the Milena principle agenda 2O12
At the occasion of the visit of Dilma and Lula to the National Museum of Brasilia a closed reception was organized in the exhibiti...on space of Anatomia da Escrita with guests invited by the president and ex-president on April 25th, during the last week of the exhibition.
The interactive sound and video installation “360 degrees / travelling spaces” by Enrique Tomas, Stefaan van Biesen and Geert Vermeire was presented at the main space of the Bienal of Literature in Brasilia and had more than 2.000 participating visitors.
The introductory event to Anatomia de Escrita, called Corpus´Island, from March 1st to March 15th included lectures about visual arts and José Saramago by Simona Vermeire in the National Library / the National Museum of Brasilia and an exhibition of paintings by Yiannis Melanitis and videopoems by Stefaan van Biesen and Geert Vermeire in the National Library.
The project Anatomia de Escrita connected the act of writing with visual arts, including several art works inspired by the Portuguese writer José Saramago, and was a part of the artistic program of the Bienal of Literature 2012 in Brasilia, the largest of its kind in South America.
Artists: Yiannis Melanitis, Stefaan van Biesen, Geert Vermeire and Enrique Tomás. Literary consultant: Simona Vermeire. Curator: Geert Vermeire
Athens Greece & Europe 2012.
[Balkan Tales] Goethe-Institut Athens Greece. [Walking with Çelibi] a contempory sound travel in a Balkan Tale.
A contemporary sound walk inspired on the world traveler, Evliya Çelebi, an Ottoman Turkish gentleman adventurer who travelled far and wide for over 40 years, visiting over 250 cities. He described everything he saw on his journeys, and left a record of his wanderings in 10 large volumes, the Seyahatname, or Book of Travels, “the longest and fullest travel account in Islamic literature, perhaps in world literature.” It is a book full of fantasy, imaginary landscapes and invented itineraries in a world where travelling was still magical and mysterious. On the other hand he is a great geographer in the tradition of Strabo and Ptolemy. Historians have cross-referenced Evliya’s descriptions of Balkan mosques, public baths and Sufi lodges with the actual sites that still stand today, and found Evliya to be highly accurate. Our sound walk refers to both the magical as the documentary side of Evliya Çelibis travels, situated within the Balkan of today. An atmosphere of past wonder connects itself with the sounds of contemporary Balkan. Poetic soundscapes, originally composed for this sound walk, and field recordings of street music, city life and nature, all made on location in the Balkan, go along with the themes and photographs of the exhibition. The five themes of the exhibition a Balkan Tale are evoked in soundscapes, linked via five musical promenades guiding you from one theme to the other. Next to this flux of music and sounds while you walk around the exhibition, you can listen as well to a small sound portrait of seven photographs. Another aspect of the traveler Çelibi which inspired us to walk together with him in this journey of sound is his usually friendly attitude to non-Muslims. Meetings with many persons are an essential part of his Book of Travels. As Çelibi said many times when he was far from his home, he was perfectly happy to be a nedim [intimate fellow] to strangers, a musahib [boon companion] to other travelers and “a friend of all mankind.” Human presence and sounds of life are the thread of our sound walk, always in the light of the joy of living together. As Çelebi wrote from his heart, “Most important is the companion, then the road.”
Introduction : Evlyana Çelebi, World Traveller ⋈ Five themes : Conquering, Religion-worshipping, Living together, Modernising, Memory-forgetting ⋈ Five promenades Seven photographs ⋈ A sound walk by Geert Vermeire [writer, concept], Enrique Tomás [composer, sound artist] and Stefaan Van Biesen [sound artist].
This project will travel from Athens Greece [February-April] Museum Bathhouse of the Winds ⋈ Goethe-Institut [November-December] ⋈ Thessaloniki [April- May] ⋈ Serbia ⋈ Belgium, Brussels [April] BOZAR ⋈ Macedonia [April-May] Museum of Macedonia ⋈ Kosovo, Prizren [May] Museum Great Hamam ⋈ Germany, Chemnitz [June-September], Museum Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, München or Berlin ⋈ Albania, Tirana [September-October] National Museum/Kunstmuseum ⋈ Italy, Trieste [January 2013] Historical Museum.
Brasilia Brazil March 28 th to April 2012.
the Milena principle at the National Museum Brasilia Brazil.
“360 º travelling spaces” and “Anatomia da Escrita” / two exhibitions of the Milena principle during the Bienal do Livro e da Leitura in Brasilia 360 º travelling spaces: a sound- and video installation inspired by “the unknown island “ of José Saramago (Enrique Tomás, Stefaan van Biesen, Geert Vermeire). Pavilion B - Bienal, Brasilia / until 23d of April, 2012 Anatomia da Escrita : the book of wonderings/the book I am, works of Stefaan van Biesen, video-poems of Geert Vermeire National Museum of Brasilia, until 29th of april 2012.
Interactive technology developed by Enrique Tomás allows the public to become part of a panoramic sound and image experience of 360 º which moves with the orientation of the listener via a rotating chair. Four natural soundscapes of Enrique Tomás represent four atmospheres of the fairy tale and follow the movement of the listener. Speakers reproduce the audio contents that are mixed on an organic way, depending of the point where you are listening.
The experience occurs in a rhythmic dialogue with a panoramic projection of various videos, video poems, video-performances and soundscapes, created for this installation by Stefaan van Biesen and Geert Vermeire. The flow of the text by Saramago is rewritten in a flow of sound and image activated by a person in a rotating chair, symbolizing the searching man of the fairy tale, and is transformed into a travel to an inner world. The work of the three artists connects itself with the typical approach of Saramago, always looking for making the public conscientious, investigating and recreating situations that question the human expectations and anxieties.
Geert Vermeire and Stefaan van Biesen (the Milena principle) collaborated with Enrique Tomás on various projects that connect literature, visual arts and new media. Including geolocalization, movement technology, applications for portable screens (smartphone, gps) for among others SMAK City Museum of Contemporary Art Ghent in Belgium, and a travelling project for various cultural venues in five countries (City Museum of Belgrado, Museum Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz, Museum Deichtorhallen in Hamburg in 2012, and in BOZAR Brussels and the Historical Museum of Trieste in 2013).
Brasilia Brazil March 28 th to April 2012.
the Milena principle at the National Museum Brasilia Brazil.
[The anatomy of writing] is a project of Yiannis Melanitis, Stefaan van Biesen and Geert Vermeire. Wagner Bajna, the director of the National Museum of Brasilia, invited Geert Vermeire to curate this exhibition. Stefaan van Biesen, Geert Vermeire and the Greek artist Yiannis Melanitis are making a project about the body as a book - the book as a body. Drawings as an instrument to a deeper understanding.
Brasilia Brazil 28th of March to 30th April 2012.
[Corpus’ Islands ⋈ Ilhas do corpo] : lectures by Simona Vermeire in the National Library of Brasilia in the context of the interdisciplinary art project the anatomy of writing ⋈ Anatomia da Escrita in the National Museum of Brasilia.
The anatomy of writing is a project of Yiannis Melanitis, Stefaan van Biesen and Geert Vermeire.
An ancient Irish legend tells about a phantom island in the North Atlantic that is hidden in mist, except for one day every seven years, and even then it is still not reachable. This island is called Brasil, or Hy-Brasil. This island is represented on several medieval maps, among others on a map made in Spain in 1325. We use the map, to present Brazil on the location of Iceland, to show the birth of a country, in this case Brazil which was initially seen as the Land of Promise. In our project we present this trans-Atlantic land as a mirror image to modern Iceland.
We add the vision of the Portuguese writer José Saramago about Brazil, related to his novels, in particular with his novel “The stone raft” in which the Iberian Peninsula parts of the European continent and floats in he Atlantic Ocean as an utopical island.
Simona Vermeire contributes to the project with the conference "Islands of the Body" in which she proposes an interdisciplinary reading of the novel “The Stone Raft” of the Portuguese writer Jose Saramago. Her approach is intended to connect the concepts conveyed in the works of participating artists: writing a new body (the body reinvented genetically) preserved in ice, as literary interpretation in the variant of Saramago's concept of Hy-Brazil and the drawings of Yiannis Melanitis, and representations as embryonic insularity of the biological body connected with the body of the geographic world (Portugal interpreted as the embryo of Brazil). A third topic geographical and metaphorical, Antarctica, will be explored in a series of poetic interventions and videos of Geert Vermeire and Stefaan van Biesen.
Curator : Geert Vermeire ⋈ Production : the Milena principle.
In negotiation.
Kassel Germany Summer 2012.
Dr. Rhea Thongens Stringaris is talking in February with the directors of the upcoming Documenta to participate in a project about Joseph Beuys. The Milena principle will take part with their concept of 'the politics of the heart'.
Amsterdam - Antwerp - Athens - Berlin - Beveren - Braga - Brasilia - Bruges - Delphi - Florence - Ghent - Guimaraes - Jahnishausen - Kassel - Lodz - Naumburg - Porto - Prague - Santiago de Compostela - Sint-Niklaas - Tirgu Mures - Venice - Vigo - Weimar