Russian illegal prison on IZOLYATSIA premises has been operational for 10 years.

Sign Up for Seminars of The Laboratory of Contemporary Art

Sign Up for Seminars of The Laboratory of Contemporary Art

The Laboratory of Contemporary Art is a series of manuals that in an accessible way tell about the theory of contemporary art practices in with attached tasks for children and young adults that will be useful not only to the professional community, but also to amateurs. The publication of each manual will be linked and occasionally devoted to online seminars for representatives of regional educational initiatives, where they can get acquainted with art practice, methods, ideas for implementation and will have the opportunity to communicate with artists and curators.

Find the program with the description of brochures and seminars below. If you are interested in visiting seminars, please point out which ones and tell us more about you in a Google-form you can find via a link. 

Who can participate in the seminars?

  • teachers of centers for children and youth creativity, art schools and public education schools;

  • representatives of educational centers, art houses, hubs, creative spaces, coworking spaces, NGOs, libraries;

  • parents who are interested in home art education for children;

  • everyone who wants to know more about the presented art practices, themes or mediums.

The events will be held online in Ukrainian from August till October of 2020. We’ll send you the links to a Zoom-conference to the mail-address mentioned. 

The dates of events may change — in a case if the seminar s postponed we’ll inform you in mail or in a telephone call. The registration form will be open until October.

The project aims to support the decentralization of informal art education for children and young adults and will be the online part of mobile cultural center Gurtobus / Community Culture Bus of IZOLYATSIA (supported by the US Embassy in Kyiv). In 2019, Gurtobus visited 24 cities in 14 regions of Ukraine with artistic and educational events. Gurtobus aims to support sustainability of Gurtobus, showing how its program activities could be implemented by local institutions, in particular those of them that have already been local partners of Gurtobus.

The project is implemented with the support of Ukrainian Cultural Foundation. The Ukrainian Cultural Foundation is a state institution established in 2017 as a new model of providing state support and promotion of initiatives in culture and creative industries on a competitive basis. According to the current legislation, the Foundation’s activities are directed and coordinated by the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine. Website: https://ucf.in.ua, facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ucf.ua.

Programme 

20.08.20

Dmytro Krasnyi The Biographies of Things: how to talk about history through objects and imprints

Curators: Valeriia Karpan and Marina Khrypun

The first installment of Laboratory of Contemporary Art continues the theme of Family Album which is central to the current season of the Gurtobus mobile cultural centre. The booklet describes work with historical memory through personal recollections and the combination of objects, both new and found — in attics, in the sideboard, at a flea market —, having its basis in Dmytro Krasnyi’s artistic practice. 

How can one research family history alongside adolescents through working with archives and found objects? The method presented in the brochure combines readymades, sculpture, installation art, graphic design and photography. During an online seminar the artist Dmytro Krasnyi and the curators Valeriia Kapan and Marina Khripun will explain these mediums in more detail, and will offer the seminar participants the chance to create their own exhibition about their family history. 

Arranged in the style of a zine, the brochure will have a layout that makes it inclusive of visually imparied reader. The seminar and the publication could be useful to people involved in informal artistic education, as well as representatives of Houses of Culture and Centres for Child and Youth Creativity, teachers of artistic disciplines, parents interested in home art education, and to all those who want to find out more about the artistic practice it describes. 

09.09.20

Yevhen Hordieiev Local Musical Identity: Sound-art and sound-research

Curator: Kateryna Rusetska 

In the booklet, there will be a section detailing the recording, structuring and archiving of regional sonic phenomena — from folk, mythology, historical legacy to industrial and street noise. How can we reinterpret that which we hear every day and form a local audio picture from the sounds gathered. The brochure’s narrative will be formed from a mixture of sociological observations, sensations, sounds and the experience of sound-artists Evhen Hordeev. What is sound art and sound performance? How can we research sound with the help of improvised means and how can we include new works with sounds in a programme of alternative musical education? 

During the online seminar, participants will be able to find out more about the instruments used in the search for material that is sonically inherent to a place, about his recording (field recording) and archival research, and talk with the artist and curator. 

This edition of Laboratory of Contemporary Art and online seminar could interest practitioners of musical art, people working in educational initiatives and all who want to find out more about sound art. 

17.09.20

Anna Manankina Digital Feelings: body and touch in media-art

Curators: Valeriia Karpan and Marina Khrypun 

This installment will be dedicated to themes of the post-human, virtual spaces, corporeality and ecology. What is media art and how can it be practiced in basic artistic education, both professional and amateur? Using the artist Anna Manankina’s projects as examples, in this installment discussion will be about how it is possible to speak about the ecological crisis through digital media and how to work with this topic using collective virtual practices. During the online seminar the artist and the curators Marina Khripun and Valeriia Karpan will speak about the creative instruments which virtual space allows, and will share practical advice on working with them.

In itself, this edition will be an experiment: by what means can a zine, as analogue media, speak about the digital, about the peculiarities of travels in and communication in virtual spaces?

The brochure and seminar will be useful to art school teachers, creative initiatives, parents who are interested in informal artistic education, and all those who wish to find out about the basic concepts and schools of media art and to speak with the artist. 

24.09.20

SVAYA Contemporary Art for Teenagers: Working with space and samizdat

Curator: Anna Potomkina

In the booklet, the artists Olha Poliak and Maria Ahisian systematize their experience of mentoring the adolescent art group Zwanzig Partisanen. What methods do the artists use in alternative basic artistic instruction? How can we research space with children through land art and readymades? The booklet will also describe the other practice of Zwanzig Partisanen — samizdat — with step-by-step instructions and advice. 

During the online seminar, the artists plan to lead a workshop on creating a zine, which will include different exercises that investigate space — working with imprints of natural structures and collages from garbage. 

The exercises presented in the booklet will be adjusted for readers with sensory impairments and aim at an alternative interaction with space. Printed editions will contain Braille.

The booklet and the online seminar could be useful for art school teachers, Centres for Child and Youth Creativity, parents who are interested in basic artistic education, representatives of creative spaces and educational initiatives and all those who want to find out more about public art and samizdat. 

02.10.20

Malynovskyi Anton (Un)identical Generations: the optics of photography

Curator: Anna Potomkina

What makes each new generation unique: the specific context or a gap in the system of knowledge transfer that forces them to start ‘from a blank canvas’ each time? What does the (non-)uniformity of generations consist in, and how can this be captured with the lens of a camera? Anna Potemkina, a curator of Laboratory of Contemporary Art, and the artist-photographer Anton Malinovskiy try and illustrate the latter and analyze these questions through the work of Anton himself, as well as that of other people working in contemporary Ukrainian photography. 

During the online seminar the artist and the curator will speak about key photographic methods (working with space and with portraits) and will lead a practical exercise with the participants. The brochure and the online seminar could be useful to photography teachers, representatives of art schools and Centres for Child and Youth Creativity, and all those who are interested in this medium on a basic level. 

15.10.20

Kolorova Kapusta / Creativity as a game and tool of interaction and communication: theater and performance for children

Authors: Iehor Martynenko and Mariia Kolomiets

22.10.20

White Cube: exercises in curation for children

Authors: Natasha Chychasova and Valeriia Buradzhyieva 

The last edition of Laboratory of Contemporary Art is dedicated to the history of curatorial activity and the white cube: the sterile white gallery space, which our eye is now accustomed to, with walls painted neutral colours and artificial (although not always) lighting. It is the white cube that most often arises in the imagination when we hear the phrase ‘contemporary art’. The booklet will describe, in an accessible format, how this exhibition concept appeared and how it was criticised, and how it can be used for a workshop on curatorial activity for children*.The printed version of the booklet will contain an interactive poster with stencils of a white cube, created in partnership with the independent art and culture publication VONO.  

During the online seminar the authors of this edition, Natasha Chichasova and Valeria Buradzhyieva, will share practical advice: how can you improvise a white cube in the classroom, creative space or simply at home? How can you develop the curatorial imagination of children and adolescents with the assistance of curatorial exercises for rethinking objects (readymades)? What is a curatorial text and how can you write about a display when it has been created? 

The seminar and the publication could be useful to representatives of educational initiatives, Houses of Culture, Centres for Child and Youth Creativity, creative space, parents and all those who are interested in basic education and curatorial work.

*The White Cube workshop was one of the most popular activities from the first season of trips made by the Gurtobus, a mobile cultural centre by the IZOLYATSIA. Foundation

Published: 23 July 2020, 17:08