PhotoEspaña 2013, XVI edition of International Festival of Photography and Visual Arts.

The thematic section, curated by Gerardo Mosquera, proposes an exhibition programme devoted to the concept Body. Eros and Politics. PHE13 will examine this key area, and will also explore the bodyless erotic gaze, aimed at the world around us. In the opposite direction, the Festival will deal with non-erotic photography – aesthetic, constructive, abstract – in which the human body plays a central role.
The exhibition programme will include artists such as Shirin Neshat and Cristina Lucas and collective exhibitions as Him, her, it, which will join together works by Edward Weston and Harry Callahan.

Pour plus d´informations : www.lafabrica.com

The Faurschou Foundation Beijing is honored to present Shirin Neshat´s ´The Book of Kings´. The exhibition features a new body of photography works and a video installation by the internationally acclaimed Iranian artist. Her work interweaves an austere yet sensuous visual language with music, poetry, and history, as well as the political and philosophical.

Neshat´s new photography series ´The Book of Kings´ is inspired by the 60,000-verse epic poem, Shahnameh (Book of Kings), by the 11th century poet Ferdowsi, which chronicled the history of Iran through the 7th century Islamic conquest of Persia. Interweaving history, poetry and politics, the series is set against the backdrop of the recent Arab Spring, and the Iranian Green Movement, which brought hundreds of thousands onto the streets across Iran in June of 2009 in protest against corrupt power. Just as Shahnameh cast the Islamic conquest of Persia as a tragedy, so ´The Book of Kings´ commemorates the countless masses of unknown citizens who courageously sacrificed themselves in the name of justice across the Middle East and Arab world.

The series is comprised of three groups of large-scale, black and white portraits, hand-annotated with poetry and prison writings in Farsi calligraphy - the Villains, the Patriots, and the Masses. In these works, the individual becomes monumental and the political becomes personal.
The villains look their part. Phalanxes of soldiers on horseback riding into bloody battle adorn their bare chests, arms. Painted on the surface of the photographs, these images are depictions of the ancient tragedy, chronicled in Shahnameh, parallels are drawn between the contemporary regime and the Islamic conquers of old. The only color in the stylized drawings overlaid atop the photographs is red for the blood of the martyrs that was spilled defending Persia against the invaders, alluding to a new generation of martyrs today.
"The Patriots" gaze earnestly into the camera, hands on hearts, adorned with exquisite calligraphic renderings of Persian poetry, lines from Iranian prison memoirs, verses from the Shahnameh. But who are the Patriots really? Are they those who seek to change to the system and build a more just one? Are they patriots supporting the current regime? Or, perhaps they are both, and it is history itself that turns on this irresolvable ambiguity.

The Masses are represented by a grid of 45 portraits, similarly inscribed with Neshat´s meticulous calligraphy. Paying homage to these unknown citizens who demonstrated the power of the powerless as they took to the streets, she captures their faces almost void of expression, as if history were still waiting to be inscribe itself upon them. Will they become martyrs, patriots, or villains? Perhaps Neshat leaves this question intentionally open.

The three-channel video, ´OverRuled´ (2011), presents an modern remake of the trial of 10th century Sufi dervish martyr, the poet Mansur Al-Hallaj, accused of heresy and executed by public dismemberment. Al-Hallaj´s belief in the possibility of an unmediated, experiential, spiritual connection to God, was deemed blasphemous by the Caliphate, just as artists and writers are treated as potentially subversive in many places today. Neshat transforms the story of his trial and execution into an allegory of spiritual overcoming.
Neshat´s interlacing of the historical and the contemporary valorizes the vulnerable yet tenacious ways that people struggle to reclaim their agency, offering rich visual and aural narratives of how the human spirit can reclaim its dignity even in the face of brutal repression.

Shirin Neshat, artiste iranienne vivant à New York, est largement reconnu pour ses extraordinaires installations vidéo et ses photographie d´art, mais ses œuvres complètes sont rarement considérés comme une production singulière ou affichés ensemble. Cette rétrospective de mi-carrière comprend huit installations vidéo et deux séries de photographies d´art. Grâce à la métaphore visuelle et sonore convaincante, Neshat confronte les complexités de l´identité, le sexe et le pouvoir d´exprimer sa propre vision qui embrasse la profondeur de la tradition islamique et les concepts occidentaux de l´individualité et de liberté.

Pour plus d´informations : www.dia.org

Présenter la Irish Skin Foundation au public par l´intermédiaire de l´art a été motivée par un certain nombre de facteurs. La peau est l´organe le plus peint, le plus photographié et le plus sculpté du corps. Peut-être que la fonction la plus remarquable de la peau est son rôle fondamental dans la manière dont nous pensons à nous-mêmes et aux autres, son rôle dans l´élaboration de nos personnalités. Notre peau non seulement façonne nos corps, mais elle façonne aussi nos personnages. Une peau malade peut agir comme une barrière inhibitrice, alors qu´une belle peau peut être une interface attrayante entre soi et le monde.
 
L´exposition Skin: an artistic atlas, organisée par le directeur de l´Académie Royal Hibernian, Patrick T. Murphy, aborde quelques-uns des thèmes les plus dominants que la peau invoque, comme la race, le sexe, l´âge, la pourriture, la maladie, la texture, l´identité , l´érotisme, la race, la parure et l´affichage. Illustrée à travers une série de médias, y compris la photographie, la peinture et la vidéo, elle promet d´être une exposition stimulante. Parmi les artistes se trouvent John Coplans, Robert Ballagh, Andres Serrano, Sigalit Landau, Jeanne Silverthorne, Jessica Robbins, Gwen Hardie, Marlene Dumas, Barrie Cooke, Pearlstein Phillip, Robert Mapplethorpe, Nicholas Nixon, Hannah Wilke, Cara Phillips, Cecily Brennan, Byron Kim, Mary Kelly, Ariana Russell Page, Shirin Neshat, Spencer Tunick, Dennis Oppenheim et des œuvres de J. Connolly et W. Kirwan de la collection Wallace, Collège royal des chirurgiens en Irlande.

Pour plus d´informations : www.irishskinfoundation.ie

A travers ses nombreuses réalisations, la photographe et vidéaste iranienne propose l’image de femmes orientales refusant toute forme de victimisation, et s’emploie, au contraire, à révéler l’obstination qui se cache derrière le voile. Ses créations tracent frontières et limites qui unissent et séparent deux mondes.

Rencontre ponctuée d’extraits de films (Turbulent, Rapture, Women without men …) et de photographies de l’artiste avec un retour sur sa dernière exposition, « The Book of Kings », une série photographique marquée par la calligraphie et un jeu sur les contrastes noirs et blancs.

Réservations et informations pratiques : www.louvre.fr et www.fnac.com

 « Paroles des images » est la première exposition de Palazzo Grassi – François Pinault Foundation consacrée à l’image en mouvement dans la Collection François Pinault.

Conçue par Caroline Bourgeois, elle ouvrira ses portes au public à l’occasion de la 69ème Mostra internazionale d’arte cinematografica de Venise, soulignant ainsi la force des liens qui unissent Venise et le cinéma.

Occupant l’atrium et le premier étage de Palazzo Grassi, l’exposition « Paroles  des images » rassemblera près de 30 œuvres – films, vidéos, installations – de 25 artistes, en un parcours qui met en valeur la très grande diversité des supports techniques, des dispositifs de projection et des modes d’appréhension de l’espace et du temps.
Parmi les artistes présentés dans l’exposition figurent Adel Abdessemed, Peter Aerschmann, Yael Bartana, Mohamed Bourouissa, Mircea Cantor, Paul Chan, Liu Da Hong, Yang Fudong, Cao Fei, Peter Fischli et David Weiss, Michel François, Abdulnasser Gharem, Johan Grimonprez, Hassan Khan, Taro Izumi, Cameron Jamie, Zoe Leonard, Bruce Nauman, Shirin Neshat, William Pope L, Anri Sala, Javier Tellez, Bill Viola, Mark Wallinger.
« Paroles des images » sera également l’occasion de présenter pour la première fois en Europe l’œuvre For Beginners de Bruce Nauman, acquise en 2011 par François Pinault.
Elle donnera lieu à la publication d’un catalogue incluant des entretiens avec l’ensemble des artistes présentés, ainsi qu’à l’organisation de rencontres mensuelles avec les artistes de l’exposition et à la programmation de films dans les deux salles aménagées en cinéma au premier étage du musée.
Parallèlement, l’exposition « Eloge du doute » continue à Punta della Dogana jusqu’au 31 décembre 2012.

Iranian art has been able to bridge the wide chasm between Iran and the rest of the world in a way that its foreign policy has struggled to achieve. A current exhibition of contemporary Iranian art, featured at the moment at Oi Futuro cultural center in Flamengo, attempts to do just this.
Comprised mainly of video and photography works, Iranian Pulse was first designed for the Biennale in Brasília in November 2010 by the curator Marc Pottier. It’s the first showing of the exhibition in Rio, and there are plans to take it to other major Brazilian cities soon after.
As the title suggests, the works attempt to lay a finger on the pulse of the current dynamics of Iranian culture. The exhibit offers deep insight into the socio-political culture of the region, depicting scenes from people’s homes, political rallies and even religious rituals.
Works are divided into the titled themes of Poetry, Spirit of Celebration, Women, and War and Traditions, but one does not have to be aware of the theme to understand the content.
Amongst the artists on display, there are several individuals who have created a big name for themselves internationally and have achieved celebrity status in the art world. One such artist is Shirin Neshat, who now resides in the U.S. Neshat’s images have often been the subject of great controversy, which is perhaps what has made her the face of contemporary Iranian art – one that challenges conventions and tackles issues head-on.
A wide range of photographs, video art, animations, installations, sound pieces, fiction films and photocollages offer a deeper view into Iran, trying to break through many of the stereotypes and misconceptions that associated with it.
Photographs of fashionable Iranian girls by Shirin Aliabadi cast a very interesting look at the modern society, although they are cleverly titled the ‘Miss Hybrid’ Series.
At the same time, the exhibition doesn’t attempt to cover up Iran’s issues. A documentary film looks at censorship towards Iranian art in the public sphere, while other works look at the effects of war and conflict on the social fabric.