THE TINA B. – CONTEMPORARY ART FESTIVAL IN PRAGUE

THE TINA B. – CONTEMPORARY ART FESTIVAL IN PRAGUE

The TINA B. Festival is a unique artistic event organised in Prague each year by Vernon Gallery. In October 2010 Prague will again become the mecca of contemporary art. Like every year artists and art works from central and eastern Europe and other countries around the world will come together in the Czech Republic’s capital city.

TINA B. is an acronym for the English ‘This Is Not Another Biennial’. The name TINA B. also evokes notions of a sensual being – the patron of the festival, a mysterious woman with an ever-changing visage, who lures thousands of visitors to the Prague festival.

Festival has been held repeatedly under the auspices and with the support of the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic and the City of Prague.

‘Miniverse’, Katja Loher,
Installation for Parkhotel, TINA B. 2010

FESTIVAL TINA B. 2010

Main Festival Exhibition: 7. 10. – 24. 10. 2010

VIP WEEK: 7. 10. – 9. 10. 2010

Location: historical centre of Prague

Nostic Palace, Jerusalem Synagogue, Czech Centre in Prague, National Theatre, New Stage, Argentinská Street, Parkhotel, Vernon Projekt, m.odla The fifth annual TINA B. Festival will take place in Prague from 7 to 24 October 2010. The theme of this year’s festival is ‘Solutions and Evolution’. Like last year, this year the festival will present art that works with new artistic methods and uses innovative artistic techniques.

The festival presents art works from almost all over the world. The main theme in 2009 was NEW ERA and under this theme we mainly showed work from Israel, Switzerland, and the Near East. Ultimately the TINA B. Festival in
2009 brought to Prague the work of around fifty artists presented in seven curatorial projects.

We are planning a similar volume of work again in 2010. However, we are also going to reflect on art
figures from Visegrad and the Mediterranean (i.e. Turkey, Greece, Spain, and Southern Italy). We see
these areas as cultural counterparts that are however both located within Europe.

We feel that these geographic zones can serve as examples of entirely distinct ways of looking
at new lifestyles.
The curators in 2009 were all well known theorists and artists: Blanca De La Torre Garcia, BBB Johannes Deimling, Paulina Kolczyńska, Nina Colosi (the Streaming Museum project) and Doron Rabina. The concept of the TINA B. Festival 2010 will like last year be centred on specific centres of art. For the TINA B. Festival 2010 we selected curators from Turkey, Italy and the Visegrad countries. They are: the Italian curators Daniele Capra, Nina Colosi and Viviana Checcia, the Polish curator Ola Grzonkowska, the Turkish curator Lalin Akalan and the Spanish curator Blanca de la Torre.

Part of the main programme is Special Events Week (7. 10. – 9. 10.), during which numerous presentations, preopenings, performances, social events, and discussions are held. During this period, important foreign and Czech guests, as well as collectors, journalists, curators, and regular visitors will have a chance to get to
know each other.

Unusual indoor and outdoor venues have again been selected for the exhibitions. One section will take visitors into Nostic Palace. ‘The Darkest Hour’, Owen Mundy and Joelle Dietrick, special project with Fabrikanten, TINA B. 2010

‘SPAM the musical’, Boris Eldagsen,
project for Nostic Palace, TINA B. 2010

In the Jerusalem Synagogue visitors will see the series of works by Orit Ishay which are documenting the tactile surface of shelters implanted like alien corn in the public space, most of which located in the periphery of Israel. Argentinská Street in Prague will host the unique Streaming Museum project by the curator Nina Colosi, which virtually connects artists and audiences around the globe. In the space of Vernon Projekt you will see a new installation by the Argentinean artist Daniel Gonzalez. As always the festival has enormous potential to awaken a wider interest in contemporary art among the public in a way that even established galleries are unable to do. This is because it focuses on art in the public space. It therefore presents numerous art works, installations, and
performances right in the streets of Prague. One of the outdoor exhibitions will focus on the work of the Italian artist Marco Di Piazza, who will show his metal statues at Letná and Žižkov in Prague. The Swiss artist Katja Loher will show her unique project on the facade of Parkhotel. Other unique outdoor projects will be held on the piazzeta of the National Theatre.

TINA B. IN ITALY

This year’s festival will be special in that after TINA B. in Prague is over, selected works will also be shown in two Italian cities, Vicenze and Venice, for three weeks starting 4. 11. 2010.

MAIN FESTIVAL THEME – SOLUTIONS AND EVOLUTION

In 2009 the TINA B. Festival conceived of art as a force that drives individuals and society to self-reflect and to think about the direction of the modern world. With the theme NEW ERA it looked into the future of our society and the direction of art. The longing to describe and identify the state of society in the 21st century spawned the
motto of the festival.

The TINA B. Festival in 2010 goes even further, reaching down to the roots of problems and through to their solutions. The theme of the fifth festival is mainly centred on the word SOLUTIONS. We ask artists for possible ways in which to help improve the negative effects of the modern era on society today. We are looking into the future with a view to improving life. How can a work of art change our living standards – from personal relations between people to current ecological issues – for the better?

‘Concrete Evolution’, Linda Čihářová,
project for Nostic Palace, TINA B. 2010

Nowadays the artist is assuming a position different from that he or she occupied in the past. The artist is becoming the focal point of interest and consequently also a possible vehicle of change. It is therefore of utmost importance that works of art reflect on and point to the right directions we can take.

The TINA B. Festival 2010 lays emphasis on serious social themes, but it also presents works that are artistically valuable and appeal to the public. The festival focuses on art in the public space and on new art media such as the digital, mobile, and internet technologies regularly used in everyday life. As such it ranks as one of the most important contemporary art events to be held even on an international scale. ART SECTIONS AT THE TINA B. FESTIVAL 2010


Performance Art


Video Art


Light Art


Installations, Special Projects

PERFORMANCE ART

An important part of the TINA B. Festival each year is the week of special events and visual performances.
Performance art is one of the boldest forms of contemporary art. In 2009 a performance art workshop was even held in Prague, run by the Berlin artist Johannes Deimling. After several days of work a group of artists and students from different countries presented the art works created during the workshop at the so-called Evening of Performance Art at Parkhotel.

Victorine Mueller, performance,
Florentina Boat,
TINA B.09, photo by Mediafax

During VIP Week in particular the TINA B. Festival 2009 drew participation from a large number of artist performers, such as Enrico Centonze, who served Prague visitors a golden soup in his performance ‘Eat Gold’, and Victorine Mueller, who presented her performance art right on Florentina Boat, with a large illuminated inflatable statue.

The 2010 festival will continue these successful projects and present diverse visual performances from the workshops of top artists from around the world. These include the French performance artists Vic Kirilove with his work ‚Journal – De – Boörd’ and the American performance artist Barbara Rosenthal with her work ‘Push Me’.

VIDEO ART

Among the most remarkable and striking events organised in the fourth year of the TINA B. Festival were the video art projects. The festival organisers installed three inhabitable VIDEO CONTAINERS right on the Pedestrian Zone of Na Příkopech, and in the containers they installed the video sections ‘Streaming Museum’, ‘Ou va la video?’, and TINA B. ON THE ROAD.

The special Streaming Museum section by the curator Nina Colosi presented Prague with a unique project – a kind of digital super-highway on which it is possible to transmit in real time and all at once works of art located on seven continents. We want to present this project again in 2010 on an outdoor screen on Argentinská Street.

The fifth year of the TINA B. Festival will again present works by artists
currently working with this art genre. ‘Unheard of cruelties’,Gianluca Codeghini, video,
TINA B. 2010 ‘Journal-De-Boörd’ Vic Kirilove, Performance, TINA B. 2010

LIGHT ART

Light is a part of almost every work of art. But for some artists it is their main creative medium. Moreover, new
technologies make it possible to work with art in very precise ways. Light projects, installations, and art form a crucial part of the contemporary art scene. Many pieces of art that work with symbols or graphic images created with neon bulbs were exhibited at this year’s Biennale in Venice.

The unorthodox works that play with light that we selected for the TINA B. Festival in 2010 are literally intended to throw new light on more or less familiar exterior and interior spaces in Prague. The LIGHT ART section will certainly turn into a magnet for the wider public. In this case again the works will also possess a dimension of intellectual or human significance.

INSTALLATIONS, SPECIAL PROJECTS

The TINA B. Festival does not remain within the boundaries of certain contemporary art groups, but rather searches for projects that transcend them. We are interested in merging creative ideas with the public space, getting art to reach inside everyday life and thus appeal to a wider spectrum of viewers. In 2009 one such project was the installation ‘Living Room’, where the Swiss artist Marion Ritzmann installed real chairs, a table, and a lamp at an elevated point on the outside wall of Parkhotel. Every passer-by was thus able to look at and
enjoy this work of art.

This year there will be similar projects, such as the installation of metal dancing sculptures by the artist Marco Di Piazza or the Multiplexihorse by the Polish artist Konrad Zientara – a light illusion of a horse running on the piazzeta of the National Theatre. The TINA B. Festival 2010 will bring art not just to the galleries but also into the streets, parks, and other public spaces.

‘Talking Bulbheads‘, Patrizio Travagli,
Light art, TINA B. 2010
Marco Di Piazza, sculpture for Letná,
TINA B. 2010