Description: The event opens the doors to dialogue among science, research, art and architecture, involving artists and intellectuals, who aim at keeping the memory of the world alive. The chosen locations stand for the richness of Venetian architectonic and artistic heritage: they range from historical buildings to abandoned factories, including locations like the Ghetto. (From the Venice Biennial's website)
I will show a video piece (Abreaction in Shanghai - 2004), which document an intervention made in that city. Sort of succinct graffiti, this intervention was a poetic and cathartic work of vulgarization consisting in the traversing of the public space with a single sentence of automatic writing. Abreaction, the intervention invite an exteriorisation of emotional tension, possible effect according to Aristotle of tragedy on the audience (Poetics, VI and VIII).

LAST DAY OF MAGIC at SCALAMATA GALLERY

Project: Sung-Hee Chang, Emily Hoover, Amy Keefer, Dustin Kelly, Christine Kesler, Stephanie Lagarde, Elyse Mallouk, Amy Martin, Josh Martinez, Lynne McCabe, Piero Passacantando, Brindalyn Webster

Videos: Vanessa Albury, Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock, Armelle Aulestia, Stephan Balleux, Bosko Blagojevic, Sara Blaylock, Rudi Bogaerts, Dolores Bouckaert & Benny Vandendriessche, Monika Bravo, Fia Cielen, Pierre Clemens, Aoife Collins, Marthe Fortun, Anthony Fuller, Pieter Geenen, Matthew Green, Mark Gubb, Bettina Hutschek, Swati Khurana, Lauren Lavitt, Michael Mallis, Jenny Marketou, David Matorin, Yvette Mattern, Jillian McDonald, Martin Murphy, Rebecca Najdowski, Alexandra Navratil, Ruth Oppenheim, Deniz Ozuygur, Jenny Perlin, Lee Ranaldo, Steve Schepens, Melanie Bellue Schumacher, Tim Segers, Joaquin Segura, Sigga Björg Sigurdardóttir, Eric Van Hove, Ana Wolovick, Frank Zadlo

LAST DAY OF MAGIC Project started as an art and theory workshop at California College of the Arts in San Francisco, during which the artists were confronted with the suggestion that "today you live, tomorrow you'll die, what will you do on your last day (of magic)?" In-group, the artists designed rituals about departure and transformation. The rituals are designed with a personal significance and shamanic purpose. They examine the artist's interpersonal experiences with belief, sacrifice, loss, disappearance, and memory. These rituals were performed on March 28th in Marin County, North of San Francisco, and documented in video. Last Day of Magic was a melancholic journey to the metaphoric edge of the cliff of life where the artists took halt, built a secret community and resided.

LAST DAY OF MAGIC Video is an examination of illusion as well as disillusion that magic provides in culture: the search for the intangible; the revealing of deception, the removal of what's obscuring. Magic changes the perception of reality. Last day of Magic video is a curated film screening about secrets, lies, false beliefs, melancholy, disappearance, tragedy and transgression.


Special thanks to: Doron Polak; Amir Cohen; Aimee Friberg; Jessica Rosen; Ted Purves; Leah Singer; Emily Gonzalez; Alison Beth Levy; Orange Alley Projects, SF; Gallery Extrana, Berkeley; Dorsch Gallery, Miami; brot.undspiele Gallery, Berlin; Galerie Adler, Frankfurt; Gallery Jan Dhaese, Ghent; OCA, Oslo; Arena Mexico Arte Contemporaneo, Mexico; ArtFagCity, NYC; Mireille Mosler Ltd, NYC; ICPAbackstage, NYC