APR. / JUN. 2011

Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporáneo

THE POLITICAL CONSTITUTION

OF THE PRESENT

session

THE POLITICAL CONSTITUTION OF THE PRESENT

The program of exhibitions and activities presented herein may be extended during the period under discussion, and may also suffer alteration of one kind or another due to events that were unforeseen at the time of publication. Up-to-date information can be consulted at www.caac.es

These troubled times, when “crisis” has become a byword in our daily vocabulary, force us to rethink the present based on what we expect, wish or guess will happen in the near future. If, as some never tire of reminding us, every period of crisis is also a moment of opportunities, then perhaps this potential systemic crisis could signal the birth of a different status quo. This exhibition session thus aims to use the complex current state of affairs as a jumping-off point, which will hopefully give us a glimpse of some future paths of development. The Political Constitution of the Present was inspired by an essay that has proven essential to understanding the transformations of latter-day capitalism and their correlations outside the field of economics. The title of the exhibition session is actually that of the first chapter in the book Empire, by Michael Hardt and Toni Negri, which analyses geostrategy in light of the present world order and then goes on to explore the concept of “biopolitics”. The six exhibitions that comprise this session are all interrelated, creating different layers of interpretation and complexity among them. Without Reality there is no Utopia, addresses the primary problem: the need to return to reality, to rethink the present, so that we can engage in utopian philosophy. Alfredo Jaar’s project invites viewers to reinterpret Marxism and its offshoots in order to find solutions to the current crisis. Rogelio López Cuenca questions the representation and the imaginary constructions of the world around us. Another show reviews the career of an artist from the German school of Capitalist Realism and activates a pictorial oeuvre that seems to speak from the present. The series created by Inmaculada Salinas share the common denominator of a specific focus on women. And finally, the penetrating murals of Jessica Diamond grace the monastery’s outer walls.

ALFREDO JAARMARX LOUNGE

15 FEB. / 15 MAY. 2011 SoUTH wING

ROGELIO LÓPEZ CUENCAOUtskiRts

3 MAR. / 15 MAY. 2011 SoUTH wING

KP BREHMERA tEst EXtENDiNG BEYOND tHE ACtiON

31 MAR. / 12 JUN. 2011 EAST wING

JESSICA DIAMONDwALL PAINTINGS

31 MAR. 2011PRIoR AND oUR FATHER’S CoURTYARDS & ST. MICHAEL ARCH

WITHOUT REALITY THERE IS NO UTOPIA14 APR. / 10 JUL. 2011MoNUMENTAL AREA AND NoRTH wING

INMACULADA SALINASPRESSED oUT woMEN

31 MAR. / 12 JUN. 2011 PRIoR’S GALLERY AND RoYAL PAVILIoN

Production: CAAC. Sponsored by LAIE library

our special thanks to Emili Gasch

ALFREDO JAARMARX LOUNGE

Karl Marx’s (Trier, Germany, 1818 - London, 1883) principal and mostinfluential ideas are still controversial today. This is evidenced in the numerous recent symposiums, publications and exhibitions. The reason for this could be the current economic crisis. However, it would be fair to say that it covers a wider spectrum within the cultural theory and contemporary critique, which constantly question and re-evaluate capitalism.The Marx Lounge is Alfredo Jaar’s answer to this. An area providing the public with extensive reading material on Marx’s philosophical, political, economic and humanistic ideas. It also presents bibliography by other theorists, philosophers and authors who have followed, analysed or revisited Marx’s theories. Žižek, Hall, Rancière, Butler, Laclau, Mouffe, Jameson, Bourdieu, Fanon, etc. bring new patterns of thought which reflect the enormous amount of knowledge gained in the past few decades. Alfredo Jaar has spoken of this as a “tsunami of thinking”, which has been taking place over the last 20 or 30 years. He says “…for me these writings offer us models of thinking the world. And that is what I try to do as an artist – I create models of thinking. I view Marx Lounge as a space of resistance, or as David Harvey would call it, a space of hope”. According to the artist, a true intellectual revolution has been carried out, although far from the real world. For these reasons, Alfredo Jaar offers a reading lounge in which to sit back and think about the importance and viability of marxism in the current state of affairs, as well as about the latest political and philosophical views. These views may help us better understand the present moment. This reading lounge will also house an exhibition of several collectors’ editions of important books such as Capital or The Communist Manifesto in various languages, courtesy of Emili Gasch.

ALFREDo JAAR, Marx Lounge. CAAC, 2011.

15 FEB. / 15 MAY. 2011South wing

ROGELIO LÓPEZ CUENCAOUtskiRts

Production: CAACwith thanks to Diputación de Granada, Juana de Aizpuru Gallerie, Concha Aizpuru, UNIA (Universidad Internacional de Andalucía), MEIAC (Museo Extremeño e Iberoameri-cano de Arte Contemporáneo)

RoGELIo LÓPEZ CUENCA, Holidays in the sun, 2008 and Total, 2006

Cercanías (Outskirts) is a work of criticism which, in various ways and via different works, allows us to reflect on one of the western world’s most violent forms of domination: representation. As in some of his more recent works, in this exhibition project Rogelio López Cuenca (Nerja, Málaga, 1959) focuses on Andalusia, devising a route map that takes in history, memory, Al-Andalus, orientalism, migrations, tourism and different iconic personalities to draw attention to a fabric created by policies of domination. Outskirts may be thought of as a political act, not only due to the subject matter it addresses or the place the artist occupies as a producer, but because it works with the materials and signs of this politics in order to dismantle the very logic of representation from within. In this context, he begins by analyzing the impact of tourism as a radical transformer of life, with works like the project that is still under way on the “Picassoization” of Málaga, the video-installation Nerja Once (Nerja Eleven), and the intervention Holidays in the Sun. Canto VI and Bienvenidos (Welcome) deal with tourism and migration, two forms that tauten and drastically change the territory. Finally, El paraíso es de los extraños (Paradise Belongs to Strangers) addresses the construction of the image of the Arab-Islamic world in the west with videos like Haram (2000) and Voyage en Orient (Voyage to the Orient) (2000). on the one hand, the Arab past is glorified as a historic legacy of the area, and on the other, people live in fear of the aesthetic and political changes occurring in cities and towns with African-Moslem migrations, above all in the case of Andalusia. Thus, in works like La Alhambra sobrevivió (The Alhambra Survived), an installation simulating a tourist souvenir shop, the artist uses the souvenir in such a way that the act of recall is not produced by the “trinket” alone but also by the counter-information scattered all around.

3 MAR. / 15 MAY. 2011 South wing

Curator: Doreen Mende, BerlinProduction: CAAC. In collaboration with Goethe Institut

KP BREHMER, Walking 1-6, part 4, 1970. Film 16 mm. (c) KP Brehmer Sammlung und Nachlass, Berlin, 2011

31 MAR. / 12 JUN. 2011 East wing

we are living in a time of an excess in exhibiting. Magazines, newspapers, stores, television, and the Internet constitute and reproduce visual grammars, directing our understanding of the world. Museum exhibitions are just a further component of this circuit. The exhibition of projects by the German artist KP Brehmer (1938–97) today leads us into a space of reflection: what means do we have for marking audible our disagreement without withdrawing our words and images? “Capitalist realism hasn’t weakened since the bank crises; if anything it has intensified.” Mark Fisher, London 2010. As a major figure of the German Pop Art artist initiative called Capitalist Realism, which culminated in the famous catalogue raisonné Grafik des Kapitalistischen Realismus by René Block in the early 1970s, Brehmer worked for decades on inverting a capitalist economy of knowledge production by decoding its forms of visual nominations. The expropriation of western concepts of typography, cartography, thermography, and color theory reveal the ways in which a visual appearance is implicated in economics. If we approached Brehmer’s displays, films, publications, compositions, and installations as “notation systems” of social processes, then a similarity to a musical score emerges. only in the moment of the performance do the questions posed by these works become apparent, under the very actual conditions of making them public. Exhibiting here might be understood as both a means and a concern of a practice—for KP Brehmer, and for us, today. Following this path, his projects implicate a future that begins to alter in the act of exposure. A thought from 1974 could turn into “a test extending beyond the action” todayand tomorrow.

KP BREHMERA tEst EXtENDiNG BEYOND tHE ACtiON

Production: CAAC

Jessica Diamond (New York, 1957) is known for her ironic and incisive texts directly painted on the wall. This North American artist forged her sensibility during the 80s, a moment in which painting was being questioned. Since then, she maintains a surprising and sincere sense of identity and uses language as the basis for her work, characterized by her critical and satirical attitude towards popular culture symbols. She usually employs mural painting to express herself, a technique that makes her stand outside the art market. The drawings and text fragments that Jessica Diamond traces on the walls deal with sadness, self-awareness, and the “funny” in tragicomic tone. The artist leaves a memo on the wall, an angry one, in which abandonment and self-protection assert themselves in personal but non-nostalgic, unsentimental codes. Her memo, a quickly written message rooted in the tactics of corporate America, is always a strong, direct statement in which individuality is reconstructed despite the generic qualities of the world we inhabit. To read this work only through the apparatus of advertising slogans, media, and low culture as coercive powers would be a misleadingly direct take denying complexities, subtleties, and contemplative aspects. In some of her pieces, Diamond deals with the vicissitudes of being a contemporary artist, because she has to make, show and sell her works to survive. She has also expressed in a concise way her point of view about the New York art market: greedy, exploitative and prone to inflation. The following wall paintings will be on view at the exhibition:I Hate Business (1989), Being Necessitates Faith In Paper (#2)(1989/2011), Money Having Sex (1988) and Is That All There Is? (1984/2010).

JESSICA DIAMoND. Being Necessitates Faith In Paper, 1989.Acrylic and latex paint on wall.

JESSICA DIAMONDwALL PAiNtiNGs

31 MAR. 2011Prior and our Father’s Courtyards & St. Michael Arch

Curator: Luisa López MorenoProduction: CAAC

INMACULADA SALINAS. Como fondo, 2010-2011.100 acrylic paintings on paper and 100 acrylic paintings on press paper.

The pieces showed by Inmaculada Salinas (Guadalcanal, Sevilla, 1967) have been made in the last three years and grouped in four series whose common feature is the repetitive and processual nature of all the works on paper, starting from a certain subject. woman as a social subject is the topic of Prensadas, Visión de las vencidas and Espejo. In Como fondo, the artist reflects on the autonomy of painting and also on the role to which it is often reduced: as a decorative object which represents power. Espejo, 2008. The artist repetitively writes the word mujer (woman) in forty white cards therefore doing a formal repetitive exercise. Besides, she uses her left hand for writing half of them thus provoking visual tension and changes of rhythm in the whole of the card. Visión de las vencidas, 2008-2009. The book by the anthropologist Miguel León Portilla, Visión de los vencidos, based on writings by Mexican indigenous, has been the reference for this work. Salinas takes fifty sentences from the book which include the word mujer (woman) or attributes regarding the place of women in society. Prensadas, 2009. By means of hundreds of cards showing press pictures, Salinas makes a statistical study about the presence/absence of women in the media. Como fondo, 2010-2011. Using press cuttings in which outstanding pieces of art serve as a background for different important figures, the artist erases people’s identity thus overshadowing their presence and giving prominence to the paintings. Her own monochromatic paintings, that follow an upward chromatic colour scale, prevail over these facts demonstrating the autonomy of painting.

INMACULADA SALINASPREssED OUt wOMEN

31 MAR. / 12 JUN. 2011Prior Gallery and Royal Pavilion

MANoLo QUEJIDo. Por aquí pasa 1 (de Las Américas), 2008.Acrylic on canvas.

what inspired the title Without Reality There Is No Utopia? How did this group exhibition come by such a name? Behind it are two thinkers: Jean Baudrillard and Andreas Huyssen. The former defined simulation as the creation of something that “has no relationship to any reality whatsoever”, and therefore diagnosed the replacement of the real by the virtual. Thus, the interpretation and significance of this show follow the line of reasoning proposed by Andreas Huyssen in “Memories of Utopia”. Huyssen picks up where Baudrillard left off, positing that, since reality has been lost and replaced by its simulacrum, utopia cannot exist, for utopia is inextricably linked to the concept of improving or moving beyond reality. Hence the title: if there is no reality, there can be no utopia. In other words, in the age of simulacra and virtual reality, the disappearance of the real also entails the end of the utopian. The exhibition consists of two asymmetrical sections. The first is “The Description of the Lie”, a kind of sceptical introduction to the systems which fabricate the simulacra of the real. The second, broader section bears the generic title “Collapses” and is divided into four sub-sections: the collapses of communism, of capitalism, of democracy and of geopolitics. In other words, as Huyssen aptly put it, “Utopia never dies alone. It takes its counter-utopia down with it.” Therefore, when communism falls it takes capitalism down, and as capitalism collapses it drags democracy along with it, since the latter decided to cast in its lot with the former. At the same time, the expansive system that characterises capitalism (colonialism) also implies its geopolitical implosion. It therefore seems that we should seriously consider the demise of utopia as the great problem of our time.

WITHOUT REALITY THERE IS NO UTOPIAIgnasI aballí • lene berg • Fernando bryce • WIllIam s. burroughs • PhIl collIns • dora garcía • danIel garcía andújar • FederIco guzmán • ed hall • jan Peter hammer • Pello Irazu • alFredo jaar • rogelIo lóPez cuenca / muntadas • zeIna maasrI • carlos motta • cIPrIan muresan • nIKolay oleynIKoV & chto delat? • manolo QuejIdo • olIVer ressler • el roto • Katya sander • suPerFlex • WolFgang tIllmans • rIrKrIt tIraVanIja • judI WertheIn • zhou xIaohu • artur ŻzmIjeWsKI

14 APR. / 10 JUL. 2011 Monumental Area and North wing

Curators: Alicia Murría, Mariano Navarro and Juan Antonio Álvarez ReyesProduction: CAAC

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Information and Prior Booking: Tel. 955 037 096 - 140 | Fax. 955 037 052educ.caac@juntadeandalucia.es

EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIESDISCoVER, EXPERIMENT, PARTICIPATE

The CAAC offers a program of activities to do with its exhibitions aimed at different sections of the public, from infants and families to young people and grownups, with special attention being paid to groups who run the risk of social exclusion. In this educational project the relationships between different aspects of contemporary art are analyzed. An educational and integrationist experience led by a team of specialized monitors in which explanations in the exhibition space-going into issues referring to today’s culture and contemporary art-alternate with activities to do with creative practice that are undertaken in the workshops. By means of these educational activities participants are offered new critical and comprehensive approaches to the reality of which they are a part, as well as new spaces for debate and communication.

“The poliTical consTiTuTion of The presenT”. A DIDACTIC woRKSHoP AND GUIDED ToUR FoR SCHooLCHILDRENfrom Tuesday to friday. prior booking Experiments with pupils about the content of a group of exhibitions.

GUIDED ToURS FoR THE GENERAL PUBLIC During public opening times. prior booking Explanatory visits to the exhibitions, adapted to the particular needs of visitors.

PRoGRAM FoR FAMILIES. every sunday at 12 h. prior bookingActivities conceived for bringing the world of contemporary art closer to children accompanied by adults, for which visits and creative workshops are mounted.

OCT. 2010 / MAR. 2011Exhibition spaces and didactic workshops area

Guided visit to Curro González exhibition.

Price: €30 pass (+ distribution costs) available from 5 March at www.territoriossevilla.com+ info: www.caac.es

20 and 21 MAY. 2011 Gardens of the Cartuja Monastery

TERRIToRIES SEVILLA, 2010 edition.

The “Territories Seville” International Music Festival of the Towns has returned, as it does every spring, to offer a select array of bands with a clear emphasis on multiculturalism. During this 14th edition, the festival will present a total of 30 concerts in two action-packed evenings, featuring the partici-pation of bands such as:

• VeTusTa Morla• asian Dub founDaTion• nach• The fall• horace anDy & Dub asanTe• ToTe King• The DiVine coMeDy• feMi KuTi & The posiTiVe force• russian reD• MuchachiTo boMbo infierno• razhel & DJ Js-1• sr. chinarro• King MiDas sounD• el coluMpio asesino• puTolargo

Some of the novelties this year include the replacement of the thematic evenings with a concentration of different styles to underscore the festival’s characteristic multicultural flavour; a significant increase in the number of performances compared with previous years, with a total of 15 concerts scheduled for each day; and the possibility of purchasing a pass for both days at a discount price.

www.caac.es

ADDRESS

Monasterio de la Cartuja de SantaMaría de las Cuevas.Avda. Américo Vespucio nº 2.Isla de la Cartuja, 41092 - Sevilla

CONTACT

Tel. + 34 955 037 070Fax + 34 955 037 052actividades.caac@juntadeandalucia.eswww.caac.es

ACCESS

Avda. de Américo Vespucio nº 2Camino de los Descubrimientos s/n

TRANSPORT

Bus routes C1, C2

OPENING HOURS

EXHIBITIoN AND MoNUMENTAL AREATuesday to Saturday: 11 to 21 h.Sunday and public hollidays: 11 to 15 h.

Closed on: Monday (except holidays), May 2 and 30, 2011

Tickets sale until 30 minutes before closing

LIBRARYMonday: 9 to 14 h.Tuesday to Friday: 11 to 14 h. and 15 to 18 h.

next exhibition sessions:

THE SONG AS TRANSFORMING SOCIAL FORCE

july – october 2011la chanson • matt stokes • alonso gil • ruth ewan • annika ström

MARGIN AND CITY

noVember – February 2012the drift towards a non-place • andreas Fogarasi • julie rivera • lara almarcegui • libia castro y ólafur ólafsson • alejandro sosa

www.caac.es