Art on emergency situations
Every day at a quarter past noon, a new group of artists gather outside «Emergency Room,» a room set up inside the Ileana Tounta Contemporary Art Center. Each carries a work made the day before on a theme chosen from the latest news. At 12.30 p.m. exactly, the doors of this round gallery space open and the artists get busy taking down the works that were hung on the walls by the preceding day’s artists and install the new ones. With only half an hour at their disposal, they move fast and with precision. Almost like news reporters who have to deliver the story in time, they operate with a sense of urgency. If there is a visual equivalent for the daily press, then «Emergency Room» is probably the closest that an art exhibition can come to it. Each work has a lifespan of 24 hours, after that it becomes «old news,» like in a newspaper. The next day, a selection of them are moved to the adjacent room, the so-called «Delay Museum.» Here documentation is treated as archival material, not immediate information. The works are generated daily in response to current events. But can they be considered as art or are they mere visual documentation with an artistic side? Conceived by the French contemporary conceptual artist Thierry Geoffroy/Colonel as a constantly evolving, international project, «Emergency Room» cannot be compared to the usual art exhibition. Its primary objective is not the production of finished, complete works of art. According to the project’s concept, stated by Geoffroy/Colonel, «the quality of aesthetic of the exhibition is not important.» «The importance lies in the possibility to show art immediately… I believe that artists are the barometers of society and that we have to give them voice in real time, without delay before it is too late,» the French artist notes in the exhibition’s «manifesto.» The project started out in Copenhagen’s Nikolaj Art Center and then moved on to the Olaf Stuber Gallery in Berlin and New York’s PS1/Moma. After Athens, it will travel to other European cities as well as Cairo. Each project yields approximately 500 works and invites roughly 15 artists (who are different at each event) on a daily basis. The process of installing the works is documented and, before entering the «Emergency Room» to install the works, a 15-minute interview session in which each artist provides information on the work that he has produced is conducted by an art historian (for the Athens project, Yiannis Kostantinidis is responsible for the entire documentation) or the gallery staff. The information is conveyed on the project’s website. The project’s collaborative work is one of its most distinctive aspects. By gathering all these different artists and asking them to react to current issues, «Emergency Room» intends to evoke the spirit of activism, of collective, political action. The question of whether art can play an activist role springs to mind. Does art express sophisticated political statements that can reach the general public? Maybe not. In «Emergency Room,» however, the political role of art does not seem to be the main objective. The idea is to give artists the opportunity to use their work in order to react immediately to current affairs. Artists are accorded the role of a news commentator. Art is produced in just a few hours and exhibited for just a day. Seen from that angle, «Emergency Room» is a reaction to the accelerated pace of contemporary life and the fast flow of information. It is adapted to the contemporary phenomenon of short attention spans and the demand for newness and constant change. In «Emergency Room,» art takes on the ephemeral character of a newspaper. To those who think of art as closer to a book than to a newspaper, as something to keep and refer to, this approach to art may, at first, feel a bit confusing. But the flexibility and lively aspect of the entire project is both refreshing and exciting, even for the more reserved visitor. At the Ileana Tounta Contemporary Art Center (48 Armatolon & Klefton, 210.643.9466) to October 5, www.emergencyrooms.org/athens.html. Parallel projects organized by Thessaloniki Biennale The Thessaloniki Biennale is nearing its close with a series of projects that have been organized for the month’s remaining days. «Public Screen,» which opened Monday, presents video art by 94 international artists. The works are being shown at Thessaloniki’s airport, the old port (near the Museum of Photography), the Kodra former military camp and other areas in the city center. The project is curated by Sirago Tsiara and aims at integrating art with public spaces and urban life. This weekend, the State Museum of Contemporary Art, the organizer of the biennale, will offer an international conference on the subject of «Art as Heterotopy.» The biennale’s three curators, Maria Tsantsanoglou (also director of the museum), Catherine David and Jan-Erik Lundstrom, will join specialists from different fields to discuss the biennale’s theoretical concepts. Also scheduled for the weekend is a performance by Leda Papaconstantinou (one of the pioneers of performance art in Greece).
