PRESS-RELEASE

Electric Visions. Part I. Waiting for a New Myth.

Opening: January, 22nd at 5 p.m.

“Electric Visions” is a project presenting contemporary video art from Russia and countries of Northern Europe. The project contains the best video works of the past several years, made by Russian, Finish, Danish, Icelandic, Norwegian and Swedish artists. “Electric visions” is the result of collaboration of three institutions: The Nordic Council of Ministers, the Distribution Center of Finish media art AV-ARRKI and the State Center of Contemporary art (St-Petersburg).

At East Area, one part of the project - the Russian part- is being shown. The programme Waiting for a New Myth consists of 25 video works by young and already well-known Russian artists. The broad geography of the project (from capitals to country-sides) includes videos from St-Petersburg, Moscow, Kaliningrad, Novosibirsk, Yekaterinburg, and Barnaul. Among artists are participants of major international exhibitions: the works by the Blue Noses (Alexander Shaburov and Vyacheslav Mizin), Oleg Kulik, Ludmila Gorlova, Viktor Alimpiev were shown at the Venice Biennale; the video Quartett by Escape won the first prize at the Art-Moscow Studios. The program also contains video works by artist of a new generation. The works were selected and brought together by curators Marina Koldobskaya and Maria Korosteleva (State Center for Contemporary art, St-Petersburg).

The curators of the project perceive video art as a broad field of practice, which includes digital animation, documentaries and staged videos as well as footage showing happenings and performances.

The history of video art in Russia is not very long: artists started to work with cameras there as late as at the turn of the 90’s. However, in the last 15 years Russian video art has developed considerably. The programme Waiting for a New Myth reflects its main tendencies and shows attempts of Russian artists to create their own myths in the existing ideological chaos.

After the projects premiere in St-Petersburg, “Electric Visions” was shown in 14 cities of Russia and in a number of European museums and centers of contemporary art: in Bergen (Norway), Bilbao (Spain), Riga (Latvia) and Vilnus (Lithuania).

“Electric Visions” at East Area: January, 22rd - February, 20th 2005,
Thursday – Sunday, 1-7 p.m.

Address: Jodenbreestraat 24 1011 NK Amsterdam
Telephone: 020-6245747
E-mail: info@eastarea.nl
For more info please see our website: www.eastarea.nl