International ArtExpo. Hidden Cities | Istanbul (Turkey)

Hidden Cities | Istanbul (Turkey)

General Information
Hidden Cities, an international videoart festival and photography exhibition, will be held in the magic city of  Istanbul. Koza Visual Culture and Arts Association, the venue of the event, will open its doors on Thursday, May 10th until Saturday, May 12th. Sixty-one artists, thirty-eight video artists and twenty-three photo artists from twenty-two different countries have been selected to be part of this project.

 

The selections has been based on the main concept of "Hidden Cities" that analyses the hybridization of physical and social identities in the contemporary cities.

 

Hidden Cities - The gossamer of precarious realities in contemporary metropolis
"It is a sociological and urban topic rather than an architectural one: hidden cities, without being hyperbolic, whether in negative terms, regarding their size, their population, their infrastructural problems, their tendency to criminality, or in positive terms, regarding  their dynamism, their variegated street life, the sheer originality of so much culture on any level, the intensity of their artistic production. Nevertheless this contest entitled Hidden Cities does not aim at confirming any of the standard images of any kind of metropolis in the world, not those of the multiplicity of guide books, not those of glossy photo albums, and not those of the authors of dirty realism or sociopolitical testimony.

 

Even if the Western tendency of city planning is marked by a new class segregation, urban renewal, massive housing projects, and highway building programs, historically shaped  cities which represent a crossing of ancient and modern cultures, are mirrored by spatial polarization of poverty increasingly sub-urbanized (which its especially migrants), but even displayed by more soft and intangible forms of alienation and marginalization challenging the issue of citizenship. Frequently hidden cities come into being because the gap between the complexity of spatial urban form and the complexity of social process and missing economic resources to keep up with progress contributes to social degradation, and isolates its residents definitely from society. Besides these factors mentioned above, the rapid increase of people living in cities is one of the most important global health issues of the 21st century.

 

Beyond a mere documentation, the basic idea lanced by the event is an international confrontation that should reflect the hidden realities urban dwellers are facing, and highlight the need for concerted action. Urban averages often mask hidden pockets of ill-health and overlooked populations. By unmasking hidden cities the most deprived populations can be identified and practical measures can be set to improve their precarious existence.

 

But hidden cities also host a magic treasure which has got lost in well designed anonymous sky scraper geometries.  The mechanism of uncontrolled and unpredictable situations, the struggle for life brings people together, unlocks their doors, orientating their look towards the neighbor or a casual passer-by, ready to talk, ready to smile. Hidden cities refer to those places that provide a slice of hidden urban life, where inhabitants enjoy their relationship with the city. It is not a matter if the city itself becomes a protagonist in photography or video art but how the city becomes a place for human lives and how those lives necessarily involve interaction with the dimensions, with the parameters, with the convolutions. Of course there is something like a real city. But that real city has no real meaning in and of itself. At this point, let us remember a quote by Julio Cortazar on the behalf of Buenos Aires: it is, like all the cities, a metaphor". Elis Saint-Juste Gluckstein, 2012

 

.organizer: International ArtExpo
.curator: Luca Curci

 

.exhibition & screening place: Koza Visual Culture and Arts Association , Istanbul - Turkey
.dates: May 10-12, 2012

 

.opening: May 10, 2012 at Koza Visual Culture and Arts Association in Istanbul, Turkey at 5:30 pm

 

.media partner: It's LIQUID Group (www.itsliquid.com)

 

.video-artists
Alaleh Alamir . France | Albin Schutting . Austria | Andreas Mares . Austria | Cristina Amiram & Khalil Charif . Brazil | Daniele Lorenzo Fumagalli . Italy | Gabriele Liuba . Italy | Hans Michael Bittner . Austria | Karin Bandelin . Germany | Kim Arrow . USA | Michael Poetschko . Austria | Paul Handley . New Zealand | Yuko Asai . Japan | Wei-Ming Ho . Taiwan | Unity Productions Foundation . USA | Monica James & Sruti Visweswaran . India | Maria da Schio . Italy | Chris Haydon . UK | Liam James . Australia | Chantal Romani . Switzerland | Gerald Forster . USA | Eleanna Martinou . Greece | Marineta Mak Kritikou . Greece | Carolin Clausnitzer . Germany | Fiona Davies . Australia | Alfonso Arzapalo . Canada | André Seddon Markwald . Brazil | Embodied Creative . UK | Francesco Acerbis . Italy | Michelle Mantsio . Australia | Erin Coates . Australia | Isabella Gresser . Germany | Lueder Schruff . Germany | Lisamarie Johnson . Ireland | Nicolas Iordanou & Sylvia Nicolaides . Cyprus | Seth Gutierrez . USA | Gregory Steel . USA | Jan Ijäs . Finland | Elena La Ganga . Italy | Yiotis Vrantzas . Greece

 

.photo-artists
Andreas Mares . Austria | Diana Nikolova . Bulgaria | EASTERN Design Office + Koichi Torimura . Japan | Taiyo Jinno . Japan | André Reinders . Germany | Esther Naor . Israel | Fabian Freese . Germany | Preben Van der Straete . Belgium | Sarah Younan . UK | Kate MacDonald . Canada | Nora Schoepfer . Austria | Oan Kyu . Italy | Wang Haiyuan . China | Maria da Schio . Italy | Eva Maria Lopez . Germany | Ge Orthof . Brazil | Loredana Raciti . Italy | Paula Roush . UK | Maciek Wojciechowski . UK | Yael Kaplan . Israel | Tanya Preminger . Israel | Lisamarie Johnson . Ireland | Jan Ijäs . Finland

 

International ArtExpo is a not for profit organization that provides a significant forum for cultural dialogue between all artists from different cultures and countries. We depend on the support of you. ArtExpo is grateful to all of the institutions, corporations, and individuals who support our efforts. We work with a number of national and international galleries as well as publishers, museums, curators and writers from all over the world. We help artists through solo and group exhibitions, gallery representation, magazine reviews and advertisements, press releases, internet promotion, as well as various curatorial projects.

 

more details
International ArtExpo
Corso Vittorio Emanuele II, 33
70122 Bari (Italy)
+39.0805234018
lucacurci@lucacurci.com
www.lucacurci.com/artexpo