VIVA! art action

 

4 – 9 octobre
at Bain St-Michel, 5300, rue St-Dominique, Montréal

vivamontreal.org

 

Emerging from a collaboration between six artists-run centers from the region of Montreal, (articule, Centre des arts actuels Skol, Centre d’art et de diffusion Clark, La Centrale Galerie Powerhouse, DARE DARE Centre de diffusion d’art multidisciplinaire de Montréal, Praxis Art Actuel), VIVA! Art Action is an international event presenting the effervescence of live art practices from quebec and abroad.

 

For its third edition, the festival showcases the works of over 20 artists contributing to the disciplines of performance, public intervention, social practices and experimental sound. A five-day happening in and of itself, this edition is characterized by convivial atmosphere in which you are invited to discover contemporary live art practices through both structured and spontaneous encounters.

 

As part of VIVA! Art Action, articule presents three artists whose practice develops through a direct engagement with the public and dwells in political, conceptual or social thoughts and observations. Jessica MacCormack (Montréal) will pursue her work around marginalized and criminalized communities with a series of urban intervention addressing actualities. Information can also be found on the project's blog at : workequalsworthequalsinnocence.wordpress.com. Shannon Cochrane (Toronto) creates situations and images that are concerned with the formal presentation of action, the possibilities of social interaction, and the investigation of authorship, repertoire, the archive and the practice of performance art itself. Julischka Stengele (Berlin/Vienne) deals with subjects such as interpersonal relationships, closeness/distance, limits/overcoming and (female) body images and cultural role models in her work which starting point, material as well as content is the body in its social context.

 

 

 

Working with animation, video, painting, drawing, installation and intervention, Jessica MacCormack’s interdisciplinary practice examines the complex position of culture within neoliberal capitalism and critiques modes of social control, while exploring the potential for art to function as a site of resistance. She is specifically interested in how modes of violence are perpetuated collectively through popular narratives, concepts of justice and denial of accountability. 
Frequently engaging with communities and collectives, her practice eschews individual authorship in favour of collaboration. This has included an ongoing commitment to working with women and youth who are in conflict with the law, through the creation of art projects in prisons as well as at numerous centres that support marginalized people. 

In 2008, she completed an MFA through the Public Art and New Artistic Strategies program at the Bauhaus University (Weimar, Germany). Her work has been shown nationally and internationally in festivals, screenings, artist run centres and museums. She is currently employed as an Assistant Professor of Studio Arts at Concordia University.  

 

 

Shannon Cochrane's performance works have been presented across Canada in Toronto, Montréal, Halifax and Vancouver and internationally in China, Chilé, France, Germany, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Scotland, Sweden, Switzerland and USA at various festivals and performance art events. Shannon is a co-founder and co-curator/organizer of the 7a*11 International Festival of Performance Art (www.7a-11d.ca) and is the current Artistic and Administrative Director of FADO Performance Art Centre (www.performanceart.ca).

 

 

Julischka Stengele is a multidisciplinary German artist, who lives and works in Berlin and Vienna. She first worked as a life-model and behind the desk at event-planning agencies before she began her studies in Visual Communication/Photography at the design department of the University of Applied Sciences in Berlin. Parallel, Stengele took up self-educational studies in performance art – supplemented by seminars and mentoring of well-known artists. Later on, still interested in the creative process of planning cultural events, she founded the "Amt für Körperschaften" (Bureau for Bodily Affairs) – a curatorial project, which is devoted to artistic positions that require a physical expression. Currently, Stengele undertakes post-graduate studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. Since 2007, Stengele participated in various group shows and presented her performances internationally, including Mexico, Poland, Finland, Austria, Italy and the USA.

 

 

images :

(left) : Julischka Stengele, Blaupause II, 2011, photo : Teresa Novotny

(centre) : Jessica MacCormack, Youth Prison Memorial, Germany, 2008

(right) : Shannon Cochrane, Performance Festival Performance, Open Festival, Beijing China, 2009, performance documentation painting by Christina Zeidler

 

Documentation of the performances :

Work equals worth = innocence, Jessica MacCormack, Photos 1, 3 and 4: Diana Le Nezet

Work equals worth = innocence, Jessica MacCormack, Photo 2 : Guy L’Heureux

Untitled, Shannon Cochrane : Guy L'Heureux

Untitled, Julischka Stengele : Guy L'Heureux