The collective SLAVS AND TATARS is participating in the CONTOUR festival
For almost three months, Mechelen will be the Belgian hub of contemporary art in the field of the moving image. The biennale CONTOUR, which began in 2003, is holding its 7th edition there which this year will be curated by Nicola SETARI. This platform will allow a wider public to discover the best of artistic creations linked to video, film, installations and performance from Belgium and further afield.
The collective SLAVS AND TATARS will be participating in the Biennale, showcasing a new version of its audio installation Speculum Linguarum, which will be presented in Dutch for the first time. The creators behind the installation will fill the museum with Oriental carpets on which acoustic baffles will be installed and which will retransmit, at various speeds, well-known Medieval didactical texts known as the “Miroir du Prince”, translated in order into the languages of those countries where the installation has been shown: Uigur, Turkish, Polish, German, (at an exhibition in Abou Dhabi), Scottish Gaelic (at an exhibition in Edinburgh) and Dutch (version created for the event). The installation highlights the problem of language and mutual understanding amongst foreign guests and explores the issue of authenticity in this context, stressing the link between the sacred and the profane, and to some extent between the businessman and the Sufi.
Slavs and Tatars is a collective which veers between the polemical and the intimate with regard to everything which has to do with the area located to the east of the Berlin Wall and to the west of the Great Wall of China, i.e. what is sometimes referred to as ‘Eurasia’. The work, which is always done as a collective, operates various media and various disciplines and affects a large spectrum of cultural registers (high and low) around a sphere of influence, which is often played down, made up of Slavs, Caucasians and the populations of central Asia.
+++ Find out more information on www.slavsandtatars.com
PRACTICAL INFORMATION
>>> The installation Speculum Linguarum is to be seen on the main exhibition venue and starting point: Hof van Busleyden (Frederik de Merodestraat 65, Mechelen) – see the MAP
>>> Opening on 28 August:
_____15:00 > 22:00 – All locations are open for individual visits after visiting the starting point of CONTOUR 7, where you will receive a free visitor’s guide with city plan
_____20:00 > 21:00 – Official opening at the starting point of CONTOUR 7 with speeches by curator Nicola Setari, Alderman for Culture in Mechelen Björn Siffer and Flemish minister of Culture Sven Gatz
_____21:00 > 00:30 – Opening party hosted by Moonshack, DJ Tobias Kirmayer (Tramp Records, Munich) and mapping-projections by VJ Blubvideo
Please note that registration is required at www.contour7.be/en/vernissage
>>> 29 August > 8 November 2015 – Thursday > Friday – 10:00 > 17:00 | Saturday > Sunday – 10:00 > 18:00
>>> €10 | €7 (inhabitants of Mechelen, -25, 60+, impaired persons, groups, etc.) | €2 (teachers, students, pupils) | Free (-12)
sales point: Tourism Mechelen (Hallestraat 2-4-6) | http://www.uitinmechelen.be
Guided tours and discounts available. Find out more HERE
Venues: CC Mechelen | Hof van Busleyden | Caserne Dossin | historical chapel “de Noker” | “Vlietenkelder” basement | st.-Rumbold cathedral
CONTOUR 7 is dedicated to Thomas More. For many he was a martyr, for others, a monster. Above all, he was a philosopher and an artist. However one regards him, he was without doubt a brilliant madman, very ahead of his time. It was in summer 1515, during a stay in Flanders, which also took him to Mechelen, that he wrote most of his work devoted to the ideal state, Utopia (Libellus vere aureus, nec minus salutaris quam festivus de optimo rei publicae statu, deque nova insula Utopia).
CONTOUR 7 will show the work of more than twenty international artists. Their works, which are to a great extent new pieces, have been inspired by utopias, monsters and martyrs, both past and present.
+++ Find out more on www.contour7.be/en
ARTISTS
AaBbPp | A Dog Republic and RAM Radioartemobile | Sander Breure and Witte van Hulzen | Andrea Büttner | Jan Fabre | Michael Fliri | Chiara Fumai | Johan Grimonprez | Fabrice Hyber | Rabih Mroué | Ana Prvacki | Michael Rakowitz | Gilad Ratman | Albert Serra | Slavs and Tatars | Nedko Solakov | Javier Téllez | Grazia Toderi | An van. Dienderen | Angel Vergara | Gilberto Zorio.
Picture gallery
