Workshops and Artists' Public Presentations

May 4-17, 2009, Yerevan, Armenia

Curator: Susanna Gyulamiryan

Coordinator: Raffie Davtian

Concept

The project “Gender Trouble. Platforms” articulates independent attitudes, positions in Art for expression through artistic language the important problems concerning gender, not only in deconstruction of the binary opposition in modeling feminine and masculine, but within problems of queer identities, post-colonial problem, problem of subjectivity, the relationships of the “history of sex” with the institutionalized collectivity. The project also problematizes the idea of self-identification and possibility of individual emotional mechanism of the Self when the latter is compelled to continuously deal with the system of limits, oppressions, discoursed gender politics, sexual exclusions and all other cultural and social taboos arising from them. Artists from different countries will represent their platforms on gender problems via personal and group art projects, film productions, exhibitions, video art, documentaries, performances, etc., which they have been involved in as artists, activists, initiators, and curators.Artists will use various media: slides, video/ photo - documentations, filming, inter-active work and researching techniques (statistics, questionnaires, video interviews, etc.).

The project was implemented in three stages:

May 4-8: Workshops

May 8-12: Artists' Public Presentations

May 13-17: Introduction with local artists

Workshops

During the workshops held on May 4-8  artists  realized their researches, interviews, filming, photography, etc. They got acquainted with work, programs and projects of art institutions, centers, foundations, non-governmental organizations working on gender issues in Armenia: Women resource center; National Armenian Association of Art Critics; Yerevan Open University/Department of Fine Arts; Cultural and Media Center of the “Mkhitar Sebastaci” Educational Center, Center of Contemporary and Experimental Art.

Artists' public presentations

Public presentations of the artists took place on May 8 - 12 at “The Club” café-art gallery, Tumanyan str.40(downtown), Yerevan.

Artists:

Ingrid Ung

Ingrid Ung (Finland) is an artist, she works and lives in Helsinki, Finland.

"My works are a journey of exploration into the state of transsexualism. Instead of a simplistic male/female dualism, I try to identify a third approach to the construction of identity, gender and sexual orientation. The important thing in art would be to process one’s own state and situation critically, in this case my transsexuality, and to establish points of contact with the basic humanity without the ballast of sexuality, background or social status. Therefore im not merely examining my own status, but I am also looking on a broader front at how our identities and bodies are being continuously created by our awareness and our gaze.

In my works there is a tension between beauty and hardness, between the sensual and the everyday. The idea is to use ambivalence and opposites to mobilize the associative function of the mind and to visualize a world with multiple voices, where things could be more alive than we are able to imagine or observe in our conscious mind".

Trans Am, 2006, video documentary, 13 mins

Synopsis: A biographic video work depicting on an intimate level a transsexual gender change from male to female through issues like work, love, dreams and hopes, and how to find your own way and place in life. Work articulates the whole picture of the process, both comical and tragic. Trans Am is a biographic research into the constructions of gender, sexual orientation and identity. In the video the artist also stages/reflects stereotyped visual identification codes, which still are based on the determination of gender and sexual orientation with humor and self irony.

Cast: Ingrid Ung (director/author), Tomas Kulistak (editing), Pertti Venetjoki (sound)

Negar Tahsili Fahadan

Negar Tahsili Fahadan (Iran) is an artist, she lives and works in Tehran, Islamic Repblic of Iran.

Being a woman and trying to be or to show like a powerful person is an issue in my country Islamic Republic of Iran .On the other hand after the Islamic revolution, women wanted to show their power more. They became more outgoing and tried their best, fighting for their own freedom and they wanted to have as much liberty as men had at that time. Despite “Western countries” where women struggled for economical reasons first to get the same salary as men, In Iran women tried to become equal to men. 65 % of students in universities nowadays are women and when they graduate they need a good job and benefits. So as long as they are well educated they want to work out of the houses and they want the same power and level that men have.

These days, making women’s only taxies or a park specially made for women is an idea in order to control crime and practicing Islamic rules .That seems reasonable first but when you think deeply you will see that they deleted the question instead of answering it. Because new rules made people think about how they can bypass these rules and some people invented some funny ways that is shown also in my documentary named "WEE - MEN OR WOMEN?!" or in Persian named "NESFAN YA NESVAN?!" (26:00 min.) "Wee" basically is a Scottish preposition which means small, little...It is about women in Iran and the fact that they are separated from men in the society. Basically it is about the rules of separation in Iran and how people deal with it...

Julie Upmeyer

Julie Umpeyer (USA) is an aartist and initiator based in Istanbul working with everyday materials and space: paper, plastic, food, the internet, her home, the street. Born in 1980 in Detroit, USA, her work as an artist has been highly influenced by this repurposing of everyday materials, with an emphasis on interaction and process-based practice.

Curiosity leads her to a three-year nomadic life - working in India, Germany, Austria, The Netherlands and Greece. After settling in Istanbul, she initiated Caravansarai, an independent project space and meeting point in Istanbul, an open exploration of the interactive and collaborative possibilities of food, space and the internet.

Sold in Istanbul, Slideshow, narration and tasting

A multi-sensory tour of consumer products in Istanbul - Turkish brands imitating foreign products, multinational corporations creating Turkish flavours, household products of all sorts - toothpaste, chips, bleach, ice cream and tomato sauce.

urbanism, fetishism, idealism

brand identity, personal identity, national identity, domesticity, hospitality, creativity

Iz Oztat

Iz Oztat (Turkey) is an artist and co-founder of “Cura Bodrum” artist residency in Turkey, an artist-led initiative to support transnational artistic, intellectual dialogue and production. Iz Oztat lives and works in Istanbul, Turkey and London, UK.

A Matter of Height and Depth

The presentation suggests a three dimensional understanding of space and phenomenon that reflects on the locatedness of our individual gaze. The artist will initiate a performative discourse with the audience and touch upon ideas of memory, Diaspora, militarism and freedom of speech, reflecting on how gender figures into the articulation of these ideas.

Iz Oztat showed a 3 minute video as an integral part of the presentation.

Armine Hovhannisyan

Armine Hovhannisyan (Armenia) is an artist, lives and works in Yerevan, Armenia.  Armine Hovhannisyan has graduated from

Armenian Open University, Department of Fine Arts in 2004. She has mostly been involved in the collaborative artistic projects and has taken part in the local and international exhibitions.In the current project one of the presented works by her refers to the representation of the woman, to the problem of her absence/presence in the urban (public) space. Another work is about the traditional ritual phenomenon still existing in nowadays society, how the division of the gender-roles and submission-models of the woman is formulated in between these phenomenon, and how an artist reverses (subversion) these norms by the ironic gesture. The next reflection is about the stereotyped “masculine power”.

The Red apple is for eating, 2005, Interactive installation

The Red apple is for eating” interactive installation is a reflection to an Armenian trad ition, to the meaning and function of the red apple in the society and its use in the marriage ceremony. The installation is based to resist the fatalistic symbol of the red apple. By the gesture of transformation the artist points out the red apple’s natural importance not the symbolic use involving the active participation of the audience.

I am here… in the city, 2008, Photo-video editing, 3 mins

The woman’s body dressed by images of the City, the symbols of Armenian nowadays re-urbanization, confirms her wish to appear and “conquer” different urban vertical spaces - buildings, as the organization and control of the Public/ the City, do not belong to the woman. The woman “subdues” the geography and “aesthetics” of the City created by rough and canonic masculine rules.

A jump, 2009, Photo series

The photo series is the demonstration of the masculine power and “abilities” paralleled with the animal word. The basis of the work is the ironic presentation of the instincts, competition and being attractive due to masculine rules.

Verena Kyselka

Verena Kyselka (Germany) is an artist, curator of several cross-culture projects, active member of the feminist performance group Exterra XX (temporary artist group from 1986 to 1994) and co-founder of the Kunsthaus Erfurt (Women Artist House in Erfurt). Verena lives and works in Berlin, Germany.

Territory of intimacy // Confusion of Identity

Screening, improvisation and talk.The presentation was a discourse about controversial point of gender from the contemporary history to artistic cross-culture strategies. How are these experiences of the contemporary history reflected nowadays? Verena Kyselka will be showing:

Exterra XX, 11 mins

5-channel video (11 minutes) about performance and body action with the performance group. Sequences from former VHS-recordings were and produced to a new virtual performance.

Drinking and Drowning, 4 mins

Video performance about different perception between drinking and drowning, life and death is following a novel about a female artist and her suicide…

Forbidden Kisses, 6 mins

Video documentation about the results of an investigation in the Albanian Film archives and the i ncredible reaction to the exhibition in Tirana.

El Orgullo, 4 mins

Video about macho behaviour in Mexico and comparative intercultural aspects.

Raffie Davtian

Raffie Davtian (Iran) is an artist and co-founder of the “Art and Cultural Studies Laboratory”, which operates in Aremenia. He was born in Isfahan, Islamic Republic of Iran. He lives in Yerevan, Armenia and Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran.

Raffie Davtian’s most important artistic projects of the past 2-3 years concern the problems of the subjects, which are in the position of possession and objects – subalterns in the history of identities.The new dimension in understanding of these topics had arrived from that moment, when the post-Soviet present had a possibility of penetration into debates on the following topics: post-colonial, totalitarian regimes, ethnic minorities, sexism, gender issues, feminism, other types of subjectivity, expanding  the thematic of identity with the following enrichment of subject – object (authority - dependent) relations as inside the local contexts, as well as in its inclusion in the discourse of the global processes.

We Can Dooo It, 2008, Short film, 7:47

“We Can Dooo It” short film shows the woman’s desire to be equally introduced in the sphere of masculine.In the film, the attempt of the women to fully identify with men proved to be an unsuccessful attempt. The reasons are different: first of all, the desire of the heroine in the film is revealed as the result of her imagination’s flight, and one of the connotations raised before spectators is inefficiency of the desire. It seems the artist supports to the theory of “difference”.

Human Doors, 2007, Video documentary, 10:55

The basic issue, addressed in this project reflects on the issues and objectives, which are important for contemporary cultural and social context.

It succeeds one of the extremely characteristic features for the modern reality, that is: the interrelation between the se xes in general, and the certain panic or anxiety of gender identity, which is typical for the today’s world and for Armenia, arrived under the global influences, in particular.

Today, the shattering of the fundamentals of patriarchal family leads to numerous uncertainties, which are accompanying that process with the loss of gender certainness, anxiety of interrelations between the sexes.

These all things are urgent issues of the present day…

Arevik Arevshtyan

Arevik Arevshtyan (Armenia) is an artist, curator of a number of exhibitions, lives and works in Yerevan, Armenia.

"Within the framework of this project I am going to speak about my activity from 1994 since now.Based on my personal creative experience I will reflect on new manifestations emerged in Armenian arts in 90-ies as a part of new economic and social situation in the country. I am going to  reflect  also on the “self-governed” activity of the artists typical for that period (let us call it “a period of short term freedom”), as an example of modernization of institutional systems in the arts.

I will present also the following topics : Androgenious perspective, as a method of creative and exhibition-related activity based on Armenian modernistic tradition.The speculation of gender issue in arts, as one of preconditions of establishment of institutions".

“MONO POLIS”

Group exhibition of woman artists, 1997, Armenian Center of Contemporary and Experimental ART (ACCEA), Yerevan, Armenia. Curator : Arevik Arevshatyan

“Two artists, One creation”

Art projects of the Rouben Grigoryan and Arevik Arevshatyan artistic group.

Narine Zolyan

Narine Zolyan (Armenia) is an artist, independent curator and cofounder of  the “Art Laboratory” which operates in Armenia. She lives and works in Armenia, Yerevan.

"Me as an artist the problems connected with gender seems especially actual and interesting. I think that from the one side art process is androgynous, and on the other side can’t help separating in own art process just the fact of m y observing as a woman, which differs a lot from men’s points of view to the world.

The presentation of some my art works which are connected with this theme is good opportunity to make some psychological researches with the help of analyzing and exploring process of my own works, bringing out essence which I used in intuitive way very often without any plan to work with gender problems before.

In process of selecting of art works for this presentation I noticed individual, personal and social motives in them, my points of view connected with my own opinions as a woman.

The duration of selecting became especially psychogenic action analyze, research, which helped to activate objectively self appreciable for further self realization in personal and social spheres".

Illusions or shock treatment, voluptuousness /the series of black and white photos/, 1999

Have you joint the terrorist? /the series of black and white photos/, 2002

Chelo –Vek (Чело-Век) /the series of black and white photos/, 2003

The language of silence /color print/, 2005

The dance or Panta Rea, video, 1:00, 2006

Sponsored by:

Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Armenia

The Civilitas Foundation

IFA Gefordert durch das Institut furAuslandsbeziehungen aus Mitteln der

Kulturabteilung des Auswartigen Amtes