Vessel has opened on Thursday 14 April 2011, in Via Guido De Ruggiero 6, Bari (Italy). It is an independent, non profit space devoted to contemporary art; a dynamic container which intends to build an artistic and social bridge between Apulia and the surrounding areas, Mediterranean, Central and Eastern Europe. vessel focuses on existing mechanisms in those areas, in order to relate them to each other creating new cultural forms.
From Vessel website:
vessel will create situations in which confrontation, interaction and creative process can facilitate models of knowledge-sharing that are not limited to the enjoyment of art, but consider participation as key for the production of new forms of expression.
In this first year, vessel will activate Motore di ricerca, a project which will see the creation of a research and documentation centre (physical and digital), a residence for international curators, an independent office to support independent design, a project room and a web radio. The centre will collect the portfolios of Apulian artists under 35 years old, through a series of open calls that will be launched via Web every two months. In addition to cataloguing artists portfolios, the documentation centre will compile a survey of academic research in environmental, historical, linguistic, urban planning, sociological sciences, etc..carried out in universities and leading research institutes in the region with which vessel has woven a dense network of collaborations.
Regional portfolios and research will be selected by the Scientific Committee, composed of Charles Esche,Ilaria Gianni, Cecilia Guida, Denis Isaia, Viktor Misiano, Marco Petroni, Roberto Pinto along with the curators of Motore di ricerca, Viviana Checchia and Anna Santomauro.
The documentation activities will be an indispensable tool for the construction of a network between regional and international dimensions. This will happen through the residency program for curators coming from the Mediterranean, Central and Eastern Europe, who will be invited to spend a period of one month at the space. These curators will have the opportunity to see the documentation collection and produce “the notebook of re-definition” on the current relationship between the former west and the former east of the European geopolitical landscape. A comparison with young curators will open a channel of privileged dialogue between the contemporary artistic culture of Apulia and that of their countries of origin. The investigation represents the starting point for a series of interventions and multidisciplinary art projects that will take place throughout Puglia, with the aim of triggering a process of cultural reinterpretation.
The office will function as an incubator of cultural and artistic projects, offering assistance and practical support to artists, curators and cultural practitioners from Puglia interested in developing their research at regional and European levels. It will be not only a centre and information hub, but also an engine to facilitate the development and sustainability of projects. The office environment will include several synergies emerging from direct contact with specialised figures. The office also becomes crucial for recovering and investing resources already available but often ignored or underestimated.
During the various phases of Motore di ricerca, vessel will maintain its laboratorial purpose, hosting a project room where artists will work, and lectures, talks, screenings and workshops will also be hosted. The project room will, in fact, be a hybrid space devoted to the flow of ideas and their elaboration.
Motore di ricerca also provides the opening of a web radio, which will be a tool for documentation and dissemination of the project. It is an intangible place that welcomes initiatives tailored to the format. The web radio, along with the website and all the digital material, is the tool by which vessel will make content available everywhere, as well as reflections and activities produced.
vessel has been conceived as a collaborative and multidisciplinary platform based on research, reflection and planning. It focuses on the processes of artistic production rather than on the artistic product. The objective of vessel is to enjoy art in its flow and enable constant re-creation within temporal and spatial, local and European boundaries
More info www.vesselartproject.org