2nd Ghetto Biennale 2011

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ARCHIVED WORK OF PARTICIPATING ARTISTS & SCHOLARS

Cat Barich

The Artist as Curator

Definition of a curator, according to Wikipedia; “In contemporary art, the curator is the person who organizes an exhibition. Thus, to curate means to arrange a collection to achieve a desired effect – usually, this entails the attempt to find a theme, however tenuous, linking a disparate body of work.”

The artist as curator project deals with issues of power, representation, role-play and self-legitimation. It seeks to blur the hierarchies inherent to the art world, giving the artist centre stage to redraw existing parameters. The artist as curator seeks to demystify and re-contextualize the curator's authority to legitimize, by seizing this role and making it accessible to artists. The culture of DIY in art has shown that artist-led-initiatives can explore new ground: The artist as curator pursues this emancipatory endeavor.

One of the main components of this piece is a variable set of colourful t-shirts, which carry descriptions such as artist, curator, participant, joker, user, designer, decorator and audience. These were further customized by Jerry Reginald Chery aka Twoket, a local haitian artist, who added "Bienvenue Ghetto Biennale." The t-shirts were casually worn and swapped around on several official occasions during the second Ghetto Biennale and either stayed with the local community or got sold as souvenirs, with the proceedings going to Twoket.

The artist as curator is an ongoing collaborative project originally initiated by Cat Barich, Daniela Klein and Noémi McComber in Berlin in 2003. It has been further developed since in London, Montreal and Port-au- Prince, with the participation of several other artists and curators.

The Artist as Healer

For the duration of the second Ghetto Biennale I have been offering my services as a certified Tellington Touch Practitioner to give healing touches and massages to the people of the local area as well as the participants of the Ghetto Biennale. These interactions happened either in public, private or semi-private spaces, depending on the preferences of the recipients.

A successful healing interaction can only be an honest and mindful collaboration between a transmitter and a receiver. The probably most notable one took place with Yvens Simeon, one member of the Atis Rezistans. A stroke left him speech impaired and partly paralyzed. Over several sessions we managed to bring awareness back into the right side of his body and finally he was able to relax the muscle tension and to move his arm again.

The central idea behind these interactions is continuing Joseph Beuys's ideas of the artist as a social sculptor, who creates structures in society using tools such as language, thought, action, and object. For the next Ghetto Biennale I attempt to teach a series of workshops, in which people get the chance to explore simple yet effective methods of self-healing and care.

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Enquiries & questions contact: Leah Gordon at:

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ARTISTS & SCHOLARS

A*BOUT A BOOK: Silke Bauer, Irina Novarese & Viola Thiele

Allison Rowe

Anderson Family: Peter Anderson, Clare Cameron, Esme Anderson & Mary Anderson

Anna Bruisma

Candice Lin, Phillip Mayles & Racine Polycarpe

Cary Cronenwett

Cat Barich

Charlotte Hammond