12.1–22.4 2012
Doug Ashford, Claire Barclay, José León Cerrillo, Yto Barrada, Matias Faldbakken, Priscila Fernandes, Zachary Formwalt, Liam Gillick/Anton Vidokle, Goldin+Senneby, Wade Guyton, Iman Issa, Gunilla Klingberg, Dorit Margreiter, Åsa Norberg/Jennie Sundén, Mai-Thu Perret, Falke Pisano, Walid Raad, Emily Roysdon, Tommy Støckel, Mika Tajima, Haegue Yang

Abstract Possible deals with abstraction and contemporary art. In the exhibition three prominent tendencies in contemporary art are followed, examined and problematized: formal abstraction, economic abstraction and “withdrawal” (Latin ab strahere lit. ‘drag away,’ to withdraw). Formal abstraction encompasses painting, sculpture and installations that reflect abstract styles, especially geometric abstraction, which often recalls the classic avant-garde’s development of what was then a wholly novel visual expression. Economic abstraction concerns art and economy, taking up, for instance, the genuine abstract value of money. “Withdrawal” refers to the wave of artists’ initiatives during the last 15 years that have deliberately not joined what we can call the “mainstream” in order to create a greater degree of self-determination for the artists. Curator Maria Lind. www.abstractpossible.org

Tensta konsthall: 11.1–22.4
Taxingegränd 10, Tensta. Open Wednesday/Thursday 11:00–21:00; Friday 11:00–18:00; Saturday/Sunday 12:00–17:00.

Bukowskis: 27.1–12.2
Berzelii Park 1, Stockholm. Open daily from 14:00–18:00.

Center for Fashion Studies: 12.1.2012–December 2013
University of Stockholm, house D, 8th floor. Works by Mai-Thu Perret and Emily Roysdon are on view inside seminar room. Open Fridays 10:00–15:00 (except 17.2) and Tuesdays 12:00–17:00 (except 31.1, 17.4), or as agreed with Rita Jonson or Petrine Knight.

With support by Danish Arts Council; FastPartner; Mondrian Foundation; Malmö konsthall; Office for Contemporary Art Norway; Austrian Embassy, Stockholm.

In collaboration with the Center for Fashion Studies, Stockholm University; The School of Architecture; Ross Tensta Gymnasium; Tensta Library; Zita Folkets Bio.

12.1-May 2012
The Bidoun Library, founded in 2009 by Bidoun Projects, is a mobile library consisting of books, magazines and other printed matter. Bidoun Projects is a non-commercial project producing exhibitions, publications and various events aiming to support contemporary culture from the Middle East. Since the turn of the last century, the term “Middle East,” which was coined in the West, has existed more as a subject for discussion and study than a geographical area. Bidoun Library is an attempt to survey this territory through its printed matter. Books, magazines and other materials are treated as objects in which complex and historical facts and ambitions meet. They are not amongst the most representative or refined objects from the Middle East—they are cheaper and more perishable. Bidoun Library acquires a new form everywhere it stops. At Tensta konsthall, printed matter associated with the Middle East and published in Sweden will be examined. Prior to its Tensta stop, the library will have visited Abu Dhabi, Beirut, Cairo, Dubai, New York, and most recently, the Serpentine Gallery in London.

With support by Bagdad Café.

January 2012
As part of Abstract Possible: The Stockholm Synergies the report Contemporary Art and its Commercial Markets: A Report on Current Conditions and Scenarios for the Future, edited by Olav Velthuis and Maria Lind, is published in January 2012 by Sternberg Press. With contributions by Stefano Baia-Curioni, Karen van den Berg/Ursula Pasero, Isabelle Graw, Goldin+Senneby, Noah Horowitz, Suhail Malik/Andrea Phillips, Alain Quemin and Olav Velthuis. Design by Metahaven.

This report explores a number of interrelated institutional developments in the last couple of decades, which have had a significant impact on the way art is marketed and perceived by its audiences. For instance, the rise of the art fair, the internet and the increased competition of auction houses on the contemporary market both reflect and further propel the globalization and commercialization of the art world; the latter much to the dismay of numerous artists and critics who claim that commerce has an uneasy relationship with art production and perception.

Copies of the report can be ordered from Sternberg Press.

23.2, 18:3

During recent decades, both the public and the private infrastructures of art have undergone changes that have affected how art is produced, presented and perceived. Internationally, studios connected to individual artists, which resemble companies with more than hundred employees, have become increasingly common. Artists are expected to be entrepreneurs within the “creative industries” as well as researchers within a growing “practice-based” area of research. Public art institutions are required to come up with their own revenues and high public attendance figures and art is more and more considered to be entertainment. In many places, for example, in municipalities, we see how public financial support has decreased, on the one hand, and on the other, become more controlled than only a decade ago.

Art has been commercialized: at present it is an object for investment and speculation, which is underlined by the fact that sales of art at auctions have increased eight times between 1998-2008. Despite strong opposition from many galleries, the distance between them and the auction houses has shrunk and art sales are multiplying in arenas like fairs and on the Internet, which—especially the Internet—have the potential of weakening traditional “gatekeeping” in both commercial and non-commercial spheres. In addition, art has become part of the kind of celebrity culture represented by fashion and the music industry. In this situation, what will happen with contemporary art? What kind of art and which artists will be privileged and which will be disregarded?

Six representatives from public and private actors in Sweden have been invited to hold a short presentation, ten minutes, describing their present guidelines and modes of working and what consequences have these guidelines and modes for artists and their conditions of production. What are their prospects? What are the risks involved? What will be the situation for art and artists in ten years time?

Invited participants (all presentations in Swedish):

Cilene Andréhn, Galleri Andréhn-Schiptjenko
Ann Larsson, Swedish Arts Grants Committee
Ingrid Lomfors, Kulturbryggan (Culture Bridge)
Michael Storåkers, Bukowskis (Auction House)
Ellen Wettmark, Swedish Arts Council
Måns Wrange, Royal University College of Fine Arts

Moderators: Kim Einarsson (Konsthall C) and Maria Lind (Tensta konsthall)

The debate is in cooperation with Konsthall C and is part of the exhibition Abstract Possible: The Stockholm Synergies at Tensta konsthall 12.1 – 22.4 2012.

29.1 and 26.2, 13:00
Cinema Zita, Birger Jarlsgatan 37, Stockholm

A film by Liam Gillick/Anton Vidokle whose starting point a manifesto written by Gao Shiming, the Executive Curator of the latest Shanghai Biennial. The manifesto is an attack on the art system and its limiting monoculture and artists Gillick and Vidokle have responded by inviting a handful of emerging artists, curators and critics to interpret and extrapolate from the text itself. The 22-minute long film hovers between cultural criticism and soap, borrowing its title from the longest running soap opera on American television. As part of the exhibition Abstract Possible: The Stockholm Synergies.

29.2-24.5 2012
What do notions of production, property, ownership and exchange mean to us right now? At a moment when the distribution between what is privately owned and publicly shared in society is being fundamentally scrutinized, questioned and protested in many parts of the world, such inquiry becomes urgent. Publishing in Process: Ownership in Question is a series of public seminars led by artists and writers attempting to address precisely this question. The program seeks to establish an ongoing context from February to May 2012 to investigate, discuss and recalibrate our working definition of such terms collectively.

At Tensta konsthall Florian Schneider (Brussels), Antonia Hirsch (Berlin), Marina Vishmidt (London), and others to be announced, will present and discuss projects and perspectives around the intersection of intellectual property, art, political economy and the public realm. The seminars are organized and moderated by artist Marysia Lewandowska (London) and curator Laurel Ptak (New York), and part of a larger, ongoing collaboration between the two that will culminate in a book publication in 2012.

The first pubic seminar at Tensta konsthall takes place on Wednseday 29 February at 18:30 with filmmaker, curator and writer Florian Schneider presenting his project Imaginary Property—asking what does it actually mean, today, to own an image?

On Thursday 22 March at 18:30 artist Antonia Hirsch will discuss her Surplus Library opening up questions of exchange, affect and economies of desire, observing that, like capital, ideas must circulate to be of, or, generate value.

On Wednesday 11 April at 18:30 theorist Marina Vishmidt shares from her ongoing research project Speculation as a Mode of Production (in Art and Capital), focusing on rent and debt as the property and governance regimes of the speculative mode of production.

All seminars in English. Future events will be announced at www.tenstakonsthall.se.

Support for Publishing In Process: Ownership In Question provided by Konstfack and IASPIS.

During school breaks
Tensta konsthall arranges art camps for children and teenagers, 10-19 years old. We offer participants a one week daytime “camp” under the guidance of a professional artist. The art camp may revolve around specific mediums, themes, or the artist’s own practice. On the final day the public is invited to see and experience the works made during the week.

Upcoming
Sports + Art
27.2-2.3 2012
With Victoria Brännström (BI, Konstfack)
For: Girls 11-14 years

For a week we will explore how to combine art with sports. Can we make a dance out of boxing, a song out of swimming or an image out of acrobatics? Sports can create team spirit and sisterhood and art can give us freedom to break the rules. It doesn’t matter if you are interested in sports or not, bring comfortable clothes and join us as we rethink sports in our very own way!

Past
The Noise Machine
With Ola Nilsson (Nyckelviksskolan)
Age: 10-12 years
Date:  2.1-5.1 2012

Let’s build noise. What sounds are we able to produce? Rumbles of thunder, cannons and whistles. A choppy sound, a flipping sound, and bowling sound. Together we will construct machines of noise using timber, cardboard, strings, metal and various materials. We will challenge the very idea of what constitutes sound and what constitutes noise. The final day of the art camp will be celebrated with a spectacular concert of noise! Assistant: Alladin Babeker.

19.1-12.4 A series of lectures at Tensta konsthall in collaboration with the Royal University College of Fine Arts. As part of the exhibition Abstract Possible: The Stockholm Synergies. (All lectures in English.)

19.1, 18:30
Doug Ashford

9.2, 18:30
Wade Guyton

15.3, 18:30
Mai-Thu Perret

24.3, 13:00
Walid Raad

12.4, 18:30
Sven Lütticken (critic and theorist)

October 2011-2013
Lars Bang Larsen, Magnus Bärtås, David Hullfish Bailey, Hito Steyerl

The point of departure for The New Model is Palle Nielsen’s legendary project from 1968, Modellen. En modell för ett kvalitativt samhälle (The Model. A model for a qualitative society). By transforming Moderna Museet into an adventure playground Nielsen wanted to give children a chance to ”be themselves” and express their own reality. The children would be able to play in an environment that was free and separate from the adult world in general and from the urban milieu in particular, and in an environment adapted to their own energetic activities. In contrast, nowadays, more or less every aspect of our lives is capitalized and culture is dominated by entertainment. Our lives in 2011 do not share much in common with the social and cultural upheavals of 1968. Today, not even play is an unspoiled, intact freedom; it is in part a function of the creative industries. How can we re-articulate and renew the questions Nielsen posed with his Model? How can we create a qualitative society out of a totally other reality? During the course of two years, The New Model, will be investigating the heritage of the Model in a number of projects involving seminars, workshops and exhibitions.

The first seminar featuring lectures by the participants, took place at Blå huset in Tensta on Saturday, 8.10 featuring presentations by critic Lars Bang Larsen and artists Magnus Bärtås, David Hullfish Bailey and Hito Steyerl.

The next seminar will take place on 11.3, 13:00-17:00, participants to be announced.

With support by European Cultural Foundation and Goethe Institute.

17.3 An afternoon taking Georges Perec’s book and film Un homme qui dort as a starting point. Lectures, film screenings, presentations and readings by Ida Börjel, Cecilia Grönberg, Jonas (J) Mangnusson and Jesper Olsson, organized by OEI as part of Abstract Possible: The Stockholm Synergies.

25.1-18.4
A series of lecture at Tensta konsthall in collaboration with ABF. How did abstraction within art emerge in the western world at the turn of the century? How has abstract art functioned and been received in other parts of the world, for example in Latin America? What has been the role of abstract art inside Muslim cultures? How do artists use abstraction today? (All lectures in Swedish.)

25.1, 18:30
Abstraction and the Classic Avant Garde, Maria Lind

21.2, 18:30
Signs. Abstraction in Traditional Muslim Art and Architecture, Jan Hjärpe

21.3, 18:30
Latin American Challenges, Maria Lind

18.4, 18:30
Formal and Economic Abstraction in Contemporary Art, Maria Lind

September 2011-May 2012

The seminar series, What Does an Art Institution Do? carried out in collaboration with the Konstfack (University College of Arts, Crafts and Design), began this fall and will continue into the spring. The purpose of this series of five seminars is to discuss how a well-considered selection of art institutions from different parts of the world operate and what function they have, locally as well as globally. Quite simply: it concerns what institutions do. It is about what kind of art they work with, how they are financed, what rules their decision-making and, not least of all, how they were established. At a time when art is under pressure to be easily understood and entertaining, it is important to draw attention to how art institutions can go their own way and offer other possibilities to both artists and the local community. In other words, how art institutions can play an active part in the public sphere? (All lectures in English.)

13.9, 18:30
Same Same: Chus Martinez on Documenta and Gavin Wade on Eastside Projects in Birmingham. Local referent: Bettina Pehrsson, Marabouparken. On working from and with a specific location.

17.11, 18:30
In the Beginning: Vasif Kortun on SALT in Istanbul and Anthony Huberman on The Artist’s Institute in New York. Local referent: Magdalena Malm, MAP. On starting a new institution.

2.2, 18:30
How Size Matters: Chris Dercon on Tate Modern in London and Gabi Ngcobo on Center for Historical Reenactments in Johannesburg. Local referent: Kim Einarsson, Konsthall C. On the potentials and problems of large and small-scale institutional work.

29.3, 18:30
All Over the Place: Sofía Hernández Chong Cuy on the Patricia Phelps de Cisneros Foundation and Kate Fowle on Independent Curators International. Local referent: Lena From, Stockholm Konst. On the mobile institution which works with various partners and sites.

 3.5, 18:30
Community Matters: Sofia Victorino on the Whitechapel Art Gallery in London and Abdellah Karroum on L’appartement 22 in Rabat. Local referent: Diana Baldon, Index – The Swedish Contemporary Art Foundation. On institutional work which relates directly to communities in the immediate vicinity of the institution.

March to May 2012

What is fashion and how does it come into existence? In this project fashion is placed in a wider context encompassing both artistic and political issues. The project starts in February and will continue to May 2012 with a group of 15 girls between the ages of 15 and 22. The group will meet every other week and participate in 2-hour workshops. There will be 10 meetings where Tensta Konsthall will invite a variety of lecturers—for example, artists, fashion experts, designers, political debaters. The project has both a practical and a theoretical point of departure based on ideas concerning physical objects, materials and clothes and involves collaboration between Emily Fahlén, mediator and Safiya Guleed, who is a guide at Tensta Konsthall. In collaboration with the Centre for Fashion Studies, Stockholm University.

14.4
Performance by and with artist Falke Pisano as part of Abstract Possible: The Stockholm Synergies.

Ongoing
The spatial concept for the new Tensta konsthall has been developed by architect Nikolaus Hirsch who was responsible for strategic changes such as painting the black ceiling white, installing strip lights and taking down a wall to the old office providing more presentational space. Architect Filippa Stålhane has developed the details, including the interiors of the office and the cafe.

Ongoing
Café T at Tensta konsthall serves home-baked bread and fresh seasonal organic dishes straight from eg Hästa farm at Järvfältet. Very good coffee and tea are also essential ingredients.

Café T is run by Blå Vägen (The Blue Way), a cooperative working throughout the county of Stockholm. The cooperative runs a large cleaning firm, sewing and handicraft outlets, cafés, provides gardeners and gardening services, dog daycare and second-hand shops for children’s clothes. In all these places people are given opportunities to practice language and work skills, and many eventually may be offered jobs.

Ongoing
In the spring of 2011 Konsthallsklubben (Gallery Club) was initiated by a group of 11 year-old girls from a nearby school. The club is aimed at children, 10-13 years old, who meet once a week to discuss and make art together with invited artists and staff. Club activities are based in the konsthall but can also take place at other locations in Tensta. The Gallery Club also makes excursions to other parts of Stockholm for projects and activities. The participants themselves discuss and decide these activities and projects, which range from visits to exhibitions, film projects to building volcanoes.

Ongoing

Together with the Amsterdam-based design studio Metahaven, and Jorge Munguia, from Mexico City’s Salon, Tensta konsthall has developed a new website and a communication strategy specific for the art space and its program. Curator Laurel Ptak.

From June 2011

Cluster is a network of eight internationally operating contemporary visual art organisations situated in residential areas on the peripheries of major European cities (plus one in Holon, an industrial zone outside of Tel Aviv). Each of these organisations are actively involved in their local contexts, fostering their embeddedness within their surroundings. Cluster was initiated in June 2011 in order to facilitate internal and public exchange of knowledge about how these types of institutions function and also to establish further collaborations between them.

During 2012-2013 the group will collectively visit each of the organisations in the network. Each visit will include a combination of closed meetings, site visits, and public events, through which we will share the ongoing dialogues that will be generated through the project. Cluster members include Casco — Office for Art, Design and Theory, Utrecht, The Netherlands; CAC Brétigny, Brétigny-sur-Orge, France; Les Laboratoires D’Aubervillers, Aubervilliers, France; Tensta konsthall, Stockholm, Sweden; The Showroom, London, UK; CA2M Centro Dos De Mayo, Madrid, Spain; The Israeli Center for Digital Art, Holon, Israel; and P.A.R.A.S.I.T.E. Museum of Contemporary Art, Ljubljana, Slovenia.

Meeting 1: The first Cluster meeting will be held in Utrecht on 22-23 February, in connection with Casco’s long-term project The Grand Domestic Revolution – User’s Manual, particularly in the framework of its final week programme. A public discussion with Cluster members Binna Choi, Maria Lind, Eyal Danon, Ferran Barrenblit and Emily Pethick will take place on the evening of 22 Febrary at 20:00.

With support by the European Cultural Foundation and The Swedish Arts Council.

10.5-30.9 2012
Triggered by the children’s program, Sesame Street, Basel and Stockholm-based artist Hinrich Sachs’ project, Kami, Khokha, Bert and Ernie (World Heritage) examines questions relating to children, popular culture and the licensing of artistic and intellectual material. What happens when material from one cultural and economic context is translated and re-coded into another? The American TV series was shown for the first time in 1969 on PBS and soon exported to other countries including Sweden, where in 1976 it was produced as Sesam, and from 1981, as Svenska Sesam (Swedish Sesam). At present, versions of Sesame Street are being produced, for example, in Arabic in Egypt and in Russian in Russia. The producers of the TV series wish to use the addictive qualities of television for a good cause and as preparation for starting school by combining pedagogical methods with elements from commercial TV. The program’s strong visual style, its humor and focus on music make it immediately enormously popular.

Kami, Khokha, Bert and Ernie (World Heritage) spotlights the new characters that international franchise partners, in accordance with license agreements, must add to their productions—for example, Kami in South Africa and Khoka in Egypt. These characters have never met on the TV screen, but Kami, Khokha, Bert and Ernie (World Heritage) brings them and their different backgrounds together at Tensta konsthall. Sachs will develop a “Stockholm character” in collaboration with students and teachers from Askeby School in Rinkeby. The children together with the other participants negotiate what these characters will do once they meet in Tensta. It could result in a play, a parade, a TV programme or an installation—or something entirely different which the participants decide collectively.

With support by the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia. In collaboration with Askebyskolan and Skapande skola.

May 2012
In cooperation with Stockholm konst and Dans och Cirkushögskolan (the University of Dance and Circus) Tensta Konsthall will host a performance of the Paris-based artist, Dominque Gonzalz-Foerster. The performance is based on Francois Truffaut’s film, Fahrenheit 451 and connects together Asplund’s library building, Odenplan and the underground, the water tower, library and museum at Tensta.

October-December 2012
This is the first comprehensive presentation of Marie-Louise Ekman’s multi-faceted artistic oeuvre since 1998. The exhibition, shown in cooperation with Henie Onstad Art Centre in Oslo, places Marie-Louise Ekman’s work in an international context.

Past—11.2, 12:00-17:00 at Tensta konsthall
Cuts can be booked from 11:00

Do you want a free haircut in exchange for your thoughts and opinions? The Cut transforms Tensta konsthall into a public discussion forum in the shape of a hair salon. London-based artists/activists and professional hairdressers Richard Houguez and Lewis Bassett from The Hair Cut Before The Party invite the public to share their personal living and working experiences in exchange for a free haircut.

In addition to drop-in hair cut sessions for the visiting public, during the day of the event a number of specially-scheduled cuts with invited speakers with experience and knowledge in different social organizations will take place. The conversations focus on questions around experience-based understanding, free knowledge and the possibilities of self-organized action. Through the specific interests of the speakers, the talks explore questions of immediacy and ways to sustain change, but also current and historical Swedish educational movements and their relation to political ambitions.

The Cut is a collective attempt towards an anti-hierarchical platform of knowledge exchange initiated by a group of artists, curators and activists: Emanuel Almborg, Karin Bähler Lavér (Prekariatet), Richard Houguez and Lewis Bassett (The Hair Cut Before The Party), Katrin Ingelstedt (The Institute of Continuation), Egle Kulbokaite, Zoë Poluch and Jens Strandberg.

Participating guests (all cuts performed in English except Per Sundgren):

12:30 To Understand the History of Swedish Public Education

Per Sundgren is currently a lecturer at the department of History of Ideas at Södertörn University. Sundgren has previously been involved in cultural politics and has served as head of the Swedish Educational Broadcasting Company (UR). In 2007, Sundgren published his dissertation Kulturen och arbetarrörelsen (Culture and the Working-Class Movement) that maps cultural and political ambitions of the Swedish working-class movement addressing a variety of perspectives—from socialist activist August Palm to leader of the Swedish Social Democratic Party Tage Erlander, from the first tentative steps of popular education at the end of the 19th century to the first cultural political programs fifty years later. Sundgren’s visit to The Cut is his first professional haircut in 47 years.

14:00 To Create a Nuanced Image of the Suburb

Saadia Hussain is artistic director of Förorten i Centrum, an organization which supports children and youth through creating platforms of dialogue and collaboration within and beyond the borders of the suburb. Using mural painting as their foregrounding method, Förorten i Centrum aims to create a sustainable platform that can later be run by the youth themselves.

15:00 To Understand Your Space and Act Out of Your Situation; A Simultaneous Haircut Between Karin Bähler Lavér and Laurel Ptak

Karin Bähler Lavér studies Aestethics at Södertörn University and is a founding member of Prekariatet. Prekariatet is a project that focuses on issues around the uncertainty of living and working conditions. Lately they have expanded the space for comprehension and politicization of the uncertain by organizing reading circles on the topic of materialist feminsim and post-Fordist work, by intervening in discussions at the think-tank Timbro, and by supporting local occupation movements. By using their website prekariatet.se as a hub to spread political, intellectual and artistic media production, Prekariatet attempts to establish more space for discussion about the precarious.

Laurel Ptak slept her last night in New York City at Zuccotti Park before relocating to Stockholm to work as curator at Tensta konsthall in the fall of 2011. Her current projects look at questions of intellectual property, art’s relationship to labor, and the possibilities and limits of online space as a deterritorialized form of public space.

The Cut is organized by The Institute of Continuation. The Institute of Continuation creates and continues conversations in the field of art together with Stockholm-based artists at the studio collective Platform Stockholm in Liljeholmen. Sometimes these conversations result in exhibitions, performances, workshops or events where international guests are invited to challenge our thoughts and ideas.

Previous salon interview with David Graeber and The Haircut Before the Party: http://vimeo.com/16869102

With support by Kulturbryggan.

PAST—28.1, 14:00
Tensta Träff, Hagstråket 13, Tensta

What will art look like in 2022 and how will artists operate? Contemporary Art and its Commercial Markets is a symposium on the occasion of a report with the same title, exploring a number of interrelated institutional developments in the last decades which have had a significant impact on the way art is marketed and perceived by its audiences. The rise of the art fair, the internet and the increased competition of auction houses on the contemporary market both reflect and further propel the globalization and commercialization of the art world; the latter much to the dismay of numerous artists and critics who claim that commerce has an uneasy relationship with art production and perception

Participants: Stefano Baia Curioni, economic historian and director of the arts, cultures, media and entertainment master of science program at Bocconi University Graduate School, Milan; Noah Horowitz, art historian and managing director of The Armory Show, New York; Andrea Phillips, reader in fine art and director of research programmes, art department, Goldsmiths, London; Mika Tajima, artist, New York; Olav Velthuis, associate professor at the department of sociology and anthropology, University of Amsterdam; Thea Westreich, art advisor, Thea Westreich Art Advisory Services, New York; Moderator Tone Hansen, director Henie Onstad Art Center, Oslo.

Contemporary Art and its Commercial Markets: A Report on Current Conditions and Future Scenarios is edited by Olav Velthuis and Maria Lind. Contributions by Stefano Baia-Curioni, Karen van den Berg/Ursula Pasero, Isabelle Graw, Goldin+Senneby, Noah Horowitz, Suhail Malik/Andrea Phillips, Alain Quemin and Olav Velthuis. Published by Sternberg Press and Tensta konsthall. Design by Metahaven.

As part of Abstract Possible: The Stockholm Synergies, Tensta konsthall 12.1-22.4 2012.

Stefano Baia Curioni is an economic historian, director of the Arts, Cultures, Media and Entertainment Master of Science program at Bocconi University Graduate School, and visiting professor of Arts markets and Heritage Management at IMT Lucca at the PhD Cultural Heritage Management. He has been engaged in the study of the relationships between arts and economies and between cultural policies and cultural institutions for more than ten years. His recent research activities include an assessment of the public Italian heritage Institutions (for the general direction of Italian Ministry of Culture); planning activities for museums and cultural institutions in Milan  (the Milan contemporary art museum) and the development of a research on the status creation processes in the contemporary world art markets. He is also a board member of Piccolo Teatro o Milan, Fondazione Ratti in Como, and scientific board member of Palazzo Tè in Mantova and Fondazione Civita in Rome.

Tone Hansen is newly appointed Director of the Henie Onstad Art Centre, Oslo. Previously, she worked as curator for the art centre for three years. Hansen is the editor of the reader(Re)Staging the Art Museum and responsible editor of  Thousand Eyes: Media technology, law and aesthetics. Recent exhibition projects include: In Translation with Saskia Holmkvist, World Rehearsal Court with Judy Radul, the reader and symposium A Thousand Eyes: Media technology, the law and the aesthetics, Creative Act, Hito Steyerl and To be Heard is to be Seen. Hansen held a research position at the Oslo National Academy of Art in Oslo from 2003-2008. Other projects include the 2007 exhibition and publication Megamonstermuseum; How to Imagine a Museum of Today? As well as the anthologies The New Administration of Aesthetics and What Does Public Mean? Art as a Participant in the Public Arena in 2007.

Noah Horowitz is Managing Director of The Armory Show. He received his PhD from The Courtauld Institute of Art, London, and formerly served as Director of the inaugural VIP Art Fair in 2011. He has written widely on contemporary art and economics for publications including The New York Times, The Observer and ARTINFO as well as for institutions such as the Serpentine Gallery, London, the Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo, and the United Kingdom’s Intellectual Property Office. Horowitz teaches on the faculty of the Sotheby’s Institute of Art, New York, and is author of Art of the Deal: Contemporary Art in a Global Financial Market, published by Princeton University Press.

Andrea Phillips is Reader in Fine Art and Director of Research Programmes, Art Department, Goldsmiths, London. Recent publications include: “Too Careful: Contemporary Art’s Public Making,” in Caring Culture: Art, Architecture and the Politics of Public Health (SKOR/Sternberg 2011); “Education Aesthetics,” in On Education (MIT/Whitechapel, 2011); “English Pastoral,” in LOG 23 ( Fall, 2011), “Making it up: aesthetic arrangements in the Barents region,” in Hotel Polar Capital (August, 2011); “The Politics of Practice-based PhDs,” in Investigacao em Arte e Design (Universidade de Lisboa, 2011); “List Aesthetics,” in Inventive Methods (Routledge and Taylor & Francis, 2011), “The wrong of contemporary art: aesthetics and political indeterminacy,” (with Suhail Malik) in Reading Rancière (Continuum, 2011).

Mika Tajima was born in 1975 in Los Angeles, California, and currently is a New York based artist. Connecting geometric abstraction to the shape of our built environment, Tajima’s work explores possible forms and activities defined by divisive spaces in which objects outline performer action and viewer positions. Abstraction operates at the edges of rationalism, décor, and representation, reframing the modernist project in a post-Fordist context – the world of immaterial circulation and information. Tajima received an MFA from Columbia University School of the Arts in 2003.Select solo exhibitions include Seattle Art Museum; Visual Arts Center at University of Texas; Bass Museum, Miami; X Initiative, New York; The Kitchen, New York; RISD Museum, Rhode Island; Circuit, Switzerland. Group exhibitions include 2008 Whitney Biennial; Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago; Contemporary Art Center Cincinnati, OH; PS 1 Contemporary Art Center, NY; Swiss Institute Contemporary Art, NY; among others.  Tajima is founding member of New Humans, a moniker for collaborative music, art, and actions. Collaborations include Charles Atlas, Vito Acconci, C. Spencer Yeh, Philippe Decrauzat, Slow and Steady Wins the Race, among others. Group and Solo performances include South London Gallery, UK; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, CA; ICA Philadelphia; Artissima, Italy; Ballroom Marfa; Swiss Institute, NY; Walker Art Center, MN; Whitney Museum, NY.

Olav Velthuis is Associate Professor at the Department of Sociology and Anthropology of the University of Amsterdam. He is the author of Imaginary Economics (NAi Publishers, 2005) and Talking Prices: Symbolic Meanings of Prices on the Market for Contemporary Art (Princeton University Press, 2005), which received the Viviana Zelizer Distinguished Book Award from the American Sociological Association for the best book in economic sociology (2006). Velthuis has worked as a staff reporter on globalization for the Dutch daily de Volkskrant, as a visiting post-doc researcher at Columbia University, and as Assistant Professor at the University of Konstanz. Currently, he is studying the emergence and development of art markets in the BRIC-countries (Brazil, Russia, India, and China). His journalistic writings on art markets have appeared in, among others, Artforum, The Art Newspaper and the Financial Times. Velthuis is board member of the Netherlands Foundation for Visual Arts, Design and Architecture (Fonds BKVB), which is the main government-sponsored foundation for visual artists in the Netherlands.

Thea Westreich. After numerous years working as a volunteer in the visual and performing arts, and following board associations with The Friends of Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the National Ballet, the American Ballet Theatre, and the Museum of African Art, Thea Westreich founded Thea Westreich Art Advisory Services—a private consultancy serving individuals build­ing fine art collections. Since 1982, she has advised private collectors throughout the United States and Europe. She has worked with clients to build collections focused variously on Impressionism, American, Modern, and Contemporary Art. She has curated collections in specific media, such as video and film, photography, and works on paper, in addition to the more traditional genres of painting and sculpture.

PAST—22.1, 14:00

A reading by Metahaven accompanied by images of their recent design work at Tensta konsthall.

Transparency used to be a high modernist ideal, perfectly suited to design objects and institutions. More recently, transparency has become a loose set of strategies and tactics to scrutinize and expose the existing order—the behavior and secrets of governments, corporations and other organizations. The techniques and methods deployed by the new transparency are: leaks, investigative journalism and database hacks. Together, they form a departure from the modern paradigm of the glass house.

This new “black transparency” is vigilant, eclectic, immediate and often humorous. From the revelations of WikiLeaks to the actions of Anonymous, it is more insurgent than institutional, and more civic than corporate. In Black Transparency, Metahaven investigates, questions, proclaims and illustrates design principles of this new unofficial movement, as well as surveys its significance for architecture and design.

The presentation at Tensta konsthall takes the form of a reading accompanied by images and is part of their forthcoming book project Black Transparency—comprised of not just a print publication, but also talks, blog posts, articles and events.

A studio for design and research, founded by Vinca Kruk and Daniel van der Velden. Metahaven‘s work—both commissioned and self-directed—reflects political and social issues in provocative graphic design objects. Metahaven released Uncorporate Identity, a book on politics and visual identity, published by Lars Müller in 2010. Solo exhibitions include Affiche Frontière (CAPC musée d’art contemporain de Bordeaux, 2008) and Stadtstaat (Künstlerhaus Stuttgart/Casco, 2009). Group exhibitions include Forms of Inquiry (AA London, 2007), Manifesta8 (Murcia, 2010), the Gwangju Design Biennale 2011 (Gwangju, Korea) and Graphic Design: Now In Production (Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2011).

Metahaven have created Tensta konsthall’s new communication strategy and website and are currently in Stockholm through January 2012 as residents at IASPIS. Their forthcoming book, Black Transparency, will be published later this year.

PAST—14.1, 16:00 Thirteen pop songs in honor of philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein make up the core of artists José León Cerrillo’s and Sara Lundén’s collaborative musical performance The Wittgenstein Suite in conjunction with the exhibition Abstract Possible: The Stockholm Synergies. Remarks on Colour—Wittgenstein’s fragmentary deliberation on the language surrounding color—is the starting point for this extension of Cerrillo’s three-dimensional work, first performed as part of his exhibition Hotel Eden in Mexico City in 2009. Here an evocative shadow play grew out of his screens and sculptures, accompanied by Lundén singing. The work was later staged at Los Angeles’ renowned Schindler house where the house itself—with its early Modernist simplicity—became the vehicle for the shadow projections.

For Abstract Possible: The Stockholm Synergies Cerrillo and Lundén have produced six new songs, thus closing the project with twelve songs in total, an entire album. Here music as abstract art form and writer Pierre Gyotat’s psychotic and visceral novel Eden Eden Eden continue to be important references. A small pamphlet with the original Wittgenstein text in German and Swedish will accompany the performance at Tensta konsthall.