Exhibition: Postgravity Art :: Syntapiens
As part of the citywide biennial performance art festival, PERFORMA 09, Eyebeam presents Postgravity Art :: Syntapiens by the Slovenian artist collaborative of Dragan Živadinov, Dunja Zupančič, and Miha Turšič.
Signifying the 50-year time span of their multimedia theatre project, Dragan Živadinov, Dunja Zupančič , and Miha Turšič will stage a 50-hour event at Eyebeam. The performers will take the audience on a journey through the concepts of “theatre in zero-gravity” starting with the first “informance” on Tuesday, November 10, at 8PM, and continuing with hourly events through November 12, which can be viewed at Eyebeam during gallery hours (12-6PM), and followed 24 hours a day on Twitter feed.
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On November 12, Eyebeam resident artists will be performing work as part of Postgravity Art :: Syntapiens. Join us in person or online as Jamie O’Shea, Scott Kildall, Rashaad Newsome and Kenya (Robinson) create interventions into the world of Postgravity Art.
2:30PM: Jamie O’Shea will get suited up and strapped into The Vertical Bed, a system that allows its user to fall asleep in a standing position. By bolting into cracks between sidewalks, subway grates, or other rigid contact points, the suit supports the wearer with a minimum of visible hardware or occupied space, holding the sleeper’s weight with concealed harnesses. The project is designed for the visual performance of an alternate way of occupying urban space, born partly out of fantasies of minimal need and elegant futurism, and partly out of fears of the dehumanization of space.
3:30PM: Scott Kildall’s Space Age Love is an auto-biographical performance in Second Life which portrays two astronauts floating without a sense of home as they connect through live text chat in reference to a double-meaning of “post-gravity”.
4:30PM: Rashaad Newsome and Kenya (Robinson) will perform an audiovisual piece using Universal Access, an embedded function of personal computing that provides unique resources to individuals with disabilities. Voiceover utilities, visual zoom, and display options are among the elements that can be customized. Rashaad Newsome + Kenya (Robinson) make performance work by manipulating these system preference functions to create novel audio patterns. Within these performances search engines results become the text for a new kind of interactive improvisational dialogue, one that references instant messaging, rap free-styling and email correspondence.
5:00PM: The final informance of the 50-hour event!
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Artists Statement:
Postgravity Art is not a style formation, it is not the zeitgeist, but the conditions in which art will be produced in the future. It therefore needs a new space of construction-a zero-gravity space.
In 1995, the 50-year theatre project, Noordung 1995 – 2045 began. By 2045, during the fifth and final reprise, cosmonaut Dragan Živadinov (trained at Yuri Gagarin Cosmonauts Training Centre, Star City) will use a spacecraft to send 14 satellites into geostatic orbit, where they will transmit signals representing the roles played by each of the deceased performers to Earth, and at the same time send high-resolution 3D projections of their faces into deep space. As images of cosmonauts, or “space sailors”, they will continue the act of searching for eternal truth.
Dragan Živadinov:
Candidate Cosmonaut, Co-founder of Neue Slowenische Kunst (NSK)
Dragan studied theatrical direction at the Academy of Music, Radio, Television and Film in Ljubljana from 1980 – 1984. He was a cofounder of the art movement NSK in 1985. During the ’80s he constructed the style “retro-gardism”, where he constructed retro-gardist events and observatories. In 1983, he founded the retro-garde Theatre of Scipio Nasica’s Sisters, and in 1987, the cosmokinetic observatory Red Pilot. In the early ’90s, he constructed “informances” and transformed Red Pilot into the Noordung Cosmokinetic Cabinet. In 1995, he embarked on the 50-year theatrical process Noordung 1995-2045, through the style of “telecosmism.” In 1998 he became a candidate cosmonaut, and in 1999 realized Biomechanics Noordung, the first complete theatre production in zero-gravity conditions. Since 2000, he has been constructing post-gravitational theatrical abstracts, and in 2005, he staged the first reprise of Noordung 1995-2005-2045. The second reprise will take place in 2015.
Dunja Zupančič:
Mechatronic Artist
Dunja graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Ljubljana in 1987, with a thesis on Eisenstein and the Russian avant-garde. During the ’80s, using processes involving the montage of abstract textures and the construction of composites, she produced pictures of monumental size. During the ’90s, using the engineering of pneumatic and hydraulic elements, she constructed mechatronic abstracts and art satellites (umbots). On December 15, 1999, she visualized and materialized Biomechanics Noordung, the first complete theatrical production performed in conditions of zero-gravity. Since 2000, she has devoted herself to substitutes of corporeality, which she translates into amorphous structures with the help of digital tools. In 2007, she devised an art satellite/technological demonstrator for a 50-year theatre production.
Miha Turšič:
Designer of zero-gravity environments
Miha studied industrial design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Ljubljana from 1994 – 1999. He began his professional career as a digital visualizations designer at the digital production house ARXEL TRIBE.
In 1998, he co-founded the design company ASOBI. Since 2005, he has directed his research towards the design of zero-gravity environments. In 2006, the international design magazine I.D. proclaimed ASOBI designers of the year in the Lighting category; and he constructed a memorial centre in Vitanje dedicated to the pioneer of space technology, Herman Potočnik Noordung. His products combine design with cosmistic structures in conditions of zero-gravity. In 2008, he devises the GOD-Zero Gravity Design brand. Miha Turšič collaborates with the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonauts Training Centre in Russia.
November 10 performance info + tickets here
