ANTHROPOLOGY

Lidia's research focuses on contemporary art and visual culture. Within the field she has the following areas of concentration: (1) art institutions: international art biennials with an extensive study of the Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art; and the Humboldt Lab Dahlem, an initiative established to rethink exhibition models and public engagement for the Humboldt Forum in Berlin, Germany. (2) Complexities and outcomes of encounters between contemporary art and anthropology. (3) Use of media in contemporary art exhibitions and in historical collections museums.

As an independent project (dmovies.net), in 2007 Lidia began a research of contemporary art practices at international art biennials and has interviewed over 150 artists, curators and visual culture theorists. While her focus was initially on art production and curation, it organically expanded to include art institutions. This led into her studies of Visual Anthropology at Freie Iniversity Berlin with a focus on contemporary art biennials. She spent a year researching the 7th Berlin Biennale during 2011-2012. Lidia followed the process of conceptualizing and realizing the exhibition, specifically the linguistic articulation of ideas and their re-articulation in visual forms. In addition to a written thesis, the audio-visual material is reflected in a 60 min. film ‘ARTISTIC OFFICE: CONSTRUCTING THE 7TH BERLIN BIENNALE FOR CONTEMPORARY ART’ (2012).

During her studies, Lidia researched art practices in SECOND LIFE with the aim to explore the potential of a virtual space as a digital platform facilitating creative processes. Starting from the kind of art being made in SECOND LIFE, looking into indications of paradigm shifts in a broader context of contemporary art practice and the possibility to create new modes of viewer participation and experiences. The resulting paper, 'Art Production and its Conceptual Systems in Second Life' is published in VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENTS AND CULTURES. Urte Undine Frömming (ED.). 2013. PP. 233-245. FRANKFURT AM MAIN: PETER LANG VERLAG.

In her path Lidia encountered the Humboldt Lab Dahlem and her research progressed to inclusion of contemporary art in historical collections museums. Parallel to the above topics, as part of her exposure to exhibitions, Lidia has been analyzing and juxtaposing how the medium of film is used in contemporary art exhibition context and in ethnological museums. Several of Lidia's films have been part of museum and gallery exhibitions and she has presented papers at international conferences and seminars on topics of art biennials, contemporary art and anthropology, and encounters between contemporary art and museums with historical art collections. Lidia integrates her research of art practices and institutions in her lectures at Freie University in Berlin.

 
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CONFERENCES I WORKSHOPS I PUBLICATIONS

2015 September - Durham University, UK. ‘Contemporary Anthropologies of Art’ workshop. Presentation paper: ‘Trajectories of Encounter: Contemporary art in the Ethnological Museum’.

2015 June - University of Barcelona, Spain. ‘Encountering Concepts in Art and Anthropology’ workshop. Presentation paper: ‘Contemporary Art Institutions’.

2015 June - Tromsø University Museum, Norway. Seminar ‘Contact-Zone: Museums, Ethnography, Performativity and Mediatization of Cultural Heritage through Artistic Intervention’. Presentation topic: ‘Re-imagining the Museum’.

2014 Tallinn, Estonia. Conference ‘Collaboration, Intimacy & Revolution’, EASA (European Association of Social Anthropologists). Thesis film screening and discussion on methodology .’ARTISTIC OFFICE: Constructing the 7th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art’ (2012), 60min.

2014 Berlin, Germany. Conference ‘Innovate Heritage: Conversations between Arts and Heritage’. Presentation paper: ‘Art Biennials as Constructs of Heritage’. (publication upcoming)

2013 Publication: Art Production and its Conceptual Systems in Second Life. In Virtual Environments and Cultures. Urte Undine Frömming (ed.). 2013. Pp. 233-245. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang Verlag.

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SCREENINGS I EXHIBITIONS

’Sounds of Painting’, Waseem Ahmed - Dahlem Karkhana, (2014) 19 min. & ‘Yuken Teruya: On Okinawa’ (2014) 9 min. 2015 Small Projects Gallery, Tromsø, Norway. Group exhibition: Contact Zones (I convene) smallprojects.no 2014—2015 Asian Art Museum, Berlin, Germany. Part of ‘Probebühne 4’ exhibition, Humboldt Lab Dahlem; and screening during ‘Prinzip Labor’ at the Ethnological Museum, Berlin. humboldt-lab-dahlem/waseem-ahmed & humboldt-lab-dahlem/yuken-teruya 

‘The making of … Music Instruments’ (2014) 90 min multi-channel installation (6 films) & Kathak (2014) 27min. 2014—2015 Ethnological Museum, Berlin, Germany. Part of the exhibitions ‘Probebühne 5 and 6’ in the ‘Music Listening’ installations.

‘ARTISTIC OFFICE: Constructing the 7th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art’ (2012) 2012 - Kino MOVIEMENTO, Berlin. 2013 - KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin, Germany. 2014 - University of Tallinn, Estonia. easaonline.org/conference

‘Forget Fear’ 7th Berlin Biennale shorts - documentation as mediation - series of films on Jonas Staal, Antanas Mockus, Nada Prlja Christina Lammer, artwiki (Pit Schultz and Burak Arikan), Teresa Margolles, Mario Lombardo, Warsaw Museum of Modern Art, Pawel Althamer. 2012 KW Institute for Contemporary Art, part of the 7th Berlin Biennale, Berlin, Germany - screened during the exhibition and online. vimeo channel

‘Wangechi Mutu at Prospect 1’ (2008), 4:29 min, and ‘Color Fields’ (2010), 4:47 min - documentary featuring Richard Armstrong. 2010 Deutsche Guggenheim, Berlin, Germany

‘Documenting Documenta’ - 2-day screening and lecture on Documenta 12. 2009 The Red House, Centre for Culture and Debate, supported by Goethe-Institut. Sofia, Bulgaria.

Films on Documenta 12 (vimeo.com/D12) & 10th Istanbul Biennial (vimeo.com/Istanbul10). 2008 La Jolla ATHENAEUM Arts and Music Library, La Jolla, CA.

‘Human/Nature: Artists Respond to a Changing Planet’ series of 8 commissioned documentaries. vimeo.com/album/3453320 2008—2009 screened during the exhibitions at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, California; BAM/PFA (Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive), Berkeley, California; and published in the Jan/Feb 2009 issue of Orion Magazine, an online publication of Rare conservation organization.

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ARTIST INTERVIEWS

Artist interviews 2007—present. dmovies.net: platform for research, documentation and presentation of art practices. Interviews with artists and curators at biennials, museum exhibits, galleries and art studios. Co-founder, concept & project development, researcher, writer, interviewer, presenter at screenings and lectures. Selected list of exhibits:

7th & 8th Berlin Biennales for Contemporary Art, 2012 & 2014, Berlin, Germany

Documenta 12 & Documenta 13, 2007 & 2012, Kassel, Germany.

Deutsche Guggenheim, 2010, Berlin, ‘Color Fields’, with Richard Armstrong.

53rd Venice Biennale, 2009, Venice, Italy.

MCASD, BAM/PFA, Rare–conservation organization: exhibition documentaries: Human/Nature: Artists Respond to a Changing Planet, 2008. San Diego, California, USA

7th Shanghai Biennale for Contemporary Art, 2008, Shanghai, China.

Prospect 1, 2008, New Orleans, Louisiana

10th Istanbul Biennial, 2007, Istanbul, Turkey.

 

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