[spectre] Mobile Studios on the road

[geert lovink]

> From: Mobile Studios <newsletter at mobile-studios.org>
> Date: 18 April 2006 11:46:35 AM
> To: mobile studios <newsletter at mobile-studios.org>
> Subject: Mobile Studios on the road
>
> The Mobile Studios in Belgrade
>
>  Finally the Mobile Studios hit the road! One week ago, Public Art Lab 
> arrived at the first station in Belgrade and settled down at the 
> Republic Square in the center of the city. Together with Remont, our 
> co-producing partner, we built up a real live production laboratory 
> after three days of setting up and getting connected to electricity 
> and the internet. Our Serbian curator Maja Ciric developed a program 
> that created a lively dialogue with the Belgrade audience.
>  It is amazing how the people of Belgrade interact with the 
> experimental structure of the Mobile Studios. We had a variety of 
> interesting art projects, talks and web conferences up to now. And we 
> received livestreamings from the Mobile Webcast Studio in Gdansk, 
> featuring a lecture of Wilfried Hou Je Bek.
>
> Please check our website http://www.mobile-studios.org  for regular 
> updates, live-streams and the tour blog.
>
> We started our opening with a flashmob event conceived by the 
> Hungarian artist Denis Biro. It simultaneously took place in 
> Bratislava, Budapest and Sofia. Despite the cold and rainy weather the 
> people gathered at the Republic Square and blowed soap bubbles in the 
> air- apparently out of the blue.
>
> One week of public art projects, performances and talks: Votings of 
> stolen chairs, tickets to a lighter future, butterflies in the stomach 
> and skype confessions with Sarajevo.
>
> The Mobile Studios have been used by the artists in a variety of 
> different ways: as tools for atmospheric investigations within the 
> public sphere, as mystical phone cells, discussion ground, projection 
> wall, auction hall, hands-on-gallery and a lot more. Here are some of 
> the significant highlights which emphasize the concept of the Mobile 
> Studios.
>
> Photo session in the stolen chairs of Vito Acconci: Bogomir Doringer's 
> "Vito Acconci`s chairs“ - This interactive performance about the 
> re-appropriation of art raised issues about local and international 
> values and positions of art. Doringer had appropriated the chairs from 
> a performance of Vito Acconci in the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam and 
> brought them to Belgrade where hardly anybody is familiar with the 
> work of Vito Acconci. Doringer introduced the artist with a gossip 
> campaign all over the city announcing "Phantom in the Museum", 
> "Doringer Wanted" etc. The artist invited passers-by and celebrities 
> to sit on Vito Acconci`s chairs and took their photographs. Then they 
> had to vote whether the appropriation of the chairs was a legal act. 
> The local tabloids especially felt attracted by this project which 
> they labeled as „art theft“.
> Auction in the Illegal Pastry Shop
>  When the Mobile Studios were turned into a public auction site by an 
> art group called "The Illegal Pastry Shop" everybody stopped, joined 
> us and Tobic Tobic, the self-proclaimed „idol of the youth“ was 
> surrounded by a crowd of people. The lots he offered are usually not 
> for sale: "talent", "official excuse for adultery", "tickets for a 
> lighter future", and so on. All the products are sold for the maximum 
> quantity of desire the passers-by bid. And there have been real 
> enthusiastic bidders! It was a lively, loud and very entertaining 
> spectacle.
> What happened to the butterflies in my stomach?
>  Zana Poliakova who is a cyber queen, stiletto feminist and internet 
> pioneer conceived the installation "Saturday Night Fever" for Mobile 
> Studios. In her barbie style cosmetic studio she asked the audience 
> about love, erotic and life in an intimitate atmosphere in front of 
> the camera- a special format for social investigations.
> I remember my Dad who died at Kosovo
>  There are works of art that do not need any further explanations - 
> like the "I remember“-project by Radmilo Petkovic. All he did was 
> installing a table with coloured post-its and pencils and a sign which 
> invited everybody to write down things that shall not be forgotten. 
> Then they sticked the post-its on the white walls of the Mobile 
> Studios. After several hours, the Talk Studio has transformed into a 
> public memory board which evoked recollections of people, love 
> affairs, political events – just everything what the people have 
> chosen to be worthwile to remember.
> Skype-Conference between Uros Djuric, Belgrade and Sejla Kameric, 
> Sarajevo
>  Uros Djuric and Sejla Kameric used the Mobile Studios as an 
> interactive field for mutual confessing without mediators between 
> them. Uros confessed to Sejla about his feelings and points of view 
> regarding the reconciliation process in Ex-Yugoslavia. He touched upon 
> very personal issues and took the opportunity to confess everything 
> that he has kept to himself so far.
> Public Art Lab wants to thank:
>  Everybody at Remont, Maja Ciric, Ana Nedeljikovic, Bogomir Doringer, 
> DezOrg, Sasa Markovic, Maja Josifovic & Dimitrije Tadic, Pavle Cosic & 
> Ivan Tobic, MobilEye, Skart artist group, Uros Djuric, Sejla Kameric, 
> Bob Miloshevic, Dorijan Kolundzija, Mrdjan Bajic, Radmilo Petkovic, 
> Nebojsa Andjelkovic-Shobaya , Zana Poliakov and the people of 
> Belgrade.
>
> Mobile Studios | www.mobile-studios.org
>  Public Art Lab, Berlin