Workspaces
10 - 19 March 2010
A collaboration with Visiting Arts 

With participants in Artist-to-artist 2010: Doa Aly, Volkan Aslan, Ali Cherri, Robin Deacon, Delta Arts, Iz Oztat, and the Western Alliance.

What is an artist studio today? Artist-to-artist participants explore ideas around collaboration, mobility and site-specifity in relation to their working environments. 

The space where artists work often represents an interface for their professional practice, in which four components play an important role: social architecture, spatial architecture, peer exchange and cultural context. Workspaces proposes to look atartists’ relationships to their working environment, considered both in a spatial and interpersonal sense.

How are artistic workspaces reshaped by international mobility? How does the place where one lives influences one’s practice? Have identification and contextualization remained the main two modes through which artists relate to the place where they live and work? How do international artistic networks alter artists’ perception of their immediate environment? How can we update the late 20^th century fantasy of an ultra-mobile artistic community, who envisions the ‘world as its studio’, in the light of a new geo-political and environmental order? How are artistic practices, networks and support structures responding to this change?

Events

Doa Aly in conversation with Eline van der Vlist - CANCELLED
10 March, 19:00 - 20:00 

Doa Aly, recent video works
A Tress of Hair (2008) and The Girl Splendid in Walking (2009) 
10 - 12 March, 10:00 -18:00 

Ali Cherri, recent video works
Un Cercle Autour du Soleil (2005), Slippage (2007) and Untitled (2006)
15 - 17 March, 10:00 -18:00 

A dialogue between Ali Cherri and Robin Deacon
16 March, 19:00 - 20:00, Arts Bar & Cafe, Toynbee Studios, 28 Commercial Street, London, E1 6AB

URGENCY / AGENCY: a publication by The Western Alliance, Volkan Aslan & Iz Oztat
Live production day: 18 March, 10:00 - 18:00 
Presentation/Performance: 18 March, 18:00 - 20:00 
Editions on show: 19 March, 10:00 - 18:00

Notional Studio - round table discussion 
Hosted by Emma Smith and Oliver Sumner of Delta Arts, with all Artist-to-artist participants and more. 
19 March, 18.30 - 20:00, followed by drinks reception. 

All events are taking place at The Delfina Foundation (unless otherwise stated) 
All events are free. Limited capacity, early rsvp essential: info@delfinafoundation.com

Visiting Art's Artist-to-artist enables artists from the UK to invite artists from overseas for up to 2 weeks.  The selected overseas artist will spend a week with the UK artist, visiting their studio, meeting key contacts, networking and exchanging ideas. More information about Artist-to-artist.

Artists Biographies:

Doa Ali (Egypt) is interested in society's economy of role-play, the use of different types of behaviour and how these vary depending on different situations and contexts. Aly has recently taken part in a number of group shows such as Port City at the Arnolfini Museum, Bristol, UK; Recognise at the Contemporary Art Forum, London, UK; Dessins Projets at l’Appartement 22 in Rabat, Morocco. In 2006 and 2007 she participated in the 7th Dakar Biennial, Senegal; Snap Judgements at the International Center of Photography in New York, and The Maghreb Connection at the Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève.

Volkan Aslan (Turkey) is an artist and curator, who, in 2008, founded 5533 along with Nancy Atakan and Marcus Graf, an independent space for research, discussion and exhibition of contemporary art. Located in a former shop in Istanbul Textile Trader’s Market, 5533 turns a former business environment into a contact zone where visitors experience various artistic forms in a non exclusive, non-elitist atmosphere.

Ali Cherri (Lebanon) is a graduate in Graphic Design from the American University in Beirut (2000) and completed his Masters in Performing Arts at DasArts (Amsterdam). He designed the stage set for 'Biokhraphia' by Lina Saneh and Rabih Mroué and  (2002) and collaborated with Rabih on the installation 'I Feel A Great Desire To Meet The Masses Once Again'. He presented "Give me a body then" (performance, 2005) as part of Diskurs 05, Giessen, Germany and Home Works III, Beirut (2005). His work was screened as part of a Tate Modern 'In Focus', included in 'Out of Beirut', Modern Art Oxford (2006) and 'Fantasy for Allan Kaprow' at Contemporary Image Collective, Cairo, a show that paid homage to Kaprow through a series of re-interpretations.

Robin Deacon (UK) is an artist, writer and filmmaker. His work has included a series of performed lectures that explore journalistic and documentary approaches to arts practice. His works have been presented in the UK and internationally at venues such as; The ICA, London (1996), The Young Vic Theatre (2000), Centre for Contemporary Culture, Barcelona (2006) and Tanzquartier Wein, Vienna (2007). Recent projects include, 'A Portrait of Stuart Sherman' (Film/Installation), Bluecoat Gallery Liverpool (2010) and 'Approximating the Art of Stuart Sherman (Spaghetti Spectacle)', Emily Harvey Foundation Gallery, New York. >

Iz Oztat (Turkey) explores how the notion of “sacred∗” materializes and shapes the body, memory, time and space. In her recent work, she used pre-modern tools and technologies as her departure point to reflect on contemporary processes of social engineering, homogenization and control. Her solo shows include Read/ OKU at PiST, Istanbul (2008), Love It or Leave It, Ohio (2005) and Nothing Disappears Without a Trace, Ohio (2004). Iz is the co-founder of cura bodrum residency in Mugla with Emincan Alemdaroglu, in the context of which she participated in unitednationsplaza, Mexico, Resartis General Meeting, Amsterdam, Prishtina Contemporary Art Library Workshop, Kosovo and Cairo Residency Symposium.

Delta Arts (UK) was formed in 2008, by Emma Smith and Oliver Sumner, as a practice to initiate projects with others. Delta Art’s activities include art practice, interaction and research. Past projects have included rural residentials with young offenders and a mobile allotment project with local residents.

The Western Alliance (UK) is made up of 8 artists / activators who are based in the South-West of England.The Western Alliance is made up of eight artists/activators in the South West.  Their current project URGENCY/AGENCY has beeng developed by members Paul Carter, Patrick Lowry, Steven Paige, Alison Sharkey, Oliver Sutherland, Rebecca Weeks and Alexandra Zierle.