PRESENTATION

PRESENTATION

This project has appeared within the debate on the state of the art system; more specifically on the fairly widespread appreciation of a profound crisis of legitimacy that may endanger the sustainable development of art within the context of cultural capitalism and the so-called knowledge-based societies. We note that there is a need for a far-reaching reconsideration of the role that the arts play and could play in contemporary societies, and of the transformations and processes that characterise them.

This context calls up an entire series of questions about the experience of art and the construction of an imaginative world, the function of art, its public nature and social impact, its commercial rules and added value, its patrimonial symbolic condition, its links with world of entertainment and democratic representation; the relations and flows of influence between institutions, and the production of immaterial work; about cultural diversity and the so-called "experience industry", the links between art and mass education media, and other micro-narratives that shape the imaginative world of society.

This crisis of (perceptual, emotional and conceptual) legitimacy seems to be framed through a flight towards models that are socially recognised as agents providing representation and representativeness, such as industry and entertainment. In this way, the artist, in an attempt to find a place in the network of social interaction, adopts productive and interpretative models that are characteristic of the businessman, the cultural manager, media communicator or political activist. Having established this shift, it seems to have achieved a status that is socially recognised, but has done so at the price of definitively abandoning the complexity that had characterised universal art. These attempts at accommodation, however radically they may be presented, are a cause and effect of the very system that they aim to question.

In contrast to these forms of accommodation, it is possible to turn difficulties into opportunities, by trying out the definition of a unique position from where art may even aspire to actively interact with other fields of knowledge. This involves confirming the persistence of art as learning - and not just "know-how" in a purely technological sense- and of the artist as an agent of a certain kind of knowledge at the extreme limits of the learning of a period. This definition of the conditions to make possible an epistemogony points towards an attempt to place the field of art beyond its condition as an object of study - as it has been considered by various disciplines, (history of art, sociology of art, philosophy of art, psychology of art, anthropology of art, etc. reflect their own disciplinary requirements and criteria rather than reflecting the specific nature of their object)- and that do not manage to conceptualise or reflect artistic experience. Confirming its condition as wisdom, means recognising that art is no longer an object of knowledge, but is now a producer of learning, and even as a field in which the learning of a period finds its high point and borderline of production and creation, of poiesis: the very place in which the difference between "knowledge" and "learning" becomes problematic.

From a structural perspective, the project aims to create a basic work group, by setting up a committee at the highest possible level, to deal with this situation conscientiously and create a network of collaborators and a system of public reports on the tricky situation that such an important activity is in. This involves creating a body of work and promoting a network of interdisciplinary international complicities and exchanges, that may well provide the basis for subsequent research and activities. The seminar also seeks to encourage active involvement by young artists and researchers in this programme.

PROGRAMME

PROGRAMME

International University of Andalusia. UNIA artandthinking, Seville.
10 - 14 November 2003

Seminar [Attendance subject to inscription]
Date: 10 - 14 November 2003
From 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
Guest speakers: Joseph Kosuth, Yves Michaud, Sarat Maharaj, José Luis Brea, Juan Martín Prada, Juan Luis Moraza

Lectures [The lectures will be open to interested members of the public. Simultaneous interpretation services will be available]

Monday 10 November 2003
· 19:00 h.
Presentation: (a-W)
Juan Luis Moraza

Tuesday 11 November 2003
· 19:00 h.
Art, transgression et excès aujourd'hui
Yves Michaud

Wednesday 12 November 2003
· 19:00 h.
An Unknown Object in Uncountable Dimensions: Visual Arts as Knowledge production in the Retinal Arena
Sarat Maharaj

Friday 14 de November 2003
· 19:00 h.
Various Accomodations
Joseph Kosuth

Arteleku. Donostia-San Sebastián
Del 17 - 21 de November 2003

Seminar [Attendance subject to inscription]
Fecha: 17 - 21 de November 2003
From 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
Guest speakers: Charles Harrison, Gérard Wajcman, José Luis Brea, Juan Martín Prada, Juan Luis Moraza

Lectures [The lectures will be open to interested members of the public. Simultaneous interpretation services will be available]

Monday 17 November 2003
· 19:00 h.
Presentation II: (a-W) II
Juan Luis Moraza

Tuesday 18 November 2003
· 19:00 h.
Complexity and Disinterest
Charles Harrison

Wednesday 19 November 2003
· 19:00 h.
La enseñanza del arte y la Universidad
Juan Martín Prada

Thursday 20 November 2003
· 19:00 h.
El tercer umbral
José Luis Brea

Friday 21 de November 2003
· 19:00 h.
L'invention du caché
Gérard Wajcman

GUEST SPEAKERS

GUEST SPEAKERS

Yves Michaud
Lecturer of Philosophy at the University of Rouen, member of the Institut Universitaire de France, coordinator of the Université de Tous les Savoirs. Has also lectured at numerous other centres, including the universities of Paris, Sao Paulo, Edinburgh, Berkeley, Tunisia, Rouen, Montpellier, etc. His many publications include L'art à l'Etat Gazeux, essai sur le triomphe de l'esthétique, 2003; La Crise de l'Art Contemporain, Utopie, Démocratie et Comédie, 1997; Les Marges de la Vision, Essais sur l'Art 1978-1995, 1996; Enseigner l'Art?, 1993; etc. He has directed publication of numerous essays, such as Le Renouvellement de l'Observations dans les Sciences, Paris; Qu'est-ce que la vie psychique?, Paris 2002; Qu'est-ce que la culture?, 2001; etc .

Sarat Maharaj
Professorial Fellow, Goldsmiths College, University of London and Professor of Visual Art and Knowledge Systems, Lund University, Sweden. He was the first Rudolf Arnheim Professor at Humboldt University, Berlin (2001-02), was Research Fellow at the Jan Van Eyck Akademie, Maastricht (1999-2001) and will be Research Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study, Berlin (2005). He was a co-curator on the Documenta XI team (Kassel, 2002) and with Ecke Bonk curator of Retinal. Optical. Visual .Conceptual… (Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam, 2002). Selected publications: Perfidious Fidelity: The Untranslatability of the Other, 1993; Modernity and Difference (with Stuart Hall), 2001; Dislocution: Dictionnaire Elementaire... on Cultural Translation..., 2000; A Monster of Veracity, a Crystalline Transubstantiation, 1996; Dogmestic Borderations, 1993; Avidya: Non-Knowledge Production in the scene of Visual Arts Practice, 2000; Xeno-epistemics: makeshift kit for visual art as knowledge production, 2002.

Charles Harrison
Member since 1971 of Art & Language, whose work has been exhibited in the world's leading museums and galleries. Organiser of exhibitions such as When Attitudes become Form, 1969 and Art as Idea, 1970. Editor and author of important publications and monographs, such as Art in Theory 1648-1815; Conceptual Art and Painting: Further Essays on Art & Language; Art in Theory 1900-2000; Art & Language, Vol 1-5; etc., collaborator with Studio International, Artforum, Cahiers du Musée National d'Art Moderne, Art History, Critical Inquiry, Arts, Art Bulletin, Kunst & Museumjournaal, etc. Lecturer at numerous universities, including the University of East Anglia, The Open University, St. Martin's School (London), University of Michigan, University of Chicago, etc.

Gérard Wajcman
Writer, psychoanalyst, lecturer, director of the seminar "Psychoanalysis and aesthetics" in the Psychoanalysis Department, University of Paris 8. Representative works: Le Maître et l'Hystérique, 1982; L'interdit, 1986; Le Jeu du Narcisse, 1994; L'objet du siècle, 1998; Collection, Arrivée, départ, Théorie et pratique des fenêtres (to be published soon). He is preparing the exhibition L'intime, le collectionneur derrière la porte, to be opened next spring in Paris.

Joseph Kosuth
He is one of the pioneers of Conceptual art and installation art. He studied in The School of Visual Arts, New York City, 1963-64 y 1967-85 and anthropology and philosophy in the New School for Social Research, New York 1965-67. A member of the Art & Language, 1969-70; co-editor of the The Fox magazin, 1975-76 and art editor of Marxist Perspectives, 1977-78. Professor at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste, Hamburg, 1988-90; and Staatliche Akademie der Bildende Künste, Stuttgart, 1991-1997. Currently professor at the Kunstakademie Munich, and Istituto Universitario di Architettura, Venice, Italy. Visiting professor in: Yale University, Cornell, New York, Duke, Chicago, Copenhagen, Oxford, Rome, Berlin, London, Glasgow, Paris, Vienna. His nearly thirty year inquiry into the relation of language to art has taken the form of installations, museum exhibitions, public commissions and publications throughout Europe, the Americas and Asia, including five Documenta(s) and four Venice Biennale(s). From the awards received should be mentioned: the Brandeis Award, 1990; Frederick Weisman Award, 1991; the Menzione d'Onore at the Venice Biennale, 1993; and the Chevalier de l'ordre des Arts et des Lettres from the French government in 1993. In February 2001, he received the Laura Honoris Causa, doctorate in Philosophy and Letters from the University of Bologna.

Juan Martín de Prada
He has written numerous articles and essays on contemporary art theory, including, Deleuze-Guattari and the corporeity of technology, 1998; Aesthetic reception and technological mediation, 1999; or Net.art or the social definition of the new media, 2000; and the books Post-modern appropriation: Art, appropriationist practice & theory of postmodernism (published by Fundamentos), Madrid 2001 and The new conditions of modern art, Briseño 2002. Lecturer on Modern Art Theory and Criticism on various postgraduate, masters and doctorate courses, he has been director of the Fine Art section at the European University in Madrid. At the moment he is permanent lecturer at Valladolid University.

José Luis Brea
He is permanent lecturer in Aesthetics and Theory of Modern Art at Castile-La Mancha University and director of the journal Estudios Visuales (Visual Studies). An independent art critic, he collaborates on various national and international magazines. At the moment he is the Spanish correspondent for Artforum, a member of the Advisory Board of the Artnodes project at the Oberta University of Catalonia and regional editor for Rhizome. Member of the Art Committee of the Telefónica Foundation and the Humanities Committee of the FECYT of the Ministry of Science and Technology, he is currently coordinating its work group on "Art, Science and Technology". Director of the 1st International Congress of Visual Studies that will be held during ARCO'04 in Madrid. He has written various essays and books including: The post-media era. Communicative action, (post)artistic practices and neo-medial mechanisms, 2002; The blind spot, 1999; A secret noise. Art in the posthumous era of culture, 1996; New Allegorical Strategies, 1991; The Cold Auras, 1991.

Juan Luis Moraza
Founder member of CVA (1979-1985). Among his latest one-man shows it is worth mentioning PLATA, Madrid 2003; INTERPASIVIDAD, Donostia-San Sebastián 1999; ANESTETICAS. Algologos, Seville 1998. Among his collective exhibitions, Ophelias & Ulysses, Venice 2001; BIDA, Valencia 2001; Spanish Art for the end of the century, Barcelona 1997; More time less history, Oporto 1996; XXII Biennial in Sao Paulo, Brazil 1994; Cooked and raw, Madrid 1994; Lux Europae, Edinburgh 1992; Pasajes, EXPO 92 Seville; The imperative dream, Madrid 1991. He has published the books MA(non É)DONNA. Images of creation, procreation and anti-conception, 1993; Six sexes of difference, Arteleku, Donostia-San Sebastián 1990; and numerous essays in collective books, specialized magazines, catalogues and newspapers. He earned a Doctorate in Fine Art at the University of the Basque Country where he taught for seven years, and is permanent lecturer at Vigo University. He has been a guest lecturer at numerous Universities and Art Centres, and has given lectures in many parts of the world. He has also taken part as a speaker at numerous national and international seminars and congresses.