From visual premonition to the written word
Toni Casassas and Jordi Lara

Presentation of the project, 28th December 2012 at 7.30 pm
Video installation, from 07.01.2013 until 02.03.2013

This exhibition explores the relationship between literature and the moving image beyond the cinematographic adaptation of a text. It takes as its starting point three moments from Jordi Lara's novel Una màquina d’'espavilar ocells de nit (A machine for waking up night-birds), evoking them through performance actions, afterwards translated into audiovisual language.

In the exhibition space, with five short films and graphic support, a creative strand may be followed: beginning with a video introducing the novel, continuing with a piece documenting the situations of filming and the interartistic story, ending with the three visual premonitions, belonging to a video-poem.

“When we read, our minds contruct images. Who knows if these mental images the reader puts together are nothing like the visions which one day struck the writer and moved him to write? They are visual premonitions, filmic sketches of a text, submerged cinematography never realised – except in this project – and which may give way to new texts.”

With the collaboration of Meritxell Manyoses, Àngels Agulló and Josep Maria Serracant.

This project has received assistance from the OSIC Oficina de Suport a la Iniciativa Cultural del Departament de Cultura de la Generalitat de Catalunya.

A LO MEJOR (Maybe)
Vídeo installation
21.11.2012 - 05.01.2013

ENTHUSIASM II
People and cities, imagination and futures
Project in progress

The activity is part of the artistic, stage and film project Entusiasme by Claudio Zulian, coordination with Bòlit Centre d'Art Contemporàni
and in collaboration of Nits Digitals.

A LO MEJOR (Maybe), 2007
Some inhabitants from the Romanian region of Dimbovita talk about how they imagine Castellón, the Spanish city to which their relatives and friends emigrated, and where they have never been. Desires, problems, longings and fears of a group of people in a globalised world.The original Romanian voices were dubbed by two Romanians, a woman and a man living in Spain for a long time. The accent is the journey of language. The Video-installation is the result of a prolonged dialogue with the participants.

ENTHUSIASM II: People and cities, imagination and futures
ENTHUSIASM is an artistic proposal bringing together different disciplines around a single multifaceted idea, consisting of imagining a city which we would be excited to live in. It was intended that the project should integrate different citizens' groups to participate in some of its phases. The first part was carried out in Gerona, with el Bòlit Arts Centre, and the second part in Vic, with ACVic and the collaboration of Nits Digitals.

ENTHUSIASM II will begin with a workshop to promote meetings and conversations between different groups of residents from a district in Vic, with a view to imagining and shaping a free, vital future. It will  deal with providing, within the context of the location, a stimulus and a reason to bring together rich cultural traditions, European and non-European alike. Migrants are the expression of culturally complex contexts, and their presence constitutes an opportunity to open up to the world in a time like ours, in which, everything important to our common future is in jeopardy. Along with the working group which participated in the workshop, a dynamic was established to explore the city together, how to imagine it, how to feel it. Everyone spoke of how they imagined the future, from their cultural viewpoint. These conversations formed the basis for a staged audiovisual work in which the workshop's participants took part.

07.10.2012 - 09.02.2013

Opening Sunday 7th Octuber at 12.00 am

ART + SCHOOL + CONTEXT is an exhibition of works by students of nursery, primary and secondary schools. It consists of two parts, the first to become a new phase in the project ART AND SCHOOL which  was deployed throughout 2011-2012 and which involved twenty-two schools.

CEIP Dr. Robert, Camprodon – CEIP El Castell, Tona – CEIP Els Castanyers, Viladrau – CEIP Joan XXIII, Balenyà – CEIP La Sínia, Vic - CEIP Les Escoles, Gurb – CEIP Les Pinediques, Taradell – CEIP Mare de Déu del sòl del Pont, Roda de Ter – CEIP Mossèn Cinto, Folgueroles - CEIP Tomàs Raguer / CEE Ramon Suriñach, Ripoll - Col·legi El Roser, Sant Julià de Vilatorta - Col·legi La Salle, Manlleu – Col·legi Sagrat Cor de Jesús, Vic – Col·legi Sagrats Cors, Centelles – Col·legi Sant Miquel dels Sants, Vic – Escola L’Era de Dalt, Tona – Escola Vedruna, Tona – Escola Vic Centre, Vic – Institut de Taradell, Taradell – Institut La Plana, Vic – Institut La Roca, La Roca del Vallès

The second part exhibits the work which artists Dani Montlleó, Gloria Safont-Tria and Martí Anson conducted with pupils and teachers at three schools and three districts of Mataró, taking as a reference the project Al portal de casa_ i els constructors_ by Jordi Canudas made in conjunction with La Sínia  primary school in Vic's Remei district . The project's tour and development were sponsored by Institut de Cultura de Mataró and exhibited at Can Palauet.

Both parts of the exhibition are complementary, working on the relationship between art, education and land, and both glancing upon education through the use of art. One shows a marked interest in generating long-term structures in which teachers( or schools) take on a leadership role, accompanied by art specialists, while the other generates an interaction between artists and teachers, creating  methodologies for shared work based upon the model of the artist in residence.

Ruralities. Project exhibition by Toni Casassas and Marta Ricart
08.06.2012 - 22.09.2012
Place: ACVic Centre d'Arts Contemporànies
C. Sant Francesc, 1, 08500 Vic

Ruralitaties from  different perspectives , narratives and videos

The perspectives
The project is the result of two combined perspectives (one multifaceted, and the other oblique) upon fragments of rural life, by two artists, Toni Casasses and Marta. Ricard. It is an open dialogue between the artists, which also opens out towards  contemplation of, attention to, and respect for the many worlds which coexist within rural environments. From these perspectives, the project is an attempt to define specific issues related to life within this environment; the relationships (tensions) between small towns and big cities; the battle between emerging agricultural industries and the remnants of an agro-culture  based upon a close relationship with plants and animals;
landscaping as the domination of nature; and established human relationships within this context.. The circumstances of rural sites are conditioned by a post-industrial context of small towns and intermediate cities, increasingly searching for their own valid alternatives to a future marked by the need for rethinking. None of them can escape to the dynamism and the changes characteristic of contemporary times. This project looks far beyond a simple comparison between rural and urban, and far beyond the walls which divide them, to search for a specific rural identity, with no intention of utterly separating itself from the city.

08.06.2012 – 22.09.1
FINAL COURSE PROJECTS, ESCOLA D’ART I SUPERIOR DE DISSENY DE VIC

PAPERS on PAPERS
Aina Roca
If you pay attention to empty spaces, where small things, tiny things can happen, I wonder: Why do I want to capture them through painting? Where would they happen then?
Which is the best question to ask myself? Why or how? (Am I asking myself why because I can't find out how?)
In Papers on paper, the paper is no longer a support for painting, but a material in itself. Open it, strip it bare, shape it, make your incisions, modify it without adding or removing. Let the material be displayed starting with a minimum action, to be incorporated within the work through its soundtrack. Halfway between the painting and somewhere else, the pictorial support is transformed into a space and demands
attention.

Project was granted a scholarship by the Foundation Felicia Fuster.

SALMIAKKI IS NOT A Japanese dish
Ester Gonzalez
Suomi, or Finland in the Finnish language, is so different from our home, that any detail deserves  commentary. Geographical position,climate, technology and nature are some of the factors which make commentary possible. The Finns admire the Mediterranean climate, food, light, etc.. We crave and observe with fascination their level of
development, which coexists well with  rural and natural spaces.
To talk about Salmiakki is to talk directly to this Scandinavian country. Licorice (the translation of salmiakki) is among the most consumed products in Finland.
I have travelled to Finland several times, and each time I have always found some new detail. The first time I was there, not knowing the language, and still I know nothing of it, it  sounded to me like Japanese, of which I know nothing either. Therefore, this publication is, from my totally alien perception of Finnish culture, a collection of
facts, objects, products and words which, visit after visit, I have discovered and collected. Details which will help us to enter their society and culture. It's a small sample of what Finland is to me.

The touring exhibition forms part of the cultural services programme of the Direcció General de Promoció i Cooperació Cultural, offered to municipal art centres and museums. Its mission is to promote contemporary artistic practices in Catalonia as a whole and bring them closer to the people.

Locations and dates for roaming:

- Capella de Sant Pelegrí. Vilafranca del Penedès
Plaça Jaume I, 1  08720 Vilafranca del Penedès
26.11.2011 - 22.01.2012
[http://www.vinseum.cat]

- Espai d'Art Moritz. Cornellà de Llobregat
C. Mossèn Jacint Verdaguer, 16-18. (Bajos interior). 08940 Cornellà de Llobregat
02.02.2012 - 01.04.2012

- Museu Abelló. Mollet del Vallès
C de Berenguer III, 122  08100 Mollet del Vallès
24.05.2012 - 26.08.2012
[http://www.museuabello.cat]

- MUSEU DE L'EMPORDÀ. Figueres
Rambla, 2. 17600 Figueres
07.09.2012 - 27.09.2012
[http://www.museuemporda.org]

- ROCA UMBERT. Fàbrica de les Arts. Granollers
C. Mare de Deu de Montserrat, 36. 08401 Granollers
22.11.2012 - 27.01.2013
ww.rocaumbert.cat]

> Currently the exhibition is:

- Can Palauet. Mataró
C. d’en Palau, 32
08.02.2013 - 28.04.2013

- Sala Muntcunill. Terrassa
pl. Didó, 3. 08221 Terrassa
11.05.2013 - 23.06.2013

Exhibition project curated by Curro Claret, with the participation of Artlantique - Basurama - Camper - Emili Padrós - Gemma Busquets - Ikea and Unicef - Katrina Furniture Project (Jenga Mwendo and Tammy Petro) - Laura Arqués, Marta Petreñas and Massimiliano Scaglione - Lee Kiseung - Makea - Mariscal - Martí Guixé - Nanimarquina - Pablo España - Recetas Urbanas/Santiago Cirugeda - Shigeru Ban Architects

With the collaboration of Escola d’Art i Superior de Disseny de Vic and Escola d'Art i Superior de Disseny Pau Gargallo de Badalona.

23.02.2012 – 19.05.2012

Opening and discussion table, thursday 23.02.2012 7pm with the participation of Martí Guixé designer, Nani Marquina designer and entrepreneur, Octavi Rofes anthropologist and subdirector of the school Eina, Curro Claret designer and Ramon Parramon director of ACVic. See Activities linked to the exhibition

INTERMEDIATE ZONE. ART, DESIGN AND SOCIETY
This exhibition is an heterogeneous and intentionally dispersed collection of projects which, from a design perspective, tackles a number of questions regarding life within society, starting out from a different set of parameters to those we might usually expect.

Supposedly the first priority of design should be "people" but in practice this is not often so clear. Many other interests are mixed up and highlighted. I do not believe this to be the case with the projects exhibited in the show; if they have anything in common, it is the effort behind each one of them to highlight and prioritise the humane over other factors.

With this  exhibition we aim to offer an open and complex vision of an attitude and a way of doing things with the deliberate belief that the role and the involvement of people in the construction of the environment should be much larger, much more intense and much more pleasurable than it usually is. As the theoretician Italian Ezio Manzini says in the way of a formula, more well-being equals less use of natural resources plus more sociability.

Some would like to think that despite the apparent hegemony that the image holds within the field of design (and in any other field), we are also witnessing a growing awareness and appreciation of the fact that the most important object is not just the final object, but what it can promote, generate and catalyse. Everyone who, in one way or another, comes into relationship during any part of the process and the life-cycle of a specific design or design service (including those involved in the construction process, or as end users) must have as rich, stimulating and enjoyable an experience with it as possible.

The selection of pieces for  the exhibition, inevitably partial and personal, attempts to demonstrate this broad vision through projects from very different contexts and with very different ambitions, dealing with various aspects of life such as health, food, the elderly, how to decide on the use of urban space, the 15-M movement, relations between locals and newcomers, labour relations between first World countries and others with cheaper workforces, or responses to "natural" disasters.

Finally I would like to point out that in almost all, if not all, the projects submitted, few resources have been necessary to carry them out. Addressing these "big issues" does not require big resources, nor does it require the initiative of great powers, nor need it be large-scale. Obviously, a little can go a long way.

Curro Claret

artesans

art and education Jordi Canudas,  public space and mobile devices Santiago Cirugeda, Makea, Straddle3, Todo por la Praxis, useful design Curro Claret, colaborative maps Guifi.net / Efraín Foglia, Iconoclasistas, Mona Fawaz / Ahmad Gharbieh / Mona Harb, Stalker / Primavera Romana, Torolab, social critic Núria Güell
Project by Ramon Parramon in collaboration with Maral Mikirditsian and Laia Solé.
La Capella - ACVic Centre d'Arts Contemporànies
Acces to publication

Place: La Capella
Hospital, 56 . 08001 Barcelona . Tel 93 442 71 71
Tuesday to Saturday, from 12 to 14 h and 16 to 20 h. Sundays and holidays  from 11 to 14 h
02.03.2012 – 22.04.2012

- Debate on creative devices and uses of the public space
Round table with the participation of David Juárez – Straddle3; Diego Peris – Todo por la Praxis; Alberto Flores and Mireia Juan – Makea; Santiago Cirugeda – Recetas Urbanas and Gaspar Maza, Professor of Anthropology at the Rovira i Virgili University.
Friday 2 March, at 7 pm. La Capella

- Displaced Legal Application #3 F.I.E.S.
Debate surrounding the project of Núria Güell with the participation of Daniel Pont and Amadeu Casellas.
Thursday 8 March, at 7 pm. La Capella

- The Great Game: The Builders
Activity led by Jordi Canudas with students from La Sínia school in Vic and the Milà i Fontanals school in Barcelona.
Friday 9 March, from 12 to 1 pm and from 2 to 4 pm. La Capella. Acces to images and video activity

- Workshop by Curro Claret. Design and construction of furniture or appliances workshop, using "The piece" and the assembly of various materials. The workshop is open for entries until April 12th. 2012 Saturdays 14 and 21 April from 10 to 13h + information

- Workshop by Curro Claret with students from the advanced training programmes in Applied Arts in Sculpture and Industrial Modelling at the Massana School of Art and Design (UAB). From 7 March to 20 April. La Capella and Escola Massana.

ON THE DOORSTEP_ AND THE BUILDERS_ Mataró

- Remei District_ Vic. Jordi Canudas and La Sínia School
- Pla d’en Boet District_ Mataró. Dani Montlleó and Camí del Mig School
- Havana District_ Mataró. Glòria Safont-Tria and Montserrat Solà School
- Rocafonda District_Mataró. Martí Anson and Germanes Bartomeu School

From 13.04.2012 to 27.05.2012
Exhibition Gallery at Can Palauet
Carrer d’en Palau, 32 · Mataró
Opening times: From Tuesday to Saturday from 5 to 8pm; Sunday from 11am
to 2pm; Closed on Monday

Originating in Jordi Canudas's project in Vic's Remei district, the project is this time being presented in Mataró, in collaboration with three local artists who are taking the process to 3 schools in 3 different districts of the city. The result of the three processes and the documentation will be added to the exhibition and initial project.

- Pla d’en Boet District_ Mataró. Dani Montlleó and Camí del Mig School
20.04.2012

The project with third year pupils at the Camí del MIg school focuses on a proposal for a public sculpture for one of the two motorway roundabouts on either side of the neighbourhood. It works upon the concept of public space through the construction of a sculpture which runs as a leit-motif.

- Havana District_ Mataró. Glòria Safont-Tria and Montserrat Solà School
08.05.2012
Pupils from the fourth year at the Montserrat Sola school establish links with the district through an exploration of the territory from different perspectives, but  always with the presence of the sea, and its influence in the district. The result of the project will be the construction of a wooden boat.

- Rocafonda District_Mataró. Martí Anson and Germanes Bartomeu School
17.05.2012
First year pupils from the Germanes Bartomeu School work on a construction project, starting with a 60's image of the neighbourhood showing an empty field and a landscape without buildings

Click to access programme of activities

Esto no es un museo. Artefactos móviles al acecho

This is not a museum. Mobile devices lurking
ACVic Centre d’Arts Contemporànies
From 11/15/2011 to 02/05/2012
Opening: Saturday October 15th at 19:30

This is not a museum. Mobile devices lurking is an exhibition curated by Martí Peran and produced by ACVic Centre d’Arts Contemporànies in collaboration with AC/E Acción Cultural Española. It is a  part of the project Ceci n’est pas une voiture, promoted jointly by ACVic, Can Xalant and IDENSITAT. During the various stages of development, Universitat de Barcelona, Museo Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Roulotte and Cercle Artístic Sant Lluc, have collaborated, or are currently collaborating.

The exhibition has arisen, according to Martí Peran, "as an exercise in documentation and reflection on the construction of mobile devices as elements for an expanded conception of the museum, or in some cases as an alternative to it."  It has a first selection of more than 50 case studies from various cities and countries. Presented as an information archive, the exhibition also showcases some of the original artifacts and various productions derived from its street work. A tour is foreseen for the exhibition, during which some new cases will be added relating to the specific contexts in which it will be displayed.

The entire project Ceci n’est pas une voiture has come together through different phases held  temporarily and  in various spaces. This exhibition is one of them and has been preceded by a period of residence and project production, carried out in Vic and Mataro with the aim of promoting new projects using  pre-existing mobile devices, Idensitat Touring device and CX-R from Can Xalant. The projects Servicio Público de Optimización de Trastos (S.P.O.T.) by Makea collective and Càmping, Caravaning, Arquitecturing from Miquel Ollé and  Sofia Mataix,
who have been in residence at  ACVic and Can Xalant, are presented together with the projects of A77 - Adriana García Galán - Amor Muñoz - Ana Dumas - Anna Recasens - Antimuseo - Cinéma Numérique Ambulant (CNA) – CLUI - Colectivo Cambalache - Colectivo Descarrilados - Colectivo Kabaret Machine - Cristian Añó and David Armengol - Diego Pérez - Domènec - Fabiana de Barros - Fanzinoteca Ambulant - Felix Mathias Ott - Floating Lab Collective - Iñaqui Larrimbe - Ivan Puig and Andrés Padilla - Josep M. Martin – La Fundició - Lluc Mayol, Matias Rossi and Ricardo Duque - Makea Tu Vida – Marksearch - Miquel Ollé and Sofia Mataix - Núria Güell  - Nuria Montiel - Pablo Helguera - Pablo Rojas Schwartz  - Pau Faus - Platoniq - Public Works - Raimond Chaves - Rallyconurbano - Raumlabor - Sabrina Artel – Soundlab - Straddle3 and Todo por la Praxis - Theo Craveiro - Toni Tomàs and Carles Porta - Virginia de Medeiros - Vitor Cesar


> Access to the presented projects of the exhibition [text + image]

This is not a museum

From 2nd December 2011 to 31st December 2011

Exhibition of photomontages  by Andrea Corachán Camús

A project by Grup d’Etnografia dels Espais Públics de l’lnstitut Català d’Antropologia curated by Manuel Delgado and Andrea Corachán Camús.

A project inviting reflection on  possible analogies between  large containers of urban art and culture, museums, cultural centres and total institutions ... spaces of confinement and maintenance of people subjected to constant scrutiny: prisons, psychiatric centres, barracks, hospitals, cemeteries, convents, factories ... The proposal combines a series of round tables, to discuss  the relationship between these two types of internment facilities, with the exhibition of a series of photomontages, which will be displayed simultaneously in  the lobbies of several art centres  in Catalonia.

Fundació Antoni Tàpies (Aragó, 255 Barcelona)
Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona (Pl. Dels Àngels, 1 Barcelona)
Arts Santa Mònica (Rambla Santa Mònica, 7 Barcelona)
CaixaForum Barcelona (Av. de Francesc Ferrer i Guàrdia, 6-8 Barcelona)
CaixaForum Girona (Ciutadans 19 Girona)
CaixaForum Tarragona (Cristòfor Colom, 2 Tarragona)
CaixaForum Lleida (Av. Blondel, 3 Lleida)
CaixaForum Palma (Pl. Weyler, 3 Palma)
Can Xalant (Francesc Layret, 75 Mataró)
ACVic Centre d’Arts Contemporànies (Sant Francesc, 1 Vic)

Cloistered art. Regarding cultural confinement in the post-industrial era
Debate Sessions

Artists, theorists and cultural managers discuss the role of art and cultural containers, museums, cultural centres, etc. in the urban contexts in which they are  located, and in relation to the dynamics of change affecting them.

Sessions will be introduced and directed by Manuel Delgado
The duration of the sessions is 2 hours approximately and the entrance is free

ACVic works with Nits Digitals with the exhibition Flux VídeoCapsa, which is part of the ECTONITS, inside the parallels activities outside the cycle.

From 12th to 20th november 2011

Opening, Saturday 12th November 6:30 pm

Collective Video-installation introducing several video works and experimenting with alternative presentation formats. It is composed of works by Iñaki Álvarez, Jordi Casas, Toni Casassas, Jan Codina, Artur Tort, Lis Costa, Xavier Gavin, Josep M. Jordana, Jordi Teixidó and Ester Xargay.

The videos are located inside a small box, fixed in a stand. To see them, a viewer must open the box and put on a pair of headphones. Each video loop is shown on a small LCD screen on a horizontal plane. Taking the whole installation and the location of the viewer into account, each video lasts approximately five minutes, so that all ten works may be viewed in less than an hour.

Selected by Núria Antentas.

More information:
Nits Digitals [http://www.nitsdigitals.com] and Flux [http://www.fluxfestival.org]

This concept of video-installation, created by the festival Flux in Barcelona 2009, is presented on this occasion in Vic as the fruit of a collaboration between Nits Digitals, festival Flux and ACVIC. In this show five unedited works are presented alongside a selection of five works previously shown at the festival Flux.

Download program [PDF]

Jordi Canudas _ ACVic On The Doorstep_ and The Builders (Al Portal de Casa_ i els Constructors_) is a project directed by Jordi Canudas for cross-collaboration among students of Escola La Sínia in the Remei district of the city of Vic, students of Escola d’Art i Superior de Disseny de Vic and ACVic Centre d’Arts Contemporànies, and with support from Pla de Barris i Participació Ciutadana de l’Ajuntament de Vic and the Generalitat de Catalunya, Consell Nacional de la Cultura i de les Arts.

21.06.2011 - 25.09.2011 [Download PDF]
Place: ACVic. Sant Francesc,1. Vic

Guided visits to the exhibition
On The Doorstep_ and The Builders (Al Portal de Casa_ i els Constructors_)
Every Saturday at 12pm. Guided visits available  by appointment.  Telephone ACVic on  93 885 37 04 . Free service.

Parallel activities
Presentation of works realised during the workshop  AL PORTAL DE CASA_ From the place: artistic practice and context, by Jordi Canudas with students of the Escola d’Art i Superior de Disseny de Vic: Laura Batriu, Judith Bravo, Alicia Campo, Sara Costa, Lucía Ijurco, Marina López, Neus Martí, David Reche, Aina Roca, Meritxell Serrallonga i Àlex Vélez.

Exhibition at Sala d’exposicions de l’Escola d’Art i Superior de Disseny de Vic (Rambla Sant Domèncec, 24. Vic).
From 21st June to 22nd July 2011.

El gran joc El Constructors amb alumnes de La Síni en l'espai expositiu El gran joc El Constructors amb alumnes de La Síni en l'espai expositiu

24.03.2011 – 04.06.2011

Opening: 24.03.2011 at 19,30h
Place: ACVic. Sant Francesc,1. Vic (Barcelona)

Apamar. Charts, metrics and policies of space brings together a selection of proposals that intervene in the city through artistic practices,architecture, design or activism. The projects intersect through proposing alternatives to the representation of space, its interpretation and how to live in it. In some cases they reveal latent conflict situations in the territory by generating maps and interpreting them. In others, they relate to self-managed social processes that activate collective strategies, by creating networks and seeking alternative systems for the citizens.

“Apamar” means to measure a field but also to know something very well. Measuring with one’s palms and being in control of a circumstance or situation supposes a subjective knowledge about the context. The exploration of the territory, critical cartography, the selection and display of data, processing of information or collective creation are issues that relate to subjectivity and socialization of space.

The participating projects in the exhibition, some finished while others still in process, work with the many underlying qualities of geographical maps. Experimenting with this seemingly conventional medium, while staying faithful to some of its main attributes such as accuracy, factuality and intentional objectivity, they create new models from a critical perspective and with the objective of proposing alternative strategies. They are born as a reaction to various situations that represent a need for reflection and active response, and they are materialized in various formats. Together,
they come forth as tools that are clearly political and serve for pointing out and making visible spaces in conflict situations; in some cases, they activate collective processes while experimenting with new strategies that allow citizens to intervene in the organization of social space.

In this sense, Beirut: Mapping Security by Mona Fawaz, Ahmad Gharbieh and Mona Harb, depicts the numerous types of security measures that have been established in municipal Beirut as a result to the armed conflicts the country has witnessed since the 70’s. Sara Nelson Wright’s visual mapping of six individuals’ travels in Brooklyn, Locations and Dislocation, is a reflection on the effects of gentrification and urban expansion. In LRPT (La región de los pantalones tranfronterizos), the Tijuana-based collective Torolab makes visible the transnational mobility of the inhabitants of the twin cities of Tijuana and San Diego. Isaki Lacuesta and Isa Campo visit Places that do not exist, and provide us with an account of the reality of these places that have desappeared from google earth for being protected areas. Geografie dell'Oltrecittà and  Agroculture nomadi de Stalker/Primavera Romana are common design projects that generate and share social knowledge and awareness on urban changes, while Guifi.net in Catalunya, Mapeo Colectivo from Iconoclasistas in Buenos Aires and Mapping the Commons, Athens by Hackitectura.net all spur us into participation with the aim of creating common resources.

This exhibition is part of ACVic Centre d’Arts Contemporànies’ Expo Program, and is curated by Maral Mikirditsian, Ramon Parramon and Laia Solé.

Alicia Casadesús Ephemeral Art Installation for different parts of the city of Vic. A project by Alícia Casadesús.

Nights of 13, 14, 15.05.2011 from 21.00h to 02.00h

“..The cities are a combination of many things. Of memory, desires, signs of a language. Cities are places for exchange, but not only the exchange of goods but also for exchanging words, desires, memories”. Italo Calvino

"...cities are a collection of many things: memories, desires, signs of a language, places of exchange, but these sites are not only exchange of goods, are also exchanges of words, desires, memories".  Italo Calvino

The identity of a city, including Vic, is defined mainly by all the people who live there, who works there, who visit it... That is why this work is shaped by conversations with people linked to the city, who have been asked to choose a place in the city which interests them, either for aesthetic appreciation, for perceptual reasons, social, empirical, historical ... From this starting point, a work has been executed which can be seen at various outdoor areas of the city, aiming to show the invisible, anonymous and the intangible parts of the city which somehow give it an identity, emphasising the city, constructing it. The part which converts spaces into places. [download postal and map]

Activity related to the Art and Children 2011 conference organized by UVic and the Escola d'Art i Superior de Disseny de Vic.  [download the program in pdf]

CATALYSTS. Art, Education, Territory
Exhibition 17.12. 2010 - 25.04.2011
Place: Arts Santa Mònica. La Rambla,7 08002 Barcelona. Espai Anella

Projectes by: Amasté, Jordi Canudas, Santiago Cirugeda, Democracia, Josep-Maria Martín, Tanit Plana, Sinapsis, Laia Solé

CATALYSTS. Art, education, territory is an exhibition showcasing art projects and participatory processes which are grounded in a direct relationship with a particular local context. Each of this set of proposals comprises three essential components, which combine with and relate to one another with varying degrees of interaction: they are artistic practices, they foment educational activities, and they take place in a specific spatial and temporal territory or context, while embodying a critical reflection on politics and society.

Curated by: Ramon Parramon
Organized by: Arts Santa Mònica - Ministry of Culture and the Media
Produced by: Arts Santa Mònica - Ministry of Culture and the Media, ACVIC Centre d'Arts Contemporànies

Through the looking glass
Joan Fontcuberta
02.12.2010-06.03.2011

Opening Thursday, December at 19.30 h.

ACVic presents the exhibition Through the looking glass by Joan Fontcuberta in collaboration with Digital Nights. This exhibition gathers two works in which the artist uses  resources offered by the internet . Titled Googlegrams and Reflectograms, these works propose to reflect on the importance and  increasing use of images, the proliferation of artists, as well as the potential for broadcast and viral dispersion, all of which are growing exponentially with the use of  social networks.

With Googlegrams Fontcuberta constructs contemporary iconographic compositions using the browser Google. Close up, it can be appreciated that these compositions are made up of  a mosaic of thousands of images, thematically related with the resulting composition. In the exhibition viewers can create their own compositions and incorporate them in the exhibition through a projection.

Reflectograms collects from the internet self-portraits by people taking their own picture in the mirror, for uploading to and spreading among social networks. It consists of an overlaid projection of specular self-portraits which transforms the exhibition space, through the confluence of multiple projections, into a saturated stage where a spectacle of overflowed subjectivity occurs. The viewers can add their portrait to the exhibition with a  camera and software provided on the premises.

Joan Fontcuberta considers there are two types of photographs, decorative, and those that” make you think “. From his earliest works he has chosen the second kind. And as he said in  his recent lecture included in the cycle Digital Nights in Vic, but thinking of what?. This is the challenge and the starting point of each of his works, to articulate a set of images that drive the viewer, observer or user towards certain subjects in order to question, discuss or simply reflect upon them.

When the images multiply and multiply, the reflections must  be considered  from the outset of a significant sample. In this case the Internet is the media and the message. A multiplier media and a message that sometimes reaches us filtered (in the case of Google) or saturated (in the case of social networks). Our view is conditioned by these mechanisms. An image can make us think. The multiplication of images does not make us think harder in proportion to number. On the contrary,  it stuns and  intoxicate us.

The artist places us in front of a mirror in which  a reality saturated with visual information is reflected,  a subversive way to exercise social control . The excess of information drives away  our capacity to concentrate, to reflect, to think. This is one of the subjects consider in the exhibition. Fontcuberta explains other subjects  and relationships in the following texts:

ACVic 2010. Transductores

TRANSDUCERS. Networked Collective Education
Relational Archive [Exhibition-archive] + Pedagogical Laboratory [Workshop and Resources Centre]
 Project directed by Antonio Collados and Javier Rodrigo

From October 1st to November 28th 2010.
Opening 1st  October, 7.30pm 
ACVic. Centre d'Arts Contemporànies. C.Sant Francesc, 1 08500 Vic T. +34 938853704

 Transducers. Networked Collective Education aims  to present  the  practices and materials shown in the archive in the form of  an educational laboratory placed in ACVic Center of Contemporary Arts. To this end, TRANSDUCERS. Networked Collective Education  organises around three points:
- The presentation of four case studies included in the project's archive.
- The creation of a resources centre for gathering documents, publications and a programme of videos à la carte .
- An open workshop "Strategies for territorial work”
The goal is to build the contents of the project in collaboration with several local networks and initiatives .