atelier wonderful 2006

Presentation by Chinese artist Wu Wenguang

Wednesday February 28th at 7pm

°°°

Wu Wenguang was born in Yunnan, China in 1956. He is the most influential figure of the Chinese “New Documentary Movement” that sprung in Beijing in the early 1990s. He spontaneously recreated the aesthetics of cinema vérité through his intimate mode of filming and the extended duration of his pieces. Wu Wenguang left for the countryside after graduating from high school in 1974, and worked as an elementary school teacher for three years. He graduated from the Department of Literature at Yunnan University in 1982 and later joined Kunming Television and China Center TV as a news journalist. Since 1989 Wu has been making independent documentary films and working as a freelance writer.

Wu Wenguang's films include BUMMING IN BEIJING: THE LAST DREAMERS(1990), an account of the wanderings of five young artists who came to Beijing from the provinces in order to pursue their own artistic dreams. The film has been widely praised and screened at numerous international film festivals including: Hong Kong International Film Festival, Fukuoka Asia Film Festival (Japan), Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival (Japan), Montreal, Hawaii, London, Singapore, Paris, Berlin, Sydney, and the New China/New Vision Film Festival at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Additional films include: 1996, MY TIME IN THE RED GUARDS (1993); AT HOME IN THE WORLD (1995); JIANG HU: LIFE ON THE ROAD (1999) and DIARY: SNOW, 21 NOV, 1998 (1999).
Wu Wenguang's work in the theater began in 1994 as an actor in FILE O,and has continued with all of Living Dance Studio's works. Other collaborations include a short film for WORK HORSE with TheatreWorks of Singapore, and projects with Ming Low.

As a journalist, Wu Wenguang's publications include THE SCENE OF THE REVOLUTION (1994, published in Taiwan); BUMMING IN BEIJING (1995,published in Taiwan); REPORT ON JIANG HU (1999, published in Lotus Magazine, China); DOCUMENT (as chief-editor, published in Tianjin, China, 2000)

PHOTOJOURNALISM AND SOCIAL PHOTOGRAPHY
Nicolas Lainez

Saturday, June 10th at 5pm

°°°

°°°

5pm : Presentation and slide show

“Documentary photography is an information and documentation tool that has been clearly affected by contemporary shifts in technology. Its testimony and communication fluctuate often between art and journalism. Some people say that photojournalism is having a crisis, other say that it must fight to rediscover a new identity.” (NL)
In his presentation, Nicolas Lainez’ aims to offer us some keys to better understand this medium of expression. The introduction of historical reference marks of photojournalism will provide the attendees with a basis of a definition of press photography and its required criteria, from both a formal and a content oriented point of view.

The projection of “The other side of the dream” is a slide show of photographs shot in Cambodia by Nicolas that will give us an example of work usually classified as “social photography” or “author photography”. In this particular form of documentary the photographer must engage in a long immersion process into the heart of the matter of his subject, while resisting against endangering the project with misinformation caused by his subjectivity.

7.30pm : Projection of the documentary film “War photographer,” about war photographer Jim Natchwey.

Nicolas Lainez was born in 1975 in Barcelona. After graduating from Film School, he completed his photography studies with internships at Magnum Photo, Agence France Presse, Rapho and Vu a Paris.
As a photographer, he has produced “The other side of the dream”, social photography project dealing with immigrants, human trafficking, and prostitution in Asia. This was done in collaboration with numerous NGOs.
His work has been presented and exhibited in Europe and Asia. He has published a book with the NGO “Pharmaciens sans frontiers”. His pictures are distributed by On Asia Photos agency.

°°°

°°°

Julie Tseselsky and Justin Barrera

Saturday, April 8th 2006, from 10am to 6pm

°°°

°°°

Migrant Media Arts presents a screening and discussion on the historical and contemporary roles of cultural documentation in our society. Thanks to the Internet and advances in digital technologies, the significance of documenting cultural, personal and political events has shifted from historical conservation to media empowerment. Average people are able to lend the world their own perspective on information previously dispensed by corporate media organizations..

Video work by Julie Tseselsky will serve as examples of current types of cultural documentation for different purposes. These will include Weapons of Mass Attraction, a video about the most documented event in history, and a rough-cut of The River Goddess, a documentary work in progress about Vietnamese traditions faced with a modernizing Vietnam. Justin Barrera will give a brief lecture and host a discussion on the topic, with simultaneous translation to Vietnamese by Aaron Robert Toronto.

Screening at 3:00 pm: The half-hour documentary Weapons of Mass Attraction was filmed in New York city in the months leading up to and during the Republican National Convention of 2004. It documents a movement of creative resistance, outraged Americans combining art and protest in response to the Bush Administration. The documentary also gives evidence of the civil rights abuses that took place in NY during the convention itself, when over 3000 people were arrested during the course of a week and held in toxic facilities for 48 hours without due process. The documentary was a collaborative process among independent videographers who risked arrest to capture these events, which were perhaps the most documented events in history...

migrantmediaarts.com

°°°

°°°

SESSION 2 : FROM GRAFFITI TO WALL PAINTING
Duy Thông, Thành Lân, Thao Nguyen, GF, G2, B
Julie Tseselsky
Nguyen Nghiem Dang Tuan, George Papadimas

Saturday, March 18th, from 10am to 6pm

°°°

°°°

Studio :
For this second session centered around graffiti, Atelier Wonderful has offered up its walls for the use of some local graffiti artists : they are BOO¶ group (Duy Thông, Thành Lân, Thao Nguyen, students from the Fine Art University of Ho Chi Minh city) and GF, G2 and B crews. All have been invited to re-think graffiti, adapted to a new context ; this reflexion means research of materials and supports dedicated to the presentation of a traditionally outdoor work in an interior place. Beginning from codes belonging to the practice of graffiti and after two weeks of conception and realization of their projects, BOO¶ , GF, G2 and B are presenting works on different supports (wall, canvas, video) created with a number of techniques.

°°°

°°°

°°°

Library corner :
Urban Expression, New York 2003-2004 (Movie) - Shot and Edited by Julie Tseselsky

At 2pm :
A talk on the topic of graffiti will be lead by Nguyen Nghiem Dang Tuan, vietnamese artist who took part to the graffiti movement in Los Angeles (US) during early 90's and by George Papadimas, Australian artist who belonged to the first wave of graffiti artists during the middle 80's in Melbourne (Australia). The talk will be followed by a projection of the movie Style wars.
(translation : Tuân)

°°°

GRAFFITI AND POST GRAFFITI
Session 1
Bertrand Peret

Saturday, March 11th, from 10am to 6pm

°°°

°°°

February 1997, the 16th maybe, I don’t remember exactly, it was the night when Clyde died. Shot by a train while she was painting. Alone. Shot by a train. Clyde was a writer. Clyde was a painter. Shot by a train. The news paper said she committed suicide, but Cook did not believe it. Never. Cook was her boyfriend. They met because of painting. At this time Cook was writing Discret ( sober ) in the streets of Bordeaux. Clyde was fascinated by his talent, and she fell in love with him. Cook and Clyde started painting together all around the city. But that night she was painting alone. And she died. Shot by a train. Then Cook changed his name into Veuf ( widow ).

A couple of years before, I was a student at the fine art school of Bordeaux, painting a lot, very inspired by the work of Jean-Michel Basquiat. One day on one of the walls of my studio someone had written “ Basquiat is incomparable”. At the same time I was recovering the walls of the city with the image of Pacman. By this way I met Cook and Clyde then I discovered it was Clyde who had written this about Basquiat. Incomparable. It’s true. And she knew it.

Before being one of the most famous artists of the XXth century, Basquiat was first well known in New York as Samo. Samo was a graffiti artist, Samo was a painter, Samo was a poet writing in subways and streets at the end of the seventies, the early eighties. Because of his relevant work people from the world of art quickly located him. Samo left the place to Jean-Michel, and Basquiat started showing his art in galleries and museums. Basquiat died in 1988, he was 27, rich and famous.
His dazzling ascent and his very early death made him become a model, a legend for many artists and graffiti artists in particular.
He contributed to let people consider street culture to be part of art history. And Clyde knew it.

Bertrand Peret

°°°

°°°

°°°