TodaysArt 2013

Fig.2 One of the venues, former Ministry of Interior

The annual fall media arts festival “TodaysArt” took place once again in The Hague, the Netherlands this year over the weekend of Sept. 27 and 28.

Following the opening ceremony at one of the venues, the Atrium of the City Hall, Morton Subotnick, a pioneer of the electronic music world, performed Silver Apples of the Moon together with video artist Lillevan. Subotnick played this groundbreaking piece on an analog synthesizer comprised of both analog and digital components.

Fig.1 Ryoji Ikeda – test pattern

The Japanese artists are also worthy of mention.

On opening day, Atsuhiro Ito, known for using fluorescent tubes as an instrument, presented a collaboration with Diamond Version. On the second day, Ryoji Ikeda, who converts data into audiovisual, made his first appearance in TodaysArt with a presentation of his Test Pattern. Black and white lines flickering at high speed reflected onto the City Hall building (designed by Richard Meier) amid a gently flowing background noise(Fig.1).

The other main venue was the 19-storey former Ministry of Interior, located adjacent to the City Hall(Fig.2). A stage and bar were installed in the lower floors, resulting in the unusual sight of people dancing ‘til dawn to music in an area where entry was once highly restricted. The higher floors were converted into art exhibit spaces so that visitors walked through the large building as if on an expedition.

The third venue was Cocky Eek’s Sphaerae, a pavilion that linked the two other venues. Numerous music and light performances took place beneath the dome ceiling that resembled a planetarium(Fig.3).

     Fig.3 Venue:'Sphæræ' by Cocky Eek
     Work: Yamila Ríos + Joris Strijbos – COVEX

In the performances over two days, objects, music and light that permeate our daily lives were broken up, expanded and augmented, and transformed into works of art.

Since its first exhibition in 2005, TodaysArt has struggled against the economic environment to maintain its unique style. Future presentations beyond this ninth endeavor will not be easy amid continuing budget cuts in the arts. But the jarring concept of staging a bar and dance floor in the official spaces of the City Hall and former Ministry of Interior are worth noting. The organizers are looking overseas, including Japan, as possible venues for future exhibits.

NTV Europe is a supporter of TodaysArt.

* More photos are on our Facebook page. (Click here)

TodaysArt

www.todaysart.nl/2013/

Oskar Kokoschka Exhibit

Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, photo Hans Wilschut

“Oskar Kokoschka – Portraits of People and Animals,” currently showing at the Museum Bojimans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam, the Netherlands, displays 148 paintings and sketches by Oskar Kokoschka. As one of Austria’s representative contemporary artists, alongside Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele, Kokoschka is often categorized as an expressionist painter. But he maintained his independence from the artist movements such as the Vienna Secession, Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) or Die Brücke (The Bridge).

Kokoschka created many portraits during his career, including sketches and lithographs, and many of his most representational works are also portraits. Rather than depict his subjects in formal settings, Kokoschka preferred to capture them in natural situations such as friends in a conversation or at dinner or children mesmerized in play. His observations resulted in illustrating characteristic poses and unique expressions. In a 1966 television interview, Kokoschka said he was interested in the “aura of a person in space.” The subjects of his work seem to radiate light from within to their surrounding environment.


From 1926 and into the following year, Kokoschka took a strong interest in animals. Living in London at the time, the artist obtained permission to work outside of visitors’ hours at the zoo at Regent Park. His paintings include those of a tigon (a cross between a tiger and lion), crocodile and deer. Among these works is Mandrill. Kokoschka offered a banana to the mandrill every time he went to the zoo. But the mandrill not only didn’t show signs of affection but continued to display a menacing growl. The artist sensed the true determination of a beast to never be tamed and decided to paint the mandrill, not in its cage but in the rich natural setting of a jungle.

Kokoschka worked with a permanent quest to capture the spirit of his subjects. And his resulting portrayals in dramatic colors of the essence of his subjects continue to make a deep impression on their viewers.


Oskar Kokoschka – Portraits of People and Animals until January 19, 2014. (closed Monday Dec 25 and Jan 1)

Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen

Museumpark 18-20
3015 CX Rotterdam
the Netherlands
www.boijmans.nl/en

Opening times:

Tuesday to Sunday 11:00-17:00
Closed on Mondays, Jan 1, Apr 27, Dec 25

Reynold Reynolds “Lost” Volkspaleis (The Hague) Exhibit

Stills: Reynold Reynolds, The Lost, 2013, 7-channel film installation. Courtesy Reynold Reynolds/West
Foto locatie: Jhoeko

A feature film under production in 1930s Berlin. Like many movies from those days, its filming is stopped under censorship of the Nazi authorities, and the movie never sees the light of day. That is until artist Reynold Reynolds (born in 1966 in Alaska) stumbles upon remnants of the film and spends three years reconstructing it. The resulting “The Lost,” along with various objects associated with the original movie, is currently on display as part of the Volkspaleis event at an electric power station in The Hague.


A team of 20 experts examined the cache of film-related materials. It included in addition to the footage, sketches and storyboards, production notes, costumes and props. Nearly all of the footage is black and white 16-millimeter film and was shot around the world. Some of the filming was done while showing the movie to the public. At the exhibit, the two-and-a-half-hour-long film is shown split among seven enormous screens in the 2,500 square meter exhibit site.


The story follows the lives of a writer who lives in a cabaret in Berlin, a photographer and other artists and cabaret dancers. The movie employs unique filming techniques to capture and intermittently reveal the clash between a hedonistic lifestyle embodied in music, alcohol and homosexuality and the police authorities under the Nazi regime that loathe those elements.
The film is packed with themes that were taboo at the time and the unconventional presentations of them. The film presents a raw portrayal of the internal struggles of artists living in the suffocating environment of censorship that transforms into a world of fantasy.


At the sprawling exhibit where several screens simultaneously show parts of the film, not necessarily in sequence and with a mixing up of scenes and actors, it’s easy to lose one’s sense of footing. So it’s important to take the time to experience the world of this film. Still, mysteries remain as to whether the footage and displayed props are originals from the 1930s or replicas created by the artist Reynold Reynolds. The seven films and exhibited props seem to form a giant whirlpool that slowly swirls the viewer around pre-war Berlin and current day.

“There is no end to this work,” says Marie-José Sondeijker of West which organized the exhibit. She decided to hold the exhibit at the power plant after concluding her own gallery was too white and too small.
This is the second hosting of the Volkspaleis outside of her gallery. That is a radical step out from the insular world of art in the direction of the general public.


Volkspaleis Until October 6th

Volkspaleis

E.On Elektriciteitsfabriek
Constant Rebecquepln 20
2518 RA Den Haag
www.volkspaleis.org/2013/

West

Groenewegje 136
2515 LR, Den Haag
The Netherlands
+31 (0)70 392 53 59
www.west-denhaag.nl ‎

Volkspaleis opening times:

13 September — 6 October 2013
Wed — Sun 14:00 — 20:00

Exhibitions Celebrating the 150th Anniversary of the Birth of Edvard Munch

Fig.1　Edvard Munch: The Scream, 1893,
Tempera and crayon on cardboard,
91 x 73.5cm, National Museum of Art,
Architecture and Design, Oslo,
© Munch Museum / Munch-Ellingsen Group /
BONO, Oslo 2013,
Photo: © Børre Høstland, National Museum,
© Munch-museet / Munch-Ellingsen Gruppen /
BONO

The year 2013 marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of Edvard Munch, and his home country of Norway is humming with Munch Year events. In the capital of Oslo, the National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design and the Munch Museum are co-hosting the exhibition “Munch 150.” The exhibit looks back on Munch’s career through 220 paintings and 50 prints and other works selected from the more than 20,000 pieces that the artist referred to as “my children.”

Munch is known for his works on the themes of life and death that can be traced back to his experience of losing family members at a young age.
Munch’s mother died when he was five and his sister when he was 13. The deaths drove his father, who was a doctor, to mental illness. The girl portrayed in his early work The Sick Child is Munch’s beloved older sister who died from tuberculosis. Hopelessness and loneliness arising from the successive deaths in his family as well as constant anxieties and fears of illness and death due to his own sickliness were a major influence on Munch’s works.


Upon moving to Berlin in 1892, Munch started what would become his lifework The Frieze of Life. The works in this series depict love and betrayal, anxieties, jealousy and death. Among the paintings were his major pieces, The Scream (Fig. 1), Vampire and Madonna. Munch envisioned The Frieze of Life as a series of decorative pictures that together would portray life as a whole. Rather than independent pieces, he created the paintings to resonate among each other like parts of a symphony. Munch showed the 22 works that comprise The Frieze of Life at the 1902 Berlin Secession Exhibition. At the Munch 150 exhibit, the frieze will be recreated for the first time in 110 years.

Fig.2　Edvard Munch: The Sun, 1911, Olje på lerret, 455 x 780 cm, Universitetet i Oslo, Aulaen,
© Munch-museet / Munch-Ellingsen Gruppen / BONO 2013,
Photo: © Munch-museet , © Munch-museet / Munch-Ellingsen Gruppen / BONO

In 1909, at age 45, Munch returned to Norway. Coming into contact once again with the plentiful nature of his homeland after many years abroad, Munch’s works took a turn toward harmony and tradition. In 1916, he completed the 11-piece mural The University Aula in the auditorium of the University of Oslo. The piece in the main end of the auditorium illuminates the room with strong rays from The Sun (Fig. 2) while the other works show Norway’s abundant nature blessed by this sunlight. After finishing this work, Munch continued actively with murals including The Freia Freize for a chocolate factory and a piece for the Oslo city hall. The artist whose works ranged from The Scream tormented with despair to The Sun brimming with hope died on January 23, 1944.

The exhibit takes place at two sites. The works from 1882 to 1903 are on display at the National Museum. The works from 1904 to 1944 are on display at the Munch Museum. Munch 150 will be shown until October 13, 2013.

National Gallery of Norway

Universitetsgata 13
0164 Oslo, Norway
+47 21 98 20 00
www.nasjonalmuseet.no/en/

Munchmuseet

Tøyengata 53,
0578 Oslo, Norway
+47 23 49 35 00
www.munch.museum.no ‎

Opening times:

Mon－Wed, Fri－Sun　10:00－17:00
Thur　10:00－19:00

“The Goddess at the Louvre” Undergoing Construction Treatment

©Victoire de Samothrace, Musée du Louvre

The conservation treatment of the Winged Victory of Samothrace, the Greek sculptural masterpiece housed at the Louvre Museum in Paris, and its exhibition space, is currently taking place.
The statue is also called Nike in Greek, meaning the messenger goddess Victory. She was constructed in the 2nd century B.C. and was discovered on the island of Samothrace in the Aegean Sea. By capturing the exact moment of the Goddess landing on the prow of the ship, with her wings still widely spread, the creator of this magnificent monument truly grips the hearts of those who see her with her strength and beauty.

Although it is unfortunate that visitors to the Louvre from all over the world will not be able to view this masterpiece during the restoration, she will reappear next spring, after the cleaning of the Paros marble (from which the statue is made) is complete.
In addition, the Daru staircase, which showcases the Winged Victory, is known to be the most effective setting to dramatize the encounter. A visitor’s first sighting of the Winged Victory will likely be from the bottom of the Daru staircase, looking up to her at the top. Climbing the stairs one step at a time, the visitor approaches the goddess — a truly magical experience!

The great project to conserve the Winged Victory and its entire exhibition space will be completed in 2015, according to the Louvre’s plans.For more details, please check the special Louvre website dedicated to the Winged Victory of Samothrace and the restoration project.The Louvre also invites individual donors to support the project. Details can be found on the same website.
English　www.louvresamothrace.fr/en
French　 www.louvresamothrace.fr/fr

Nippon Television Holdings also supports this restoration project.
www.ntvhd.co.jp/english/pressrelease/2013/20130904.html

Exhibit: “Vermeer and Music: The Art of Love and Leisure”

“If music be the food of love, play on;” Twelfth Night, Shakespeare


Painters in the 17th century Netherlands had a strong affinity for music with more than one in ten of the works from the Dutch Golden Age incorporating such themes. Twelve of the existing 36 paintings by Johannes Vermeer include musical references. The current exhibit in London “Vermeer and Music: The Art of Love and Leisure” displays five of these works by Vermeer, along with paintings with musical motifs by his contemporaries Gerard ter Borch, Gabriel Metsu, Jan Steen and Pieter de Hooch.

Music in the Netherlands of that era was not a complex, lofty art, but rather a popular pastime for all classes. People enjoyed simple and accessible musical entertainment such as chamber music performed and sung in their own homes, often holding concerts with friends. Music as part of one’s life was frequently depicted in the forms of various symbols in paintings. In portraits, the depiction of music scores and instruments signaled the social status and talents of the subject while in illustrations of scenes of daily life, the musical items revealed the intellectual and social status of the people in the picture.


The important role of harmony in music became a metaphor for the romantic relationship between a man and a woman. Scenes of music lessons in particular were popular as they offered the rare occasion of a natural setting in which an unmarried man and woman could be together. In Gabriel Metsu’s painting, a male music teacher has stopped a lesson to offer his young female pupil a glass of wine. In the background of Metsu’s “A Man and a Woman seated by a Virginal,” (Fig. 1) we see behind a curtain, a portion of a picture of Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night” which foreshadows what will happen to the two people in the painting.

Fig. 1
Gabriel Metsu (1629 - 1667)
A Man and a Woman seated by a Virginal
about 1665, oil on oak
38.4 x 32.2 cm
The National Gallery, London, Inv. NG839
© The National Gallery, London

Fig. 2
Johannes Vermeer (1632 - 1675)
The Music Lesson
about 1662-3, oil on canvas
73.3 x 64.5 cm
Royal Collection Trust
© Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2013

Fig. 3
Johannes Vermeer (1632 - 1675)
A Young Woman seated at a Virginal
about 1670-2, oil on canvas
51.5 x 45.5 cm
The National Gallery, London, Inv. NG2568
© The National Gallery, London

Vermeer’s “The Music Lesson” (Fig. 2) portrays a woman playing the virginal and a man listening intently. The woman seems to be focusing on her music, but her reflection in the mirror above her head reveals she is looking toward the man suggesting she has intimate feelings for him. Inscribed on the lid of the virginal are the words “Musica Letitae Comes Medicina Doloris” (“Music is a companion in pleasure, and a balm in sorrow”) which allude to the inner thoughts of the woman. At the time, the virginal symbolized the female voice and the viol that of the male. The viola da gamba lies behind the woman as if waiting to be played in harmony with the virginal. Such drama between a man and a woman is hidden within this tranquil painting.

The artists began to devise ways to draw viewers in as active participants of the unfolding romances in the paintings instead of letting us remain simply observers. The women portrayed in Vermeer’s “A Young Woman seated at a Virginal” (Fig. 3) and Gerard Dou’s “Woman at the Clavichord” cast appealing gazes toward the viewer as if inviting us to pick up and play the viols at their sides.

Music may very well be the key to deciphering 17th century Dutch paintings.


The exhibit displays viols, guitars and virginals from the 17th century and will also host musical performances from the era from Thursdays through Saturdays.


“Vermeer and Music: The Art of Love and Leisure” runs until September 8, 2013.

The National Gallery, London

Trafalgar Square,
London WC2N 5DN
The United Kingdom
+44 (0)20 7747 2885
http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/

Opening times:

Mondays – Thursdays, Saturdays, Sundays　10：00 – 18：00
Fridays　10：00 – 21：00

History and Design go hand in hand at the Lloyd Hotel and Cultural Embassy in Amsterdam

Lloyd Hotel & Cultural Embassy

With its mix of guest rooms ranging from one star to five stars, The Lloyd Hotel is unlike any other. Inside the rooms might be grand pianos, beds long enough to fit seven to eight people, soundproofing fixtures strong enough for concerts, a bathtub and swing set up in the rafters or a gigantic kitchen. This place is filled to the brim with the playfulness typical of Dutch design.
There’s also a lot of interiors with movable parts, or you can just freely use any of the furniture in the corridor. Different from a regular hotel, the bathroom and toilet might be right in the middle of the room, or furnished in another such way to draw the eye. In these guest rooms you could bring in a room divider, take a shower right alongside your bed, or submerse yourself in the tub; they propose and allow an entirely different use of time and space than in our daily lives.

5-star room. Bath area is designed by MVRDV.

The Lloyd Hotel, located on Amsterdam Harbor’s eastern wharf, draws its name from the original owner of the building, the shipping company Lloyd.　Originally constructed as a hotel where emigrants to South America could have a physical examination and a few days’ rest, at that time as many as nine hundred people could stay at the hotel. After Royal Dutch Lloyd went bankrupt in 1935, during the German occupation of the Netherlands in WWII, the building was used to hold members of the underground resistance. After the war ended, it turned into a regular penitentiary, and later again a reformatory centre for youth. From the second half of the 1980s, it was put to use as studio space for artists.

Between 1989 and 1999, artists created work, lived and interacted there.
They took down the walls creating the melancholy and enclosed impression, and brought about a complete change with what came before: an open space and open atmosphere, in which a variety of people could come and go. The open-minded and creative spirit of the artists was taken over by Suzanne Oxenaar and Otto Nan, the founders of the current Lloyd Hotel and Cultural Embassy, and this can be seen all over the hotel in different forms.


When the building was being renovated for use as a hotel, what counted most was the concepts of “a release from the dark past” and “welcoming the sense of playfulness, bringing the space alive”. The Dutch architecture agency MVRDV made the central area of the hotel into a light and open atrium. Inside the building is the Cultural Embassy; which lives up to its name, always surrounded in works of contemporary art and design. For example: on the top floor, there is Suchan Kinoshita’s work, at the entrance to the restaurant and café, which are popular locally as well, the work “Lloyd Life” is on display, by the Amsterdam-based artist Chikako Watanabe. Moreover, in the upper reaches of the café, there is a library, and space provided for exhibitions and workshops, where visitors can walk around freely. At Lloyd Hotel and the Cultural Embassy, design and art have integrated to create an experience for all five senses, and its attitude and conception of remembering its history with respect is mesmerizing.

*Click here for more photos.

Lloyd Hotel & Cultural Embassy

Oostelijke Handelskade 34
1019 BN Amsterdam
The Netherlands
http://www.lloydhotel.com
t: +31205613636