week 8

Here’s my artist research presentation for the group project:

This week we researched artists based on words we were given in the last workshop. My keyword was Architecture, and I chose it because the moment I saw it I had an art project in mind that fits into this. Obviously, I didn’t remember the name nor the artist because my ability to memorise names is as bad as it could be. But here comes the internet! I remember that the project was about melting figures placed on the stairs, so I typed “melting men” in the search bar and guess what? That’s the exact name of the project that I thought about!

I researched the artist and prepared what I will talk about during the presentation. To those who haven’t been present, I’ll put my “speech” here! 🙂

Nele Azevedo is a Brazilian artist, who specialize in sculpture, and visual art. She’s also an independent researcher. Her works focus on the problem of global warming and raising awareness beyond the contemporary art realm. Her project that I’ll tell you about travelled all around the world including Paris, Braunschweig and Berlin, Porto, Florence, Amsterdam, Belfast, Santiago de Chile, Lima and also Birmingham.

The project is called Melting Men also known as Monumentum Minimo. In 2009 she craved 1,000 human figures out of ice and placed them on a stairway in a Square of Berlin. Her intention was to bring awareness to Global Warming. The installation was supposed to visually remind people of the melting ice caps in Greenland and Antarctica. It took from 30 minutes to hours for the ice figures to melt. The project was created with help of passers-by.

Here is the short video presenting the Birmingham project created to commemorate the victims of the First World War. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqzRdWbg0AE

How does it connect with the architecture? I think it’s obvious. Even if architecture in not a main theme in this project it clearly is a very important element of it. The public space – the stairs were used to make a base for the melting men. An architectural creation that is a daily use object became an exhibition place. Such an ordinary part of a building was used in a unique way.

It also connects with Mike’s project. The melting symbolizes evanescence. The main theme is the time that flows by, is the same as it will be in the village that we’ll create. It tells the story of human existence, which has the same ending for everyone. Our time in the village will be the melting process for the figures. The melting is a life that we live daily, every second every minute or every hour.

For my project, I finished the daily updating yay!!! Finally! Now I’m thinking about the presentation. Maybe using the VR that I talked about with Chris is a good idea? Making the project interactive would be fun. It’s also a good idea, because for my proposal form I can find other artists that make their work interactive and create the whole exhibition as a place for students to visit on a school trip? What if the artists that will also take part in my hypothetical exhibition create their work based on books? The exhibition would aim to encourage young people to read more. The statistics show that only 51, 8% of 8 to 18-year-olds enjoy reading – it’s still an increase compared to 2020 (47,8%).

I also googled artists that could fit in my idea for the exhibition. I haven’t researched them yet, I put them here only because I think they seem interesting, but it might come out that they don’t fit in my idea at all. I leave it here to remember that I can come back and I’ll already have a list list of potential artists.

Ettore Spalletti

https://ocula.com/art-galleries/marian-goodman-gallery/exhibitions/works-on-paper-editions-and-books/

Whitney Bedford

Book (Rothko), 2013

https://ocula.com/art-galleries/starkwhite/artworks/whitney-bedford/book-(rothko)/

Joseph Beuys

Iphigenie / Titus Andronicus, from portfolio: Forty Are Better Than One, 1969/2009

https://www.artsy.net/artwork/joseph-beuys-iphigenie-slash-titus-andronicus-from-portfolio-forty-are-better-than-one

Vertical Submarine

Chopper Book 10+1 Edition, 2015

https://www.artsy.net/artwork/vertical-submarine-chopper-book-10-plus-1-edition

Saba Qizilbash

A Brief Visual History of the Battle of Ichhogil Bund – Volume One, A Brief Visual History of the Battle of Ichhogil Bund – Volume Two, A Brief Visual History of Indo-Pak Maritime Trespassing – Volume Two & A Brief Visual History of Indo-Pak Maritime Trespassing – Volume One, 2020

https://www.artsy.net/artwork/saba-qizilbash-a-brief-visual-history-of-the-battle-of-ichhogil-bund-volume-one-a-brief-visual-history-of-the-battle-of-ichhogil-bund-volume-two-a-brief-visual-history-of-indo-pak-maritime-trespassing-volume-two-and-a-brief-visual-history-of-indo-pak-maritime-trespassing-volume-one