New Vision Forum Node on Education: Tomorrow’s Art Audience

Tomorrow’s Art Audience is for our younger audience and support for the future of art. The goal of this project is to improve conditions both for educators as well as children and young people to facilitate learning and enjoyment with contemporary art. We know that there are great human resources available, but how do we liberate these when there are no tools and networks to develop this potential? Tomorrow’s Art Audience develops and supports:

- Collection of existing ideas and methods for working with contemporary art.
- Innovation: to create and disseminate new methods for working with contemporary art.
- Networking: creating links between existing creative islands.
- Internationalization: linking knowledge and experience from across Europe.

Our New Website

Vision Forum is proud to announce its new website. It has been designed by Tomas at Fanatic/Blvvd (and about a zillion other cool projects in the music/media business.) We will gradually move the blog from this address to our website.

But that is another story...

Enjoy!

10.000 visitors in April

We do not know who he/she is or what he/she looks like. However, we suspect that this moustache clad fellow from ex Yugoslavia could be the 10.000th visitor on our website in April (who could ever ask for better proof than this dinar bill?).

We are extremely happy that all of you (with or without moustache) follow us online and keep up with our activities. The final number was 10.460 visitors!

The sky's the limit and welcome back!

Vision Forum in the Media

 Find out what has been written about Vision Forum and our events in the press, the media and in academia. Below you find a selection of what has been written. You can find out more about our history on Wikipedia. For more information about Vision Forum's own publications click here.

Norrköping Air – Call for Residency

 

CLOSED FOR APPLICATIONS - PLEASE COME BACK NEXT YEAR

Norrköping Air offers three artists the opportunity to live and work in Norrköping, Sweden from June 1– August 31, 2014. It is the second year that we offer this summer residency to artists from all over the world to develop projects in dialogue with the Norrköping Air team and Swedish institutions.

1. What kind of artistic practice are we looking for?
∞ Norrköping Air focuses specifically on time-based art and process-based practices. We are particularly interested in work that can be presented in public spaces of the urban landscape or work that is site-specific, experimental and challenges or looks for alternatives to existing ideas, forms and norms.
∞ We are looking for projects to be developed in tandem with the other two residents’ practices and in dialogue with Norrköping Air’s partners in the region.

2. What do we offer?
∞ Each selected resident will receive a 15,000 SEK grant per month for the three months of June, July and August 2014.
∞ We offer accommodation and at least one return ticket to the artist’s country of residence*.
∞ We provide access to production facilities at Linköping University (mostly digital) as well as access to other work space(s).
∞ Each successful applicant will have an opportunity to show the work publicly with one of our partners in Norrköping and/or region.
∞ The grant includes a small budget for production and a public presentation.

To find out more click here.

The Other Vision Forums

Summer is a time when we have time to look at values that are new or challenging to us in different ways. We hopefully have more time to read and to ponder and develop new ideas. Why not have a look at the "other" Vision Forum. There is a lot to learn, however we are unsure how their outlook on gender and family could function in contemporary Swedish academic life. Find more here. If you find their opinions a bit narrow-minded. The antidote is found here

It gets better in October we found another sibling in Brazil - now we know why we spend so much energy to make projects in South America. By clicking here, you will find their outlook on large family logistics. However, this Vision Forum will meet other problems with Swedish academic life. Enjoy!

Acting the City

Vision Forum member and curator Susanne Ewerlöf is creating many projects withing the project Acting the City, the project looks at contemporary art practice in the city and draws inspiration from many of our previous projects (e.g. The Invisible Generation and Think Again) The project also includes work by and Norrköping Air residents Natasha Rosling, Johanna Adebäck and Anna Hess. Here are a few words from the official website.

"Today, Norrköping is one of the few Swedish cities that still has unused, hidden spaces within its downtown. Similar to many other Swedishcities, there are remnants of days gone by, historical reminders of visionary ideas, like the Swedish vision of Folkhemmet, to industrialareas, each lacking modern interpretation. Who’s in charge of our urban space and who shapes our city? Acting in the City is based on an idea of the city being a theatrical scene, where its citizens are actors and creators. Streets and squares are venues for events and meetings; actions or interactions are viewed as a role play. Group affiliation or disassociation is demonstrated by various attributes. Our choices, both conscious and unconscious ones, reflect our group belonging based on cultural background, class and gender, each being significant. Participating artists in Acting in the City each have their own unique background. They focus on questions of space and human behavior. The exhibition relates specific local occurences to those of other cities from around the world."

More info here.

Konstön

Vision Forum member Cecilia Ahlqvist is creating a sculpture park in her hometown of Skärblacka called Konstön. The first work was created by artists Jenny Berntsson and Felice Hapetzeder who call themselves "Local A" when they work as a group.  They have created a piece together with students at Mosstorpskolan in Skärblacka within the project Acting the City. There is also a bilingual catalogue (Swedish/English) that can be ordered from Norrköpings konstmuseum.

More info here.

Eskapism in Gothenburg

On a dark evening in april, Acéphale invites you to Eskapism: an event in collaboration with Teater Mutation, Vision Forum and Göteborgs konsthall. The latter will for this night will be turned into a travel agency for escapists. Guided by the surrealist artist Leonora Carrington, you will visit five mysterious places in the city, on a trip between contemporary art, dream and reality. Acéhpale, together with various artists, create nights on the borderline between exhibitions, performances and clubs.

To join, visit Göteborgs konsthall between 19.00 - 21.00 on April 13. The journey will go on until late in the night.

Tickets: 120 SEK (purchased here only), Minimum Age: 20 .

Participants of the night:

TEATER MUTATION (Malmö), ÅSA ERSMARK (Stockholm), Jonas Liveröd (Malmö), OSKAR NILSSON, RICKARD LJUNGDAHL EKLUND & JOHAN CEDERBERG (Stockholm), IDA KLAMBORN, JONNY TEARDROP (Paris), KRYSTALLIA Sakellariou (Bogotá), ELINA NILSSON, THEODORE TROTTNER & SIMON MULLAN (Stockholm), REBECCA ESKILSSON, ANNA BERENCREUTZ, BELÄTEN, MICHAEL IDEHALL, KIM & EMANU

For more info, click here or here.

Vision Forum wins prestigious Swedish Institute Grant

 

Vision Forum is proud to announce that we have been awarded a prestigious Creative Force grant from the Swedish Institute to develop a collaboration with Assabil Libraries and 98weeks in Beirut. More info here soon.

VISION FORUM SPRING MEETING 2013 - March 5-6, 2013.

Vision Forum is proud to announce its sixth international workshop with KSM in Norrköping March 5-6, 2013. It is a packed program that looks at the "Synthesis of Human Experience and the fostering of Diversity in Academia,"with participants from Germany, Finland, Italy and the UK who will meet local players for inspiration and creation.

PROGRAM

MARCH 5
19.30 Verkstad organises social event at Broadway konditori. Advance booking necessary, contact Moa Hannerz Simå on (moa.hannerz.sima (at)  gmail.com) to book your ticket.

MARCH 6

9.30 -  Konstantin Economou introduces the partnership between Vision Forum and KSM.
9.45 - Per Hüttner talks about our Vision Forum's structure, methodology and current projects.
10.00 - Susanne Ewerlöf, curator of the centenary projects at Norrköpings konstmuseum introduces  her collaboration with Vision Forum.
10.45 - Anna Gritz, curator at South London Gallery and artist Reuben Henry talk about their work with INFRA.
11. 30 - Discussions.

12.00 - Lunch

14.00 - Sara Giannini talks about her work with OuUnPo, Global Art and the Museum and ZKM in Karlsruhe.

14.45 - Jacopo Miliani presents his artistic practice and his work with OuUnPo 

15.30 -  Refreshments and discussions.
16.00 - Visit to Verkstad and Ida Pettersson's exhibition.

The sessions on March 6 are held in ateljé 2, on the 6th of Kåkenhus. Find a map here. To see more images click here.

98weeks in Egypt

Vision Forum partner 98weeks shows their work as part of Beirut Season 2.

Beirut wants to break the spell of the State as a theater of fantasy. She works hard. She tries to make her own magic with stories culled from newspapers; she invites artists to intervene in them. Her story is moving. But what do we make of these stories, and what do these stories make of us? And will they survive? [1]

Season One (10 October 2012–14 January 2013) at Beirut examined labour in the loves and lives of images, and drew on a drawing's desire. Amidst current affairs Season Two (7 February–6 April 2013) tests the relationship between magic, power and resistance and their connection to the modern State, whilst reflecting on notions of history and its revision, collective memory and national identity.



In February, artist Azin Feizabadi visited Beirut for a month and presented new elements from his on-going project A Collective Memory. We invited 98weeks from Beirut to present an evening of films on resistance and the State from different geographical and historical perspectives. Also, this season, (a(version)s) (2012) by Joe Namy lives in our library, while Indent in collaboration with Egypt Independent gains momentum, having featured interventions and in-situ works by Carlos Amorales, Taha Belal, Dan Perjovschi and Azin Feizabadi, with more to come. 



Currently on view is The Magic of the State, an exhibition and editorial project conceived by Beirut in Cairo and Lisson Gallery in London. The exhibition is a collaboration and encounter between two contrasting art institutions operating in very different contexts: a not-for-profit art space in the making and an established private gallery. This practice-based exchange opens up a shared space for reflections on the different economic, logistical, social and political realities these institutions live. 



The project is titled after anthropologist Michael Taussig's eponymous book from 1997. Historically placed at the intersection of science, religion and politics, the concept of magic exists in an integral relationship to that of power. Magic's coerciveness lies in its power to transform, simultaneously holding together the desire to believe and the desire to doubt. Here, politics and magic, statecraft and stagecraft, converge as performance.



Two discrete yet interconnected exhibitions in Cairo (3 March–6 April) and London (27 March–4 May) feature a different constellation of works by the same artists, including new commissions, and a public program of performances, talks and screenings.

The selected and newly commissioned works by Ryan Gander, Goldin+Senneby, Rana Hamadeh, Anja Kirschner and David Panos, Liz Magic Laser, Christodoulos Panayiotou and Lili Reynaud-Dewar question the legacy of outmoded systems of beliefs and mythological principles within the modern State, pointing to the slippage between the prescriptive intent and the idiosyncratic manifestations of stately power. They chart the potential of alternative aggregations, and explore the possibility of resistance by thinking laterally and looking at unorthodox places.



The exhibition in Cairo opens on Sunday, 3 March with a performance by artist Lili Reynaud-Dewar with iconic club performer Mary Knox, and experimental musician Hendrik Hegray, featuring texts by Sun Ra and records from "La Grande Oreille" collection. On Tuesday, 5 March Michael Taussig revisits his book The Magic of the State in a lecture held at Beirut in Cairo. The opening week will continue with a lecture-performance by artist Rana Hamadeh on Thursday, 7 March.

Following the show a compendium on art, magic and politics will be released. It will feature essays, spells, fiction and true stories in both English and Arabic, with contributions by Will Bradley, Hany Darwish, Michael Taussig, a telephone conversation between Peter Lamborn Wilson and Evan Calder Williams, and others. 

In March, Beirut hosts artist Anja Kirschner, conducting research on the history of Egyptian horror movies and the way they could be seen to reflect major political events, externalising social and personal trauma through the "supernatural."

In April, theatre director Laila Soliman will present her forthcoming project Here, there and everywhere/Hopes, a performative research looking into what is said about State Security Systems between myth and reality in Rabat, Cairo and Berlin. 

For a full program of our events find us on Facebook at "Beirut in Cairo" visit our homepage and sign up for our monthly newsletter here.




About 
Beirut is an art initiative and exhibition space that considers institution building as a curatorial act. It is founded on the belief that change first needs to be imagined in order to be achieved. The year at Beirut is conceived in three seasons, each comprising a series of exhibitions, seminars, workshops, rotational studio and research projects, in addition to talks, screenings and publications. Beirut's facilities are open to a local and international public, including library, communal workspace and rooms with a view over Beirut for visiting artists, curators and writers. 

As a small art initiative with big plans, Beirut needs your support. If you would like to donate books in exchange for Indian mangoes or write us a cheque, story or love letter please contact us at office@beirutbeirut.org. 

Opening hours: Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday 12–8pm
Contact: office@beirutbeirut.org

Per Hüttner about OuUnPo on Global Art and the Museum.

Vision Forum is proud to announce that Per Hüttner has been selected to be the guest author of the month in August for the Global Art and the Museum's website. He writes a text about OuUnPo and globalisation. Please read more here.

Vision Forum and OuUnPo wins prestigious ECF-grant.

Vision Forum is proud to announce that we have been awarded a prestigious European Cultural Foundation Collaboration Grant for the OuUnPo session in Beirut in November and December 2012. The events will be organised by Fatos Üstek and Sara Giannini. Confirmed partners in Beirut are Batroun Projects, Beirut Art Center and Ashkal Alwan.

For the the meeting in Beirut, OuUnPo will join forces with the international research project "GAM – Global Art and the Museum". GAM is a research program initiated by Hans Belting and Peter Weibel at the ZKM – Centre for Art and Media Karslruhe in 2006. For more information about OuUnPo click here. For more information about the Beirut session, click here.

Art and Science

Vision Forum has from the outset worked with researchers in the hard sciences to investigate how meetings between specialists in the two fields can inspire creativity on both sides. During one of the (In)visible Dialogue sessions organised by Vision Forum in 2011, Sandra Masur (Mount Sinai, New York) and Laurent Devèze (ISBA, Besançon) underlined how the scientific laboratory has gradually grown more into a communal working place for research and development over the last decade. The practice has shifted to larger research teams where the responsibilities are divided and tasks differentiated, but still retaining a common goal. On the other hand, the artist has retained his/her singular brand name and a more insular process. We have seen movements where artists form groups (Superflex, General Idea), but also artists like Olafur Eliasson and Tomàs Saraceno develop studios that emulate the working methods of architectural firms. But we our preparatory research suggests that by implicating methodologies from the sciences that this can develop further.

Vision Forum sees great potential developing parallel strategies to institutions like the Santa Fe Institute that look at large populations in major cities or the interactions in schools of fish. Here the extended specialization and at the same time demand for amassing and evaluating gigantic amounts of data has forced researchers to collaborate with researchers in the humanities and design. Vision Forum has developed both a practice and the theoretical and digital tools to create situations for true artistic research and production based on the above mentioned working methods.

Vision Forum Film

Vision Forum Film is Vision Forum's youngest research field and has been active since spring 2011. It has been started with the specific situation in Östergötland in mind and to develop its relationship to the capital region of Stockholm. Within the region there is great talent fostered. But there is little support or possibility to grow in the region. We have therefore set up this research to stimulate film making in the region and to develop dialogue with the capital region and the international network in Vision Forum.

We see that film has immense potential to facilitate international exchange, something that can also be clearly seen in the history of film. Vision Forum Film builds on the existing networks in the organisation in order to facilitate these international dialogues.

We are specifically interested in film productions that crossover genres and/or productions that allows film and visual art to dialogue . Vision Forum has previously been particularly successful in creating meetings between visual art and music, visual art and science and visual art and drama and builds on these experiences and contacts.

More info about Vision Forum Film here.

Performance practice

Vision looks at performance in a very open way and also investigates the porousness between exhibition and performance through projects like Ö- A Möbius Trip. Or by initiating meetings where boundaries between creator and audience is blurred. This is the case in OuUnPo sessions. Vision Forum is also looking for performative aspects in situations like lectures and sometimes creates workshop-like situations where new forms of meeting between researcher and audience is created.

This research has been developed in close collaboration with artists, curators and researchers from different fields and with different geographic, ethnic and cultural backgrounds, Together we search for alternative ways of documenting and presenting art and academic research. For more examples about these cross-over look at the information about meetings/seminars and exhibitions/performances.

Exhibitions and Performances

Vision Forum has a long history of arranging exhibitions and performances. These are often interdisciplinary and experimental in their nature  have been hosted by institutions like Tate Britain in London, Mingshen Museum in Shanghai, OCAT in Shanzhen and Palais de Tokyo in Paris. Most of these public events are discussed and evaluated in an academic setting and critically analysed in publications that are distributed in Europe, Asia and South America. Below you will find a selection of events that we have created over the last decade.


2013
 • Is Misunderstanding Misunderstood, 3rd Ghetto Bienniale, Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

• OuUnPo Japan, Godzilla and the Phoenix, Mori Art Museum, Spiral, Bankart 1929 and other venues in Tokyo and Yokohama.


2012
• An Opera in Five Acts, David Roberts Art Foundation, London, UK

• Think Again, Mingshen Museum and  FCAC, Shanghai, China.
• The Entremet, The Museum of Contemporary Art Les Abattoirs, Toulouse, France
• Speech and What Archive, Convivio, Micro Onde, Centre for Contemporary Art, l'Onde, Vélizy-Villacoublay, France
• Speech and What Archive, Avant Spectacle A Micro Medicine Show event for the exhibition La Ronde curated by Emilie Renard, Centre for Contemporary Art, Ferme du Buisson, Noisiel, France
• Time Capsules and Conditions of Now, Curated by Fatos Ustek, David Roberts Art Foundation, London, UK
• Speech and What Archive, Speech Objects, a four part exhibition at le Musée de l'Objet, Blois, France
• Speech and What Archive, A Floating Conversation, performance, CNEAI, Paris, France

2011
• Community without Propinquity (curated by Claire Louise Staunton), MK Gallery, Milton Keynes, UK
• Quantum Police, curated by Anne Klontz, The Old Police Station and Cartel, London, UK
• Speech and What archive, Medicine Show Rotterdam, Paola Pivi's GRRR JAMMING SQUEEK, Rotterdam, Holland
• (In)Visible Dialogues, curated by Lena Boëthius, Konstakademien, Stockholm, Sweden
• Speech and What archive, Speech Objects #3, Musée de l'objet, Blois, France
• Quantum Police, curated by Anne Klontz, Valerie Lambert Gallery, Brussels; DKTUS Stockholm and Putting Out the Fire with Gasoline, Manufactura’s Studio, Wuhan
• Speech and What archive, Medicine Show Avante Spectacle, La Ferme du Buisson, Paris, France


2010
• 0K – in 5 Acts The Flat Time House, London, UK
• This Image Is No More, GOOD TV, Wu Dao Ying Hu Tong, Beijing, China[31].
• Dynasty, Pauline Curnier Jardin, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris and Palais de Tokyo, Paris.
• The Invisible Generation, Les Kurbas Center, Kiev, Ukraine.
• Simultaneity, Curated by Anne Klontz, Rumänska kulturinstitutet, Stockholm and Platform China, Beijing.
• The Invisible Generation, Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (with Yan Jun)
• Imminent

2009
• The Invisible Generation, OCAT, Shenzhen, China
• News for Tomorrow, Yan Jun, Beijing, China (With Birdcage, Paris)
• The Invisible Generation, VCA Margaret Lawrence Gallery, Melbourne
• Do not Go Gentle ERBA and Musée du temps, Besançon, France"
• Calabi-Yau Presents, Gerlesborgsskolan, Sweden; FACT, Liverpool and VCA Margaret Lawrence Gallery, Melbourne (3 parallel exhibitions in 3 countries).
• INH-SZ Temporary Project Space, Shenzhen. Exhibitions, film programme, lecture series including Chu Yun, Guy Delisle, Christian Jankowski, Daniel Knorr, Liu Chuang, Map Office, Yang Yong. Directed by Claire Louise Staunton, Inheritance Projects.

2008
• (Anti)Realism, Norrköpings konsthall, Norrköping, Sweden, ERBA Besançon, France and Adele C, Rome, Italy
• Vision Forum, 1:1 Projects and Lift gallery, Rom, Italy
.
2007
• Privé och Publico, Galleri 54, Göteborg, Sweden (as Curatorial Mutiny)
• Private Parts, Museet för glömska, Norrköping, Sweden (as Curatorial Mutiny)

2006
• GYBE!, (Videofeed) Vacio 9, Madrid, Spain (as Curatorial Mutiny)
• Open Mike (Performance), Vacio 9, Madrid, Spain (as Curatorial Mutiny)
• Participate? Kraftstationen Drags, Norrköping, Sweden (as Curatorial Mutiny)

2005
• Participate? Basekamp, Philadelphia, USA (as Curatorial Mutiny)
• Participate? Chinese European Art Center, Xiamen, China (as Curatorial Mutiny)

Meetings

Vision Forum arranges international meetings in Europe, Asia, the Middle East and South America. These are predominantly organised within research groups such as Ouunpo, Speech & What Archive and La Durée and have been carried out in collaboration with art institutions like Tate Britain and Tate Modern, in London; MACRO in Rome; Ullens Centre for Contemporary Art and Rockbund Art Museum in China; Palais de Tokyo and CNEAI in Paris; Fundação Serralves in Porto; Mori Art Musuem in Tokyo and academic institutions like Max Planck Institute in Germany and Holland; Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm and CCA in San Francisco.

Vision Forum also builds interface with its audience using various media. We organise international meetings in collaboration with Östsam and KSM at Linköpings universitet twice a year. These allow the region of Östergötland to take part of our research. These meetings are collaborations with regional institutions and individuals. We have worked with Norrköpings konstmuseum, Arbetets museum, Länsmuseet, Passagen, Visualisation Center C and many more.

Selected Workshops

2013

• Volume, 98weeks, Assabil Libraries, The National Library Archive etc., Beirut, Lebanon
• Is Misunderstanding Misunderstood, 3rd Ghetto Bienniale, Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
• Vision Forum Autumn Meeting 2013, Norrköpings konstmuseum, CNEMA, Visualiseringscenter C and public spaces in Norrköping and Söderköping.
• OuUnPo Japan, Godzilla and the Phoenix, Mori Art Museum, Spiral, Bankart 1929 and many more venues in Tokyo and Yokohama.
• Temporality and Dis-Location of Self, four workshops in around Stockholm, Botkyrka konsthall, Hallwylska palatset and various public locations.
• Vision Forum Spring Meeting 2013, Linköpings Universitet.

2012

• Vision Forum Autumn Meeting 2012, Norrköpings konstmuseum, Rejmyre Artlab and Passagen, Linköping  
• OuUnPo Lebanon "QUANTUM FLUCTUATIONS OF A SYNECDOCHIC UNIVERSE", Ashkal Alwan, Beirut Art Center, 98Weeks, Musée National de Beyrouth, UMAM Research and Documentation Centre and Batroun Projects.
•  Ö a Moebius Trip III, Stockholm, Sweden
•  Vision Forum Spring Meeting 2012, Norrköpings konstmuseum, Verkstad, Norrköping and public venues in Skärblacka.
• Ouunpo-rto, Culturgest, Casa de Musica, Fundação Serralves and other institutions in Porto, Portugal.
• Think Again, Mingshen Museum, Rockbund Art Museum, FCAC, 2666 Library, Shanghai, China.
•  Ö a Moebius Trip II, Stockholm archipelago, Sweden
• Time Capsules and Conditions of Now, David Roberts Art Foundation, London, UK

2011

• Ouunpo Greece, Deste Foundation, Six Dogs and public venues, Athens Greece

• Community without Propinquity (curated by Claire Louise Staunton), MK Gallery, Milton Keynes, UK.

• Vision Forum Autumn Meeting 2011 Arbetets Museum, Norrköpings konstmuseum etc., Sweden

• (In)Visible Dialogues, curated by Lena Boëthius, Konstakademien, Stockholm, Sweden.

• Ouunpo: Urgency and Leisure, Tesla Museum, Museum of Serbian History etc. Belgrade, Serbia

• Ö a Moebius Trip I , Stockholm archipelago, Sweden

• Vision Forum Spring Meeting 2011 Norrköpings konstmuseum and Verkstad för konst, Sweden



2010

• Ouunpo, Ponder Pause Process (a Situation), Tate Britain, London, UK

• Ouunpo MACRO, Rome, Italy

• In the Limbo of the Signifier: Workshop on Linear Logic, Ars Longa, Paris, France

2009

• New Creation Musée du temps, Besançon, France

• The Stockholm Syndrome, Kungliga Konsthögskolan, Stockholm, Sweden.



2008

• If you don’t want God, you’d better have a multiverse, Press to Exit, Skopje, Macedonia

• If you don’t want God, you’d better have a multiverse, 1:1 Projects, Rome, Italy

• Vision Forum, White Space, Zürich, Switzerland

• Vision Forum, Amsterdam, Holland

• (Anti)Realism, The Academy of Fine Arts, Guangzhou, China

Educational Modules

Vision Forum is a development of the organisation Curatorial Mutiny and its dialogue with KSM at Linköpings universitet that started in 2004. Since its inception in 2008, Vision Forum has grown to focus on international education, production and research in contemporary visual art and the integration of these on a regional, national and international scale.

1. Introduction and contexts

"We do not lack communication. On the contrary, we have too much of it. We lack creation. We lack resistance to the present. The creation of concepts in itself calls for a future form, for a new earth and people that do not yet exist."
—Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, "What is Philosophy"


The collaboration between KSM and Vision Forum allows knowledge, experience and vision to meet with artistic and academic creativity to enrich the academic and cultural life of the region of Östergötland. The collaboration brings together students, researchers, producers and influential personalities from the arts, humanities and sciences to dialogue about central life issues. The participants of the project come from all over Europe, often with roots from other continents, and also host a broad age range and a balanced gender mix. The exchange safeguards academic and cultural diversity in the region and inspires students, researchers and staff to find, enrich and develop their creative and academic processes.

The collaboration operates on three levels:


I. Local: To bring knowledge, experience and inspiration and new ideas from all over Europe and further afield to dialogue with and to enrich the unique context of the cultural, institutional and academic world of Norrköping, Linköping and the region of Östergötland.



II. National: To bring knowledge, experience and inspiration and new ideas from all over Europe and further afield to dialogue with and to enrich the cultural and academic worlds in Sweden. To enforce a dialogue with the academic, institutional and cultural world in the rest of Sweden with Norrköping, Linköping and the region of Östergötland.



III. International: To create a platform for international expansion for the academic, institutional and artistic world of Norrköping, Linköping and the region of Östergötland and to use this expansion to enrich the professional processes for academics and cultural practitioners in the region.



To work on these three levels allow the students and researchers to develop their personal practice based on their individual needs, visions and ambitions. But it also allows them to create a platform where they can actively choose to work locally, nationally and internationally. The platform gives them the tools, the network and skills to expand and through that allow the cultural and academic life in the region to expand with them.





2. The nature of the collaboration its future goals.

“One of the primary blocks to such latent creativity is what Bohm refers to as ‘self-sustaining’ confusion in the mind, in contrast to ‘simple’ confusion. Simple confusion is that which we experience when for instance, we don’t understand directions we are given, or when we can’t find the solution to a puzzle. Self-sustaining confusion, on the other hand occurs ‘when the mind is trying to escape awareness of conflict… in which one’s deep intention is really to avoid perceiving the fact, rather than to sort it out and make it clear’ Bohm points out that this process creates an order of its own: a reflexive state of dullness in which the natural agility of the mind is replaced is replaced with a torpor on the one hand, mechanical and meaningless fantasies on the other. Unfortunately says Bohm, this has come to be considered a normal state of mind, and is therefore endemic to our culture.”
— Lee Nichols, Preface to the Routledge Classics Edition of David Bohm’s “On Creativity”, Routledge 1997.

The collaboration between KSM and Vision Forum is built on research about the role and nature of knowledge within in the academic and artistic fields. This foundation allows the students and researchers both to operate professionally in local, national and international art audiences and at the same time develop research that benefits the academic and artistic worlds.

The collaboration needs to be based on a clear understanding of the methodologies, goals and limitations of the respective fields: art, science and humanities. It is essential not only to demarcate the nature of knowledge in respective fields and the overlapping aims between them, but also to respect that there are profound philosophical differences between the genres. But both Vision Forum and KSM also both have far reaching experience of what can be achieved through a dialogue between different disciplines.

In each project carried out by students and researchers, great detail is given on the formulation of the problem as well as the context where the problem is addressed. The projects are created and carried out in such a way that they allow the audience to actively follow the outcome through traces of the process undergone. The project is set up with the goal of realizing the potential of each individual student and researcher and to stimulate a rich cultural and academic environment in Östergötland.


3. Thematic Fields



"The art of constructing a problem is very important: you invent a problem, a problem position, before finding a solution. None of this happens in an interview, a conversation, a discussion. Even reflection, whether it's alone, between two or more is not enough. Above all, not reflection. Objections are even worse. Every time someone puts an objection I want to say 'OK, OK, let's go on to something else'. Objections have never contributed anything. It is the same when I am asked a general question. The aim is not to answer the question, it's to get out, to get out of it."
—Gilles Deleuze


The collaboration between KSM and Vision Forum focuses on three main fields. These have been developed over the last years. Within each field the students and researchers work with meetings, research and production preferably in parallel. The three fields also open doors for work across the fields and students and researchers often work with projects that either is placed between these thematic fields and/or between accepted artistic genres.

The three thematic fields are:


I. 
Performance: Vision Forum has focused on performance from the outset. The practical approach to academic research that has been a trademark of KSM from the start makes it very easy to collaborate in this field and the two organizations have been working together in this genre since 2004.
II. Art and Science
: The collaboration offers artistic production and research to meet scientific and humanist research.
III. Experimental film: Film is and has always been a strong point for KSM, but the creators have had a hard time reaching outside the local. Vision Forum offers the venues for presentation and expansion. This field also works for an expanded local production of experimental film.