumental in scale, his paintings are a meditative conversation on the motif which seems to separate itself from its pictorial support to declare itself in the world of three dimensional objects.

Real World. The dissolving space of experience is curated by Modern Art Oxford's Senior Curator, Suzanne Cotter.

A fully illustrated book featuring reproductions of work by the artists and new essays by writer and critic Michael Archer and Suzanne Cotter is available from 1 October 2004.

MODERN ART OXFORD

30 Pembroke Street, Oxford OX1 1BP

www.modernartoxford.org.uk

Marco Breuer, Hanno Otten, Heinz Hajek-Halke: Cameraless Photographs 1950 – 2004 at Marcia Wood Gallery, Atlanta

Marco Breuer, Hanno Otten, Heinz Hajek-Halke: Cameraless Photographs 1950 – 2004
Marcia Wood Gallery, Atlanta
September 18 – October 30, 2004

Marcia Wood Gallery presents an exhibition of photographs made without a camera by three German photographers well known for their work in this particular aspect of the medium. Each artist uses the form to make direct abstracted images that recall the most radical experiments by the Surrealists and Bauhaus artists, among others. This exhibition brings together the work of two contemporary German photographers, Hanno Otten and Marco Breuer, with vintage prints by Heinz Hajek-Halke, a leading practitioner of cameraless work in Germany from the wartime era through the 1950s and 60s. Although cameraless work has been increasingly prevalent among contemporary photographers, this exhibition will examine how the continued celebration of abstract photography in postwar Germany has affected the work of these younger artists.

HEINZ HAJEK-HALKE (1898-1983) was very active in the development of experimental photography in Germany from the 1920s until his death in 1983. Although he studied art in both classical and experimental venues, Heinz Hajek-Halke spent most of his professional and artistic career in photography. Picture editor, press photographer and graphic designer, he also made important experimental photocollages and photographs inspired by film, abstract art, and biological forms that were reproduced in several photographic journals. In the 1950s, he taught photography and actively exhibited in important exhibitions, including Otto Steinert’s Subjective Photography. In 1957, he published a book on his techniques for cameraless photography.

HANNO OTTEN (born 1954) has been photographing since the 1980s. His early work included black and white abstractions, but for many years, color has been at the heart of his art. He has been making color studies, in sculpture and straight photographic prints since the 1990s. The more recent photograms, large abstract compositions of rectangular forms in panorama format, are the purest form of color study. By manipulating large blocks of pure color and geometric form in his ever more complex compositions, Hanno Otten reconsiders basic tenets of modernism, allowing color and light to suggest musical themes or monumental architecture. Hanno Otten has exhibited widely in Europe and in New York. He lives in London and Cologne.

MARCO BREUER (born 1966) has several degrees in photography and has made cameraless photographs since the early 1990s. His current images result from direct physical contact with the photographic paper itself and record performance-like rituals in the darkroom. In his abstract images of striated patterns from the Tilt and Pan series, based on film techniques, Marco Breuer embraces experimental practice in the spirit of his mid 19th century forbearers. He teaches in the MFA program at Bard College. He has published and exhibited widely in the United States and Germany and is represented in widely represented museum collections. Marco Breuer currently lives in upstate New York.

This exhibition has been curated/organized by LISA KURZNER for Marcia Wood Gallery. Lisa Kurzner is a freelance curator and critic who recently relocated to Atlanta from Europe. She organized Under Different Circumstances at the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center last winter. Previously she was the Newhall Curatorial Fellow in the Museum of Modern Art’s Department of Photography, and has worked with several international agencies supporting contemporary art.

MARCIA WOOD GALLERY
263 Walker Street, Atlanta, GA 30313
www.marciawoodgallery.com

Nikon F6 35mm professional SLR

Nikon introduce the F6™ 35mm professional SLR - a flagship film camera that seamlessly blends cutting-edge new technologies and uncompromising craftsmanship to offer film enthusiasts the finest shooting experience an SLR camera can offer.

The F6 benefits from the aggressive advancements in camera technology Nikon has made in response to an explosive demand for high-end digital cameras. It embodies Nikon's latest technological advancements, such as the Multi-CAM200 11-area AF system for exceptionally high-speed autofocus operation with outstanding accuracy, and the i-TTL Creative Lighting System for incomparable flash photography. The F6 features a newly refined proprietary 3D Color Matrix Metering system for improved accuracy in scene recognition and exposure. The camera also operates at highly subdued noise levels to ensure the ultimate shooting experience. For film shooters, the F6 undoubtedly represents the epitome of 35mm SLR photography and cutting edge performance.

"While many professional photographers have rapidly adopted digital photography in their workflow, there are several who enjoy the choice of using 35m film, depending on the situation or circumstance they are photographing in. Nikon recognizes this, and with the F6 and the newly announced D2X digital SLR camera, we are offering photographers the best cameras in both categories, for a seamless experience in performance, features and usability," said Jerry Grossman, vice president of Marketing, Nikon Inc.

The F6 is the sixth model in a legendary series of F-series professional film SLR cameras from Nikon. First introduced with the Nikon F in 1959, the series has transcended newer challenges over the years with successive new models. The original Nikon F was succeeded by the F2 (1971), F3 (1980), F4 (1988) and the critically acclaimed F5 in 1996. Each of these cameras inherited select elements from its predecessors, including the legendary Nikon F mount and a consistent design philosophy to offer professionals tools of the highest caliber and performance. Each successive model also raised the bar for innovation and technological advancement to meet the increasingly diversified needs of professional photographers. Today, tens of thousands of Nikon F-series SLR cameras and Nikkor lenses are put to test daily around the world, helping photographers make great pictures. The new Nikon F6 promises to uphold Nikon's tradition of innovation and enduring value.

F6 offers New Features for Film Fanatics

The Nikon F6 35mm film SLR camera earns its right to become the next flagship Nikon F-Series professional camera by incorporating remarkable new technologies and design enhancements that give photographers who prefer film the highest level of performance in an SLR camera. In addition to incorporating Nikon's new Multi-CAM2000 11-area AF system and powerful i-TTL Creative Lighting System, the F6 also incorporates several fine refinements in design and construction. It features an improved Nikon 3D Color Matrix Metering system for greater accuracy in scene recognition and exposure, as well as a new shutter unit crafted from DuPont™ KEVLAR® and a special aluminum alloy for unparalleled reliability, lighting-quick movement and precision. Nikon engineers have successfully subdued the camera's operational sounds by using a professional echoic chamber to measure sound and vibration meticulously and then craft the camera with parts that have been highly refined for absolute minimum vibration, and frequency of movement attenuated to a level below that detectable by the human ear. Constructed on an aluminum-alloy die-cast chassis with magnesium-alloy front body and covers (top, bottom) and strategically placed rubber surfaces, the F6 is built like a tank, and has undergone several reliability and rigidity tests to ensure flawless performance. A self-diagnostic shutter incorporated in the camera has undergone testing to assure accurate release up to and beyond 150,000 cycles, even in the most extreme environmental conditions. The F6 undoubtedly goes beyond Nikon's uncompromising standards of quality, durability and rigidity that photographers around the world expect and trust.

The F6 also features a variety of exciting, innovative control options such as a customizable function button, built-in data back functions, shooting data memory and compatibility with a new Multi Power Battery Pack MB-40. This new power pack boosts the camera"s framing rate from a native 5.5 frames per second to a full 8 frames per second, allowing Nikon engineers to reduce the size of the F6 significantly from its predecessor, the F5. With the convenience and versatility afforded by 41 Custom Settings, photographers can also fine-tune the F6 to suit their individual shooting preferences and requirements.

The new flagship film SLR also boasts a number of dedicated accessories. These include the Multi Power Battery Pack MB-40, interchangeable focusing screens (seven types), Data Reader MV-1 and camera cases. The Nikon F6 is scheduled to be available at Nikon authorized dealers in October 2004.

Nikon F6 Feature Highlights

High-precision shutter unit

No shutter unit in any other camera comes close to matching the precision and durability of the F6's assembly. Created from cutting-edge materials - DuPontTM KEVLAR® and a special aluminum alloy - the blades of the shutter unit offer unparalleled reliability and are extremely lightweight, for lightning-quick movement. For enhanced accuracy, the movement of the blades was carefully analyzed during the design process using a high-speed video camera and computer simulations, enabling unprecedented precision even at shutter speeds of up to 1/8,000 second. DuPontTM and KEVLAR® are trademarks and registered trademarks of DuPont or its affiliates.

Minimized operational sound and vibration

Nikon engineers were so intent on subduing the camera's operational sounds that they used a professional audio room to properly gauge the sound quality and frequency. The degree of vibration to which every part of the camera would be subjected was measured. This meticulous approach has resulted in a camera comprised of parts that have been highly refined for absolute minimum vibration, and frequency of movement attenuated to a level below that detectable by the human ear.

Highly efficient mechanics

The development of the F6 marks the first time 3D computer movement analysis has ever been applied to an SLR. This technique reveals the degree of power distributed to or generated by particular parts in specific directions. This made it possible for Nikon to optimize the mechanical operation of the camera with fewer parts, leading to lower power consumption and higher durability

Harsh environmental testing

To ensure the camera could withstand the most severe conditions and environments, the F6 has been subjected to rigorous testing. The F6's astonishing reliability is a function of Nikon's "the right material for the right place" approach. Nikon engineers considered countless situations for camera use, then submitted the F6 to real-life testing to virtually guarantee exceptional dependability wherever and whenever photographers shoot.

For more information visit www.nikonusa.com, which links all levels of photographers to the web's most comprehensive photo learning and sharing communities

(c) Image Source : Nikon, Inc. - Nikon US Press Release - 16.09.2004

Gale Antokal, Patricia Sweetow Gallery, San Francisco - We are so Lightly Here

Gale Antokal, We are so Lightly Here 

Patricia Sweetow Gallery, San Francisco 

September 9 - October 14, 2004 

Patricia Sweetow Gallery presents the exhibition of Gale Antokal, We are so Lightly Here, drawings in pastel, flour and ash. This is Gale Antokal's third solo exhibition at PSG. A fully illustrated 36-page catalogue accompanies this exhibition. 

Bay Area artist GALE ANTOKAL took a 3 1/2 year hiatus to develop a body of work vastly different from her formal, still-life compositions that were the subject of her drawings for two decades. The new body of work differs in palette, monochrome v. color; in subject, human v. object; and detail, soft-focus v. hard-focus. Prior to beginning the current body of drawings, Gale Antokal synthesized an approach to her subject that obviates identification of person, time and place, yet delivers a haunting vision of displacement, and loss. Her queries are eloquently posed through the drawings, "What do we leave behind to prove we have ever existed? What is left after all is taken away?"

"Unorthodox and meaningful materials allow Antokal to give the work a considered gravity without resorting to heavy-handed imagery. They allow each drawing to remain historically nonspecific, and to invoke responses from within each viewer’s personal experience. While some works reveal clues—the boxy suitcase, the dated hemline—to place and location, the physical fragility of the work, (one brush against the paper and the image vanishes) reminds how quickly the lessons of history can be forgotten". (1) Gale Antokal's choice of images is extensive, milk pouring down a flight of stairs, groups of people walking with baggage in hand, monumental mountains shrouded in snow, sledders disappearing down a hill, billowing smoke, footprints in snow, a lone skater gliding across a field of ice, birds in chaotic flight, all the drawings reverberate with ghostly evanescence and collective foreboding. The fugitive nature of the media gives poignancy and immediacy to images that intentionally dissolve into oblique memories.

A fully illustrated 36-page catalogue accompanies this exhibition. Included are essays written by Laura Richard Janku, Editor of Artweek, We are so Lightly Here: The Fate of People and Places, and Craig Buckwald, PhD, Principal Editor at the University of California, Berkeley, Approaching Life: Vision and Technique in Gale Antokal's We are so Lightly Here.

GALE ANTOKAL was born in New York, New York, and received her MFA from the California College of the Arts in 1984. She is an Assistant Professor in the School of Art & Design at San Jose State University, California. Gale Antokal held several visiting artist positions and teaching positions including the San Francisco Art Institute, Instructor of Art History at the Lehrhaus Institute, and the American College in Jerusalem. In 1992 Gale Antokal received a Visual Arts Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. She is included in both public and private collections

(1) Laura Richard Janku, We are so Lightly Here, catalogue essay

PATRICIA SWEETOW GALLERY

49 Geary Street, San Francisco, CA 94108

www.patriciasweetowgallery.com

Christoph Wedding, Malerei at Galerie Jean-Luc et Takado Richard in Paris

 

First exhibition of  the work of  the young German painter CHRISTOPH WEDDING, born in 1967, at Galerie Jean-Luc & Takako Richard in Paris.

Christoph Wedding’s pictures are painted directly on supports made of medium with rectangular shapes and rounded corners and hollows. Multiple coats in thin, translucent layers are painted over one another like a series of veils of different colours. In this way the artist manages to create an illusion of infinite depth. 

Most of his paintings combine curves and straight  lines with sharp shapes  in forceful  compositions. The “veils”, like the elliptical lines, are painted in a single stroke of a wide brush, allowing no correction. The artist uses straight lines as often as curves in his compositions. Curves meeting straight lines produce the sharp edges. The dynamics of the lines and transparency of the paint bring to mind the architectural sculptures of Antoine Pevsner and Naum Gabo. Straight lines are all either vertical or horizontal, this geometrical structuring being counterbalanced by the potentially more organic and chaotic play of fluid curves. This relationship between hardness and sensuality in uncompromising coexistence is quite disturbing to the viewer. 

Christoph Wedding combines two different aesthetic and philosophical approaches in the same picture – one marked by rigour, order and a search for finality, the other more organic, pantheistic and anarchic. Between these two extremes, Christoph Wedding’s paintings achieve a state of precarious balance and tense coexistence.

In 2003  Christoph Wedding was one of the artists shown in the New Abstract Painting exhibition at  the Morsbroich Museum  in Leverkusen, and has had a one man  show at the Kunstverein, Heilbronn. Galerie Aurel Scheibler presented a Christoph Wedding one man show in FIAC 2003.

 
CHRISTOPH WEDDING, Malerei 
11 September – 19 October 2004

Galerie Jean-Luc & Takako Richard
51-53, rue Saint-Louis en l’Ile  
75004 PARIS

Emma Woffenden, Barrett Marsden Gallery, London

Emma Woffenden
Barrett Marsden Gallery, London
10 September - 9 October 2004

Emma Woffenden is widely acclaimed as one of Britain‘s most innovative and talented glass artists. Her haunting, enigmatic forms can be reminiscent of transient experiences that hover on the edge of consciousness, such as those which occur between waking and sleep. They are often presented as tableaux or in an installation context, with each autonomous element contributing to the whole. There can be a sense that these presences are on the cusp of transformation - that something vaguely unnerving is about to unfold.

Emma Woffenden employs a full range of glass-working techniques. The forms are variously blown, cast, slumped or fabricated from sheet glass and often combined with other materials. Each work is a distillation of references and her abstract, organic forms, in particular, touch a visceral nerve. These are cast in clear glass, then ground and polished, giving rise to a range of impressions: heaviness and solidity, transparency and magnification, sensuousness and luminosity.

The physical and evocative characteristics of the works are further heightened through her deliberate juxtaposition of opposites, the organic forms contrasting sharply with the more austere representations of man-made objects. The stark, minimal shapes of two faceless grandfather clocks are dark, but reflective. Their deep shadows rhythmically shift from side to side with the pendulum swing of an overhead light bulb, marking the passage of time in eerie silence.

EMMA WOFFENDEN, b. 1962, trained at West Surrey College of Art and Design, 1981-1984, and the Royal College of Art, 1991-1993. Alongside her studio based practice she has collaborated with Tord Boontje on the design and production of the award winning Transglas range of glassware and was curator of the exhibition Solid Air, Crafts Council Gallery, 2001 - 2002.

Examples of her work can be found in numerous public collections including the British Council, Belgium; Ernsting Glass Museum, Germany; Broadfield House Glass Museum; Brighton and Hove Museum; Victoria and Albert Museum; and the Crafts Council. Recent exhibitions (with accompanying publications) include a major solo show at the National Glass Centre, Sunderland (1999), and No Horizon, a series of site-sensitive installations created in response to the architectural spaces of Fabrica, Brighton; Angel Row Gallery, Nottingham; and Firstsite, The Minories, Colchester 2003 - 2004. Emma Woffenden is represented by Barrett Marsden Gallery.

BARRETT MARSDEN GALLERY
17-18 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DN
www.bmgallery.co.uk

Juan Uslé, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin - Open Rooms

Juan Uslé: Open Rooms

Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin

8 September 2004 - 3 January 2005

A major exhibition of the work of the internationally-acclaimed Spanish painter Juan Uslé opens to the public at the Irish Museum of Modern Art. Juan Uslé: Open Rooms, the artist’s first solo exhibition in Ireland, comprises some 33 abstract paintings dating from the early 1990s to his most recent works. Although influenced by ideas ranging from philosophy to multiculturalism, Juan Uslé’s work is not in any way representational, rather it seeks to convey his personal vision of the world, which is poetic rather than narrative.

The works in Open Rooms are grouped in five categories and all date from the period after 1987, when Uslé left Spain for New York. This move lead of a marked change in his work, away from the calming browns, blacks and blues of his native Cantabria to a more varied, contrasting palate, reflecting the fleeting sensory impressions and intense visual stimulation of a vibrant, ever-changing city.

The Sońé que Revelabas (meaning I dreamt you were revealed) series comprises large dark canvases - deep, pulsating spaces built up from luminous horizontal stripes, which seem to register the vital pulse of the artist, as it might appear on a cardiac monitoring machine. The Eolo (“el otro orden” or “another order”) works, by contrast, contain much lighter shades, often with large white spaces and simple playful forms in the style of Joan Miró as in Mosqueteros, o mira cómo me mira Miró desde la ventana que mira a su jardin, 1995 (Musketeers, or look at how Miró looks at me from the window that looks out onto his garden).

Rizomas includes some of Juan Uslé’s most complex compositions, with a layering of line and colour creating rhythmic, dynamic spaces which celebrate the sensory possibilities of painting. They also reveal the thought processes behind the works, while at the same time pointing to the complex history of painting. The In Urbania paintings are based on the horizontal and vertical structures of an urban landscape and also, the movement of light and form. Their tones of red, white and blue call to mind the flag, while their geometric structures, referencing freeway interchanges and subway lines, underline their urban inspiration.

The rich variety of Juan Uslé work is evident in Celibataires (singles). Although identical in size, this series can be seen almost as an exercise in the varied styles which are such a defining feature of his work. The Duchampian title emphasises further the individuality of each work.

Commenting on Juan Uslé’s work, the curator of the exhibition IMMA Director Enrique Juncosa said: “His work depicts the history of painting, with a complete awareness of its linguistic splendour . . . But it also expresses a vision of the world which moves and affects us, exploiting the power of metaphors and symbols which derives from the assimilation of new ideas and of a world which has changed externally, above all, with the extensive use of new technologies.”

Born in Santander in 1954, Juan Uslé began painting in the early 1980s. Since then his work has been presented internationally in many important museum and gallery exhibitions, including at the MACBA, Barcelona, the Saatchi Gallery, London, the Museum Moderner Kunst, Vienna, and at Documenta IX, Kassel, Germany.

Juan Uslé: Open Rooms was first shown at Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia (MNCARS), Madrid. It has travelled to Fundación Marcelino Botín, Santander, Spain, and Stedelijk Museum Voor Actuele Kunst, (SMAK), Gent, Belgium. The exhibition is supported by the Directorate General for Cultural and Scientific Relations of the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, along with the State Corporation for Cultural Action Abroad (SEACEX) and MNCARS. The opening event at IMMA is supported by the Instituto Cervantes, Dublin.

A fully-illustrated catalogue, with essays by Enrique Juncosa, Jan Hoet and David Carrier, writers, and Eva Wittocx, Co-Ordinator of Exhibitions, SMAK, accompanies the exhibition.

IMMA - IRISH MUSEUM OF MODERN ART 

Military Road, Kilmainham, Dublin 8

www.modernart.ie

French Photojournalists join Associated Press

The international photojournalist collective VII and the world's largest news cooperative, The Associated Press, have agreed on a distribution deal

Under the arrangement, AP clients, including member newspapers and communications professionals, gain access to VII's extensive archive and to an exclusive weekly topical picture story package that will be made available via the AP PhotoArchive and AP Wide World Photos.

VII, based in Paris, is an independent group of nine photojournalists, founded in 2001. Founding members Alexandra Boulat, Ron Haviv, Gary Knight, Antonin Kratochvil, Christopher Morris, James Nachtwey and John Stanmeyer were joined in 2002 by Lauren Greenfield and in 2004 by Joachim Ladefoged. VII's central purpose is to maximize the distribution of its output through all appropriate channels, and by this means to fund the production of innovative and diverse work.

"This agreement with AP extends the work of VII to a new editorial market," said Gary Knight of the VII photo agency. The exclusive weekly topical picture story package will be drawn from VII's archive and its more recent production, he said.

The announcement was made at Visa pour l'image, the International Festival of Photojournalism in Perpignan, France.

"The addition of VII's catalogue of in-depth feature and documentary photography adds a new dimension to the material available to AP's clients," said Andrew Hill, director of sales for AP Wide World.

VII derives its name from the number of founding photojournalists who, in September 2001, formed this collectively owned agency. Designed from the outset to be an efficient, technologically enabled distribution hub for some of the world's finest photojournalism, VII has been responsible for creating and relaying to the world many of the images that define the turbulent opening years of the 21st century. Alexandra Boulat, Ron Haviv, Gary Knight, Antonin Kratochvil, Christopher Morris, James Nachtwey, John Stanmeyer, Lauren Greenfield and Joachim Ladefoged document conflict -- environmental, social and political, both violent and non-violent -- to produce an unflinching record of the injustices created and experienced by people caught up in the events they describe.

www.apimages.com

Jack Pierson at Alison Jacques Gallery, London

Jack Pierson
Alison Jacques Gallery, London
10 September - 9 October 2004 

Alison Jacques Gallery announces its inaugural exhibition featuring nine new word sculptures by American artist Jack Pierson. Assembled with plastic, wood and metal letters pirated from discarded commercial signage, Jack Pierson’s sculptural aphorisms denote a parallel universe of seduction, wistful yearning, and false promise. The letters, which are salvaged from junkyards, derelict movie houses, roadside diners, and other forsaken enterprises, consolidate disparate relics from the commercial American landscape into a concise and personal visual rhetoric. The letters are alternately weathered, shimmering, rugged, gilded, or down-at-heel. They suggest an American voice trying to express a sense of authority long since mired in dust and disappointment.

The new word sculptures continue Jack Pierson’s taste for the gritty and blunt, tantalising us with promises of ‘TRUTH’ and ‘LOVE,’ only to dash the dream with deceit and accusation: ‘YOU ROTTEN PRICK’. Appropriately, ‘PORNOGRAPHY’ hangs in the balance, promising ‘ANYTHING YOU WANT’ with a cynical wink acknowledging that earnest desire is a meagre commodity in today’s transitive, heavily mediated, post-sexual age.

Since the late 1980s, Jack Pierson has been promiscuous in his art, producing drawings, installations, sculptures and photographs. His work often functions like a series of film stills, communicating shudders of self-awareness caught between here and there, public and private. This diverse practice is intent on smudging the distinctions between autobiography and a curiosity with popular culture’s darker corners. Jack Pierson has long been fascinated by the props and clichés of distressed glamour, lost time and thwarted desire. His work revels in its personality crisis, accommodating the allusions and delusions from which his life has been constructed.

Jack Pierson’s acclaimed early photographs capture nostalgia for an elusive golden boy bohemia. They are personal, diaristic, fleeting and flagrantly sentimental. His more recent photography parallels the tone of the new word sculptures. It is increasingly indebted to established codes of commercial, homoerotic portraiture without forsaking the previous work’s autobiographical impulse and heavyhearted charm. Pornography is indeed the subtext, but so–according to Jack Pierson–is self-portraiture. As his confessional, romantic persona retreats into a growing constellation of conceptual, soft-core surrogates; his visual vocabulary similarly constructs itself from the ruins of desire and consumption.

Jack Pierson was born in Massachusetts (1960). In addition to ‘Regrets’, a solo retrospective at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Miami, recent museum shows include: The Whitney Biennial, New York and ‘Electric Dreams’, The Barbican London. Solo shows include Cheim and Read, New York and ‘Self-Portraits’, Regan Projects, Los Angeles.

ALISON JACQUES GALLERY
4 Clifford Sreet, London W1X 1RB
www.alisonjacquesgallery.com

Arjan van Helmond, Galerie Juliètte Jongma, Amsterdam - Don't be a stranger

Arjan van Helmond: Don't be a stranger

Galerie Juliètte Jongma, Amsterdam

4 September – 9 October 2004

Galerie Juliètte Jongma, located on the Gerard Douplein in Amsterdam's Pijp, opens her doors for the first time on 4 September 2004. The gallery will focus on young international contemporary art in every discipline – art that taps into current discussion and reflects on contemporary discourse.

The opening exhibition is a solo exhibition by Dutch painter ARJAN VAN HELMOND (1971), currently working at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam.

Arjan van Helmond's work is characterised by strong filmic suspense, loosely referring to the ominous atmospheres present in the works of directors like Alfred Hitchcock. Arjan van Helmond focuses on those moments in a narrative when none of its characters are present; he tries to capture the underlying psychology of a certain location when deserted. His small-format paintings of landscapes, architecture, and interiors all hint at an imminent action, or its opposite: the sudden departure of the imaginary story's protagonists.

An image of an office space containing packed boxes may unfold a story about resignation, or moving, but in the material translation of the applied paint these boxes may at the same time become skyscrapers. A window covered with brownish moisture looks to be crying. Often the objects in Arjan van Helmond's works are open for various interpretations: a hotel bed turns into water on closer inspection, or becomes a book spread open. These subtle changes, from the recognisable into the more freely poetic, are what defines the work of the artist, and what makes the images linger on for a long time. The artist's eye focuses on that moment when time seems suspended, tiny details in our daily life or our memories, images and moments easily forgotten. As if to say that a moment will never return the same way.

GALERIE JULIETTE JONGMA

Gerard Douplein 23, 1073XE Amsterdam

www.juliettejongma.com

Ant Farm: 1968 - 1978, ICA, Philadelphia

Ant Farm: 1968 - 1978
Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadephia
September 8 - December 12, 2004

ICA presents the first exhibition to survey the work of the legendary architecture and art collective, Ant Farm. A group of radical architects who were also video, performance and installation artists-but above all, visionaries and cultural commentators-Ant Farm was founded by Chip Lord and Doug Michaels in 1968 amidst the hot-house San Francisco counter-culture. Influenced by "alternative" architects like Buckminster Fuller, Archigram, and Superstudio, Ant Farm's early inflatable structures were suited to a nomadic, communal lifestyle, divergent from the mainstream Brutalist architecture of the 1960s. The group was also known for spectacular performance events like "Media Burn" (1975), for which Lord and Michaels dressed up like astronauts and sped a customized Cadillac El Dorado through a pyramid of burning televisions.

Ant Farm officially disbanded in 1978 after a fire in their San Francisco studio destroyed a great deal of their work. Much of their photographic documentation and videotapes survived, however, and this, along with a wide range of Ant Farm materials organized into a visual "timeline," will form the core of the exhibition. A comprehensive catalogue, published by UC Press, will accompany the exhibition. It includes essays by Caroline Maniaque, Michael Sorkin, Steve Seid, a conversation among Constance Lewallen, Chip Lord, Doug Michels, and Curtis Schreier, an Ant Farm-designed timeline, and a reprint of Lord's essay on American car culture, Automerica.

Ant Farm: 1968 - 1978 is co-curated by Constance Lewallen, Senior Curator for Exhibitions at Berkeley Art Museum, and Steve Seid, Assistant Curator for Video at the Pacific Film Archive. Ant Farm: 1968 - 1978 was previously presented at Berkeley Art Museum, University of California (January 21 through April 26, 2004) and at Santa Monica Museum of Art (July 2 through August 14, 2004). After its presentation at ICA, the exhibition will travel to University of Houston, Blaffer Art Gallery (January 15 through March 13, 2005); ZKM (Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie), Karlsruhe, Germany (April 30 through July 24, 2005); and Yale University School of Architecture Gallery (August 29 through November 4, 2005).

Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania
118 S. 36th St. Philadelphia, PA 19104-3289
www.icaphila.org