Manifesta 10
Date uploaded: February 10, 2014
Around 50 leading contemporary artists, from Russia and around the world, will participate in Manifesta 10; which will include a host of commissions in the public realm. The roving European Biennial of Contemporary Art, will be hosted this year at the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russian Federation from the 28th June - 31st October 2014.
A number of artists will create new works specifically for Manifesta 10. The Biennial will be a landmark opportunity to experience and learn more about the geopolitical history of the site and venues, along with various positions within contemporary art, in the company of the works of historical excellence held in the Hermitage's collection. Education and Mediation will also play an important role in this Biennial, as it will investigate the notion and the role of contemporary culture in a changing, contested society.
The Public Program, headed up by Joanna Warsza, will reach out to a broad public by offering events and encounters with art outside of the main Manifesta 10 venues.
Joanna’s curatorial practice is largely based in the public realm, operating within political, social, staged, and performative situations and related issues. Most recently, she was co-curator of the Göteborg Biennial in Sweden. In 2006 she founded the Laura Palmer Foundation, which she ran until 2011. Other recent projects include the Georgian Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennale and the 7th Berlin Biennale. Joanna has long been interested in the former countries of the USSR, having pursued research on contemporary art in Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Moldova, Ukraine, Belorussia, and the Baltic countries. Her program will refer to the role of the private and the public, both during the USSR era, as well as in the current post-Soviet condition.
Joanna says of the program she has devised: “during the Soviet Union, ‘public’ could be understood as a critical exchange of free thoughts, often happening at home universities, secret political gatherings, and apartment exhibitions, where unofficial and nonconformist art was hosted. The Program will stage a dialogue between the informal and the official, investigating the history, dichotomies and local idiosyncrasies that have informed the private and the public—from early avant-gardes to the current post-Soviet, gentrified and privatized public realm. Special attention will be given to local initiatives in St. Petersburg along with artists of the former Soviet and Eastern bloc.”
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