Artistic Director: Victoria Lu

Curator: HUANG Yun, ZHANG Jiaping

Late last year, the first of the four exhibitions of the 2nd Animamix Biennial opened at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Taipei. The Biennial now continues with three different exhibitions at the Museum of Contemporary art in Shanghai, the Today Art Museum in Beijing and the Guangdong Museum of Art in Guangzhou.  Nearly 300 artists from more than 30 nations have been invited to participate in the Biennial.
Although the Guangzhou-based artist and curator Huang Yihan began speaking of an art movement known as the “Cartoon Generation” as early as 1992, it was not until 2004, when Victoria Lu curated Fiction.Love at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Taipei, that a conceptual framework for the new aesthetics of animation (Animamix) came to be formulated. Victoria Lu sees the Cartoon Generation as the Asian origin of Animamix. Seeing this exhibition as an opportunity to look back on history and hoping to revise our understanding of the Cartoon Generation, the curatorial team for Dazzled and Enchanted – New Age Animamix has specially invited a number of artists from the Guangzhou region to show their works in this exhibition. This exhibition investigates the particular qualities of the art produced as Animamix aesthetics developed between the time of the Cartoon Generation and today. Too, the exhibition shows that the Cartoon Generation should be seen as a highlight of the history of the cultural and creative industries in the Guangdong region.
In 2006, when Victoria Lu curated the second version of  Fiction @ Love at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Shanghai, she coined the term “Animamix” (“animation” + “comics”) to describe this new trend in artistic production that she had been following for several years. “Animamix” works are characterized by the following four traits: 1) their worship of youth and idealized youthful beauty; 2) the richness of their narrative texts; 3) their interest in the colorful light of animation; and 4) their notion of a practical aesthetics and their adherence to high production values derived from the animation and comics industries.
The artists whom Victoria Lu sees as Animamix artists are not people who simply work in the animation or comics industries; similarly, the term “Animamix art” does not necessarily refer to animation or comics themselves. Whereas the Pop artists of the previous century simply appropriated visual symbols from animation and comics, Animamix artists have created a visual language that is itself an original form of art. Animamix has already become an important source of inspiration for the creative industries of the twenty-first century.
This new art form registers the power of human creativity in realms both real and fictional. Animamix works take almost infinite forms, even including items related to the most basic necessities of daily life-food, clothing, shelter, and transportation. The works included in this exhibition of the 2nd Animamix Biennial create a new category of the aesthetics of daily life appropriate to this young century. In this era, the division between high art and low art no longer exists.

Guangdong Museum of Art

Opening Time: 9:00—17:00 each day;  closed on Mondays

Address: 338 Yanyu Road, Er-sha Island, Guangzhou 510105, P.R.China

Tel: 020-8735 1468

http://www.gdmoa.org

December 27, 2009 – January 10, 2010

Artistic Director: Victoria Lu

Curator: LIU Chunfeng

Heurisko "Ms. and Mr. Gossip", 75 x 80 cm, oil on wood

Heurisko "Seaman Anne Jane", 77 x 76 cm, oil on wood

Heurisko "I Don´t Know", 68 x 66 cm, oil on wood

When Victoria Lu curated “Fiction.Love” in 2004 at MoCA Taipei, she become aware of a new trend in aesthetics, and in 2006,when she curated a new version of Fiction@Love at MoCA Shanghai she coined a term to describe this new trend: Animamix, combining”animation” and “comics.”.

• All the various and abundant forms of Animamix in popular culture are centered on the worship of youth and the pursuit of an idealized youthful beauty.

• The bizarre and ever-changing narrative texts in Animamix artimbue the images with a strong narrative character, which themselves form a visual language.

• The colorful lights derived from the electronic media create a totally new and unique visual experience of art with colored lights..

• Animamix involves the use of great human, material and financial resources interacting and cooperating across different sectors.

The Animamix artists of the 21st century are not just the people who are engaged in creating animation and comics products; rather,Animamix artists are found in all the fields of the creative industry. Unlike the pop artists of the previous century who simplyappropriated visual symbols from comics and animation, 21^st century Animamix artists are a new generation of Neo-Aestheticswho are already completely submersed in the aesthetics of Animamix. Themultifarious styles of Animamix art actually are the very archetype of artistic creation. In other words, Animamix art has become the most important source of inspiration for the global art scene in the 21stcentury.
Looking back at modern art, which only emerged at the end of the 19th century, it developed at the beginning of the last century entirely in the abstract style. Even in modern literary works, where language forms the main narrative, deconstruction of words frequently occurredplaying around with semantics or abstract deconstructionswhich made it difficult for readers to quickly grasp the meaning. In the digitized environment of the 21st century, literarynarrative has changed, becoming more diverse and more interesting. More and more information is being transmitted via pictorial languageto convey and communicate ideas. The anthropomorphic charactersfound in cartoons, animation and comics, coupled with the narrative of the story line, together become an exaggerated form of distortions,which will become the new mainstream characterizing visual aestheticsin this century just as abstract art led the way in the aesthetics of the 20th century.

Animamix art does not refer simply to animation or comicsalone. Its derivative products are so abundant in variety and large in number, extending even to items related to people’s livelihoods and to food, clothing, home and transport, that almost nothing is excluded. The value of the output of the Animamix industry is not just in the artworks themselves, but rather in the totality of the combined or multiplying cultural forces of an era. The production and marketingof Animamix art will become a most important link in the creative industry worldwide. This type of artistic creation is in perfect harmony with popular culture; in this new era, the division between high art and low art no longer exists.

This new type of art records in the virtual world the creative forces of our lives and saves them in the fourth dimension of theelectronic and digital worlds. The inaugural Animamix Biennial was staged at MoCA Shanghai in 2007. This year, the Animamix Biennial is expanding to four venues. It will open at the end of 2009 and continue into 2010, staging at MoCATaipei, MoCA Shanghai, Today’s Art Museum in Beijing, and Guangdong Art Museum in Guangzhou.

Animamix Biennial 2009-2010 is the first major cross-straitsinternational Biennial jointly hosted by four museums. It consists offourdifferent exhibitions with a book, Animamix: The New Aesthetics of the 21^st Century,will be published jointly by the four museums.

Today Art Museum Beijing

Opening Time: 10:00-17:00 (Except Spring Festial Holiday)

Address: No. 32 Baiziwan Road, Chaoyang District,

Beijing, 100022, China

Tel: 8610-58760600

www.todayartmuseum.com

The exhition closes sunday 10 of january 2010.

Heurisko "Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish", 80 x 86 cm, oil on wood

Heurisko "Public Woman", 77 x 63 cm, oil on wood

Heurisko "Public Man", 77 x 63 cm, oil on wood

CCCB – 2a planta

Centro de Cultura Contemporánea de Barcelona

C/ Montalegre 5  -  08001 Barcelona

www.bacfestival.com

December 12th, 2009 – January 31st, 2010

Artistic Director: Victoria Lu

Curator: PAN Qing

Confabulations "Edward", 47 x 30 cm, oil on wood

Confabulations "Hazel", 47 x 30 cm, oil on wood

Confabulations "Bill", 47 x 30 cm, oil on wood

Confabulations "Helen", 47 x 30 cm, oil on wood

Confabulations "Pamela", 47 x 30 cm, oil on wood

The Animamix artists of the 21st century are not just the people who are engaged in creating animation and comics products; rather,Animamix artists are found in all the fields of the creative industry. Unlike the pop artists of the previous century who simply appropriated visual symbols from comics and animation, 21^st century Animamix artists are a new generation of Neo-Aestheticswho are already completely submersed in the aesthetics of Animamix. The multifarious styles of Animamix art actually are the very archetype of artistic creation. In other words, Animamix art has become the most important source of inspiration for the global art scene in the 21st century.

上海當代藝術館

Museum of Contemporary Art, Shanghai

People’s Park, 231 Nanjing West Road, Shanghai, 200003

Tel: +86 21 6327 9900-125

Fax: +86 21 6327 1257

www.mocashanghai.org

The exhition closes saturday 9 of january 2010.

“FEMALE POSITIONS” oder: Was A mit B zu tun hat.

Welcome on earth, welcome into the exhibition “Female position”.

galerie wagner + marks

Dr. Christel Wagner-Niedner + Michael M. Marks

Fahrgasse 22, 60311 Frankfurt am Main

Öffnungszeiten: Mi – Fr 13-18.30 Uhr – Sa 11-15 Uhr  und nach Vereinbarung

Tel. 069–21 99 69 32   Fax. 069–21 99 69 33

www.galerie-wagner-marks.de e-mail: info@galerie-wagner-marks.de

"The room is lit by a huge lamp" bordado sobre tela/ embroidery on textile / 70cm x 70cm

Topografies is a series of a group of embroidery works on canvas.

Similar to earth surface in maps, Topografies takes a look at a diverse number of features relating to the socialized world.

Its areas of action begin with the analysis of media images, filled with violence, which slip in to our domestic and aesthetic homes “Radiant edges”, until another kind of violence, more careful and subtle, that has been taken to an artistic land, as in the series entitled “Jiu-Jitsu”.

Thread has been used as a system of representation of a manipulated society directed in “Things can only get better”, and finally embroidery works contrast with the common sublime in “Kisses”, studying the different levels of the same reality or fact.

This group of works, is a journey which takes the audience on the a human skin surface, in constant movement, where it is necessary to analyze, even though the only way to do it could be going along the edges, through figurative curves, which are deeply full of content.

Exhibition together with Ramón Sanmiquel and Paco García Barcos

Galeria Hartmann
Sta. Teresa 8 Bjs.
08012 Barcelona
+34 93 4159556
tuesday-friday 10h00-14h00 and 17h00-20h00
saturday 11h00-14h30
August closed
www.galeriahartmann.com

Exhibition at the Fast Cool- Gallery Madrid

C/ Costanilla de los Desamparados 6

April 15th – June 25th 2009

In this exhibition a group of paintings, such as the series “Protect me”, “Ladies and Gentlemen”, “Confabulations” come together. We can see new works in the series Bowls Athenea, in which we can observe busts of women with two animal heads that fuse together in their hair. These animals represent consciousness, and reflect , in an internal and spontaneous way, kindness and evilness as part of a whole. These figures represent Ateneas o Minervas, goddess of justice and wisdom.

They have been placed inside bowls, objects that have been used since immemorial ancient times to deposit food. It’s shape can be analyzed from two different perspectives; concave or convex, two opposite sides that have to live together in the same object, as good and evil coexist in human beings since his origins.

"Bowl Athenea Bears" / oil on wooden bowl / ø 15 cm

"Bowl Athenea Lions" / oil on wooden bowl / ø 15 cm

"Bowl Athenea Koalas" / oil on wooden bowl / ø 15 cm

]]> http://blog.mapigil.com/?feed=rss2&p=634 0 http://blog.mapigil.com/?p=598 http://blog.mapigil.com/?p=598#comments Thu, 07 May 2009 19:42:56 +0000 admin http://blog.mapigil.com/?p=598 Design for the curtains of the Tenerife Espacio de las Artes building in Santa Cruz de Tenerife

Building design by Herzog & de Meuron

From a number of photographs of landscapes in Tenerefie comes a discourse between the natural exterior areas and the functional aspect of dressing interior spaces with pieces of cloth, which cover glass walls. This dialogue gives an abstract vision of water, represented in the shape of vertical columns. “Water”, which functions as a translucent, shiny and reductionist veil. In contrasts “Landscape”, gives a vision of a beach after being fused with its own unique elements in its veil. This resultant view is a recalling image, which suggest the natural landscape, as part of a memory exercise.

Curtains "Water" TEA -Tenerife Espacio de las Artes

Curtains "Water" TEA -Tenerife Espacio de las Artes

Curtains "Water" TEA -Tenerife Espacio de las Artes

Curtains "Water" TEA -Tenerife Espacio de las Artes

Curtains "Landscape" TEA -Tenerife Espacio de las Artes

Curtains "Landscape" TEA -Tenerife Espacio de las Artes

Curtains "Landscape" TEA -Tenerife Espacio de las Artes

Curtains "Landscape" TEA -Tenerife Espacio de las Artes

Opens: Tuesday 02 of december at 20.00 hrs.

The exhition closes sunday 28 of december 2008.

CCCB – c/ Montalegre 5, 08001 Barcelona

A soldier represents the artists fight as an urban guerilla, against media impositions which is attempting to control our lives.

As a member of society, the individual is forced to obey a number of obligations so that the system can continue to function. Freedom no longer exists, it is merely a liberty that has been built by some marketing laws; it is represented as a product.

The individual has to fight in a virtual world so that he /she can evade, and clash with societal norms, which are attempting to dictate the way one should live and assert that happiness can only be reached if you hold specific values.

"soldier" / mural de tiza/ chalk drawing/ Kreidezeichnung - 400x520 cm

detail "soldier"

Development, and in general, human unwraps in consecutives stages which have very special characteristics. ­Protect me, is based on childhood, as the phase of intuitive thought and imagination (4- 7 years old) and an egocentric attitude. It is a period of time, in which fantasy and game make up the majority of their lives. It is a time of tails, fables and legends.

Through impassioned fantasy and game the child brings objects to life and creates a unique psychological world. Children are free containers but, they are not able to make decision on their own education.

Childhood is a delicate and vulnerable stage.  One in which the child is molded and transformed by the world of adults in his or her surroundings.

In “Protect Me”, clothes have been created, based on pieces of primary circles that stick all together through automatic buttons.  In conclusion, the whole attire is made by the union of different pieces of cloth. Oilcloth and felt are the materials that have been used, to refer to the main issue of the project: protection.

The combination of the color white with saturated pinks and reds dominates the collection and brings up the idea of purity and clarity. In relation to graphics, the technique was oil and pencil on wood.

The use of figures shows different relationship between cartoon and fictional characters. The title of each piece makes reference to common sentences used by children.

In the background we can appreciate a diversity of nearly transparent patterns; each placed one on top of the other. This creates a confused environment, one which drives us to a world between order and chaos, and ultimately essence of who we are and our appearance in the world.

"love me" / oleo y spray sobre madera / oil paint and spray on wood -38x19cm

“play with me” / oleo y spray sobre madera / oil paint and spray on wood -38×19cm

“don´t leave me” / oleo y spray sobre madera / oil paint and spray on wood -38×19cm

“look at me” / oleo y spray sobre madera / oil paint and spray on wood -38×19cm

“please” / oleo y spray sobre madera / oil paint and spray on wood -38×19cm

“buy it for me” / oleo y spray sobre madera / oil paint and spray on wood -38×19cm

“don’t forget me” / oleo y spray sobre madera / oil paint and spray on wood -38×19cm

“I want it” / oleo y spray sobre madera / oil paint and spray on wood -38×19cm

vestidos de hule y fieltro con botones automáticos / dresses made of oilskin and felt

vestidos de hule y fieltro con botones automáticos / dresses made of oilskin and felt

vestidos de hule y fieltro con botones automáticos / dresses made of oilskin and felt

expo Iguapop

expo Iguapop

“blue girl” / oleo y spray sobre madera / oil paint and spray on wood  – 60×42cm

"niña a caballo" 160x120 cm oleo sobre madera / oil on wood

The individual becomes aware of himself and his relationship with the external world through his capacity of learning. Memory is an essential part of the learning process, without it, experiences would get lost and human being would not be able to acquire knowledge. Remembering is a way of retrieving or localizing the information that has been stored.

What would happen if we could access that storage?

There is a phenomenon, which often follows amnesia. It is called confabulation, consists in inventing facts that have never existed and understand them as if they were real. This fact happens because our brain has a “button” that can erase parts of our memory. In terms of behavioral disorders, this “button” works in an arbitrary way. As the brain, is an organ that doesn’t admit empty spaces, when it searches for memory that has been deleted  without any command, brain recognize it, and fills in those hollows which information that has been created by its own fantasy.

To create this phenomenon brain doesn’t let the individual realize his own consciousness and environment, so it starts building a world, in which fiction and reality are at the same level.

I have started this project using a graduation class photo of 1963 with students, who were 20 years old. I have changed each of their portraits, deforming their heads and making each photo look more childish.

Now, all of them are in their sixties, although their lives have played out in different ways, they still remember their university years and meet all together in diverse celebrations. It seems as if they were trapped in that period of time, or if they had necessity to recognize themselves again.

In these paintings, the time factor fuses in some kind of age cocktail of each character, immersing the audience in a time machine.

Portraits are surrounded of a new scene and different objects and shapes which all together rebuild a new iconography, giving the character a new invented identity, in which reality and fiction are indistinguishable. There is no separation between real history and tail, not even between the I and the other.

"Carol" oleo sobre madera / oil paint on wood / 47x30 cm

"Shirley" oleo sobre madera / oil paint on wood / 47x30 cm

"Patricia" oleo sobre madera / oil paint on wood / 47x30 cm

"Bill" oleo sobre madera / oil paint on wood / 47x30 cm

"Christine" oleo sobre madera / oil paint on wood / 47x30 cm

This series consists of animal’s drawings that have two heads, which are placed on top of a background that imitates geometric symbols of wallpaper. The domestic and ornamental character that these backgrounds present us, try to create an environmental confidence, where those double-headed animal mutations, live together. Small monsters are drawn in a natural way, without veering too far from a possible reality, which on its own, is not natural. In conclusion, this series is questioning the limit between reality and fiction, natural and artificial and domestic versus savage.

"deer" detail

"mouse" detail

"rabbit" / lapiz sobre madera / pencil on wood / Ø22cm

"walrus"/ lapiz sobre madera / pencil on wood / Ø22cm

"wolf"/ lapiz sobre madera / pencil on wood / Ø22cm

wall instalation

From the 18th of January to the 3rd of March 2007

In order to realize this project, a number of artists created a collective method of working that allows for interaction between different disciplines of art in a lab /space, in which those participating artists, have created a particular way of working that allows the development of works, researching for historical references, urban and pop culture and critical seminaries.

The roaming nature of Inoxidable-Neopop promotes interaction, research and the application of different collective installations. In each of the countries visited by Inoxidable Neopop, there is a local curator which selects the artists, who then integrates the specific installation that has been created to develop a particular project.

The subject matter continues to evolve and is modified for each country and project. The result is a unique and specific political, social, economic, and aesthetic result in each exhibition.

Participants:

to dust - to clear

to dust to clear + work of Victor Castillo

to dust - to clear /swan

to dust - to clear /white donkey

to dust - to clear /drawers

to dust - to clear /drawers

to dust - to clear /drawers

to dust - to clear /drawers

En una pared pintada de negro aparecen unas líneas de fuerte cromatismo representando imágenes que podrían proceder del cine, la televisión o la prensa. De qué manera estamos condicionados por los medios de comunicación y cómo nos vemos confrontados con imágenes de contenido violento y agresivo de manera muchas veces gratuita es la pregunta que lleva a ofrecer estas imágenes como lineas delicadas que estilizan y filtran su contenido. De igual manera los “mass media” presentan sus imágenes con un alto grado de edulcorante y esteticismo se cuelan en nuestra vida cotidiana.

"convoy" 600x380 cm dibujo de tiza/ chalk drawing/ Kreidezeichnung

"convoy" dibujo de tiza/ chalk drawing/ Kreidezeichnung

"convoy" dibujo de tiza/ chalk drawing/ Kreidezeichnung

"convoy" dibujo de tiza/ chalk drawing/ Kreidezeichnung

instituto monsa de ediciones

And why not take a look, or several Coups d’Oeil, at a folder bringing together the work from the same generation of artists who have resisted the rigidity of a label?

Behind these works lie hidden expanding universes which inhale a certain pop and exhale a shrewd irony in what we could verbalize as a continuous breath of reinventing the present.

At a glance we come across original ways to shrink, expand and tether down the various traditions that these authors come from. Their genuine form of outlining, observing, deforming, deflating and exploding their phantoms, objects, roots and icons make each one the motor of their own world.

Coups d’Oeil is a visual blow to today’s society, to the image of politics and the politics of the image. Between blows each artist takes a breath and with lungs full up to the bursting point, we are brought to the challenge itself. As so we are invited to take a deeper look at the surprising complicity woven between their works.

ARSTISTAS /ARTISTS:

Hiroshi Shimamura

Juan Cardosa

Mapi Gil

Robbert Van Ingen

Sabine Finkenauer

Victor Castillo

The Disenchanted Forest

Bread & Butter Barcelona

from july 5th until july 7th of 2006

…And in the Disenchanted Forest in where we reside

We transform to space

We give a name to each snake

While each tree whispered its own story

We named it The Creation Space,

An Enchanted Laboratory

While time slips through our fingers,

Like roots, from the hands of…

Participating artists:

Edbyus!

Eva Vázquez

Mr. Hierro

Mapi Gil

Diva

Julia Pelletier

Hiroshi Shimamura

NinaBoy

Mariana Sarraute

VIctor Castillo

ARTIST SELECCTION: GIGI R. HARRINGTON+ JUAN JOSÉ FERNÁNDEZ

We are at a point, where we assume all the images that surround our lives, as something completely normal, that we must accept without any doubts. The entertainment industry discourse revolves around the evidence of a universe riddle of uncertain realities upheld by the scene show. These media images which are saturated in grandeur correspond to a cliché that the social collective recognizes in an instant.

The underlying significance, contained in those risky, violent or pathetic images, presented in an overflowing beauty and glamorous way, admit the emptiness of those labeled behaviors. In this series of works, called ¨Radiant Edges¨ (Bordes Resplandecientes), the artist starts using a computer technique for the outline of the projects and then works are finished using a domestic resource: the embroidery technique.

Rather than taking a pompous stance of imposing value judgments to sweeten society, this series focuses on profiles which captivate and trap our retinas with the intensity of color, an efficient and persuasive strategy used by the T.V media industry. The radiant edges of dense chromaticism and extravagance, act as a weapon which threatens the audience in the absence of its own content.

"Apuntando" 160x120cm bordado sobre tela / embroidery

"Muere Mujer" 160x120cm bordado sobre tela / embroidery

"Muere Mujer II" 160x120 bordado sobre tela / embroidery

detalle bordado / detail embroidery

Jiu-Jitsu

In this series of embroideries a moment is captured from Jiu-Jitsu, a type of Japanese martial art that covers a wide variety of combat styles, all based on self-defense without the use of weapons.

Translated Jiu-Jitsu would literally mean “soft art”.

This work is based on a fight, in which nothing, but the ones raw hands are used, with its own rules and technique. Under this construction it seems as if violence shares the same space as art

Characters float inside a cloth frame that it is simply based on two colors: black and white, creating two energies, in perfect balance, enriching one with the other in this particular instant, an instant frozen in time.

"jiu-jitsu" / bordados sobre tela/

"jiu-jitsu" / bordados sobre tela/

"jiu-jitsu" / bordados sobre tela/

"jiu-jitsu" / bordados sobre tela/

"jiu-jitsu" / bordados sobre tela/

Exposition in the ‘GaleríaLa Santa’ – Barcelona

Galería La Santa called on 22 artists to intervene directly on the walls of the gallery. Brigadas al muro is an eclectic group of artists who come from different disciplines, and that have already worked on walls in actual urban culture; visual artists, illustrators, designers, graffiti painters and fashion trendy designers. Brigadas al muro uses walls as canvas. In it artists critically condemn different situations, an answer and a disagreement sample in view of a society that is becoming more and more unequal.

This project is called Brigadas al muro, in reference to the Brigada Ramona Parra and its interventions on the walls of Chile during the 60´s and 70´s, while the city was marked by a social and politic general unrest. Brigadas al muro, come to the rescue with actual codes, a critical spirit, and team work which characterized the brigades of Ramona Parra.

Artists:

roope alho (finnland), atma (france), víctor castillo (chile), javier de cea (chile),

diva (france/vietnam), dur y magno (spain), sabine finkenauer (germany), mapi gil (spain),

ginou (libanon), francisco gonçalves (chile), stephan guillais (france/germany),

boris hoppek(germany), inocuo (spain), miss van (france), cristian montes (chile),

xavi muñoz (spain), sonia pulido (spain), hiroshi shimamura (japan),

santiago taccetti (italia/argentina), sixeart (españa), eva vázquez (españa),

cristine zufferey (switzerland).

"Brigadas al Muro" / mural de tiza / chalk mural

"Brigadas al Muro" / detalle mural de tiza / detail chalk mural

Brigadas al Muro

Brigadas al Muro

Brigadas al Muro

Brigadas al Muro