ARTICA SVALBARD
ANNUAL REPORT 2018
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CONTENTS 1. ABOUT ARTICA SVALBARD 2. ANNUAL REVIEW BY ARTICA SVALBARD’S DIRECTOR 3. HIGHLIGHTS FROM ARTICA SVALBARD’S PROGRAMME IN 2018 4. ORGANISATION AND KEY PARTNERS 5. WHAT ARE WE DOING IN 2019? 6. FINANCIAL STATEMENTS
Photo, front page: Daga Wojtanowicz
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1. ABOUT ARTICA SVALBARD
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Art is present wherever important questions are being asked; Svalbard is such a place in our time.
The purpose of the foundation is to facilitate artistic and cultural activities on Svalbard, and to support the development of Norwegian art and culture by enabling artists in all genres to create and present their art. The foundation shall bolster the cultural and creative industries on Svalbard. Artica Svalbard shall have an Arctic and international focus and shall use public events to raise awareness of and discuss Arctic Norway’s relevance to fields such as culture, geopolitics, climate change, migration and minorities. Artica Svalbard was founded by the Norwegian Ministry of Culture, Fritt Ord (the Freedom of Expression Foundation) and the Cultural Business Development Foundation of the bank SpareBank1 Nord-Norge, on the 8th of November 2016.
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2. ANNUAL REVIEW BY ARTICA SVALBARD’S DIRECTOR
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ANNUAL REVIEW BY ARTICA SVALBARD’S DIRECTOR Artica Svalbard´s mission is to use art as a driving force for creating awareness, knowledge, dialogue and take action in the development of the Arctic. The foundation was established in November 2016, born out of a shared desire to use art as a tool for putting the spotlight on the Arctic. We want to use art to draw attention to, and increase understanding of, what we consider to be the most important issues of our time. Longyearbyen is Artica Svalbard’s base. A small but diverse community undergoing enormous changes. Longyearbyen is like an international microcosm, and suddenly it has the eyes of the whole world upon it. Here climate change is taking place twice as quickly as in other parts of the planet, and Svalbard is an international hub for climate scientists from all over the world. Climate change is increasing the risk of avalanches, and large numbers of homes are being demolished. That has led to a real housing crisis. Amidst all of these changes, this former mining community is searching for a new, modern identity. Artica Svalbard believes that art can help to provide a fresh perspective. Our desire is to create interdisciplinary platforms where artists and other experts from a variety of disciplines can meet to share their knowledge, both with local people in Longyearbyen and the rest of the world, through our digital platforms and live streams. The artists who work at Artica express themselves in a variety of ways and through all kinds of media, including printmaking, poetry, drawing and painting, sculpture, journalism, dramatic arts, literature, sound art and installations. As well as hosting artists, we organise a number of projects and hold a wide range of events, from open debates, lecture series and conferences, through to open days, workshops, concerts, performances and artist conversations.
Artica Svalbard – Annual report 2018
In 2018 it was once again a priority to cooperate with the local community, which is something we find very rewarding. Artica has put down local roots, and we hope and believe that most of the residents of Longyearbyen know who we are and what we do. We will continue our various collaborations with the local literature festival, Longyearbyen youth club, the Arctic Chamber Music Festival, Longyearbyen film club, Project Isfjorden and Longyearbyen public library. Our artists-in-residence have helped us to establish a good rapport and strong partnerships with a number of local organisations, including Svalbard Museum, UNIS, the Norwegian Polar Institute, Galleri Svalbard, Polar Permaculture, the mining company and last but not least the local government, because the artists contact them to draw on their expertise in conjunction with their projects. The artist residency programme is Artica’s main focus, and we continue to receive artists from Norway and the whole world, with an emphasis on site-specific projects and artistic processes linked to the Arctic and the Polar regions. All of these projects are shared with the general public through various events, ranging from artist presentations and workshops, through “artist walks” to presentations on a bigger scale in and around Longyearbyen. In addition, we have kick-started local initiatives such as the Spitsbergen Makerspace association and a creative writing workshop. We are finding that many people want to attend our events. Family workshops focusing on the environment and recycling are popular, as is our joint programme with the film club, which in 2019 we will use to continue exploring how climate change is having a direct impact on local communities in different parts of the world. The local event that attracted the biggest audience in 2018 was the open public debate we held in November, together with our Key Partner Norwegian PEN and their eminent whistleblowing committee, dealing with the satellites on Svalbard, global politics and
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surveillance. With over seventy people attending from all parts of the local community, these topics were clearly important to many people. The debate, which lasted over two hours, was recorded and is available as a podcast on our website. Digital platforms are particularly important to Artica Svalbard, as the last thing we want to do is increase CO2 emissions by flying in large audiences to our events. Live video streams and podcasts have a vital role to play, and we will take them a step further in 2019. The foundation itself, the team that runs Artica Svalbard and our initial partnerships and collaborations are all firmly established now, and we are embarking on the year 2019 with great pleasure and enthusiasm. Our events don’t necessarily have to be large, but they must adhere to high standards, promote reflection and critical thinking, and be capable of reaching out to as many people as possible, as well as always using art as their main tool.
We would like to thank the founders and supporters of Artica Svalbard: the Ministry of Culture, Fritt Ord (the Freedom of Expression Foundation), SpareBank 1 Nord-Norge’s Cultural Business Development Foundation and The Savings Bank Foundation DNB. We would also like to thank our Key Partners Norwegian PEN, the Office for Contemporary Art Norway and the Queen Sonja Print Award.
Photo by Artica Svalbard ́s coordinator Didrik Paulsen, 2018: (from the left) Eli Skatvedt/ Director Artica Svalbard, Drew Snyder/OCA, Moa Björnsson/ Artica Board Member, Anne Berit Figenschau/Head of the Board of Artica Svalbard, Mette Tverli/ QSPA, Marit Anne Hauan/Artica Board Member, Karianne Ryen Eriksen/Project Manager QSPA, A.K Dolven/Artica Board Member, Kjetil Trædal Thorsen/Artica Board Member, Ingrid Moe/OCA, Katya Garcia-Antón/Director OCA, Jan Martin Berg/Artica Board Member.
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3. HIGHLIGHTS FROM ARTICA SVALBARD’S PROGRAMME IN 2018
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Description of a selection of our activities in 2018:
THE ARTIST RESIDENCY PROGRAMME AND NOMINATED ARTISTS IN 2018 Artica Svalbard’s main focus is our artist residency programme, which will become a part of our history and eventual fill our archives. Artists and authors from Norway and around the world come to Artica’s wellequipped artist workshop to explore highly varied process-related projects linked to the Arctic and the Polar regions. The artist residency programme is helping us to build up a large repository of knowledge that arises out of encounters and interdisciplinary partnerships. With the help of Artica’s team, the artists who come here are all able to develop their projects and share them with the general public through our events. Nominated artists-in-residence at Artica Svalbard in 2018: Nominated by Norwegian PEN Eastrine Kire Juni Dahr Ole Robert Sunde Nominated by the Queen Sonja Print Award Fuki Hamada Karo Akpokiere Ellen Karin Mæhlum Nominated by the Office for Contemporary Art Norway (OCA) Lars Paalgard Oddvar I.N. Daren Oswaldo Macia Mette Henriette
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Artist biographies of artists in residence:
QUEEN SONJA PRINT AWARD: Fuki Hamada, a printmaker, was born in Fukuoka Prefecture in 1972. She graduated from MFA Printmaking at Musashino Art University, Tokyo, Japan (2000). Recent solo exhibitions are at Gallery NATSUKA, Japan (2017) SNAP Gallery, Canada (2012) and Galleria Käpy, Finland (2010). Hamada has participated in a large number of international group exhibitions. Karo Akpokiere is a child of the 80s born and raised in Lagos, Nigeria. He received a diploma in Graphic Design from Yaba College of Technology, Lagos, Nigeria in 2006. Akpokiere has taken part in several exhibitions locally and internationally, including his first solo exhibition 26/365: An Exhibition of Illustrated Letters at the Goethe-Institut, Lagos, Nigeria (2011) and the first Lagos Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) Public Art Exhibition, Lagos (2012). Akpokiere’s recent group exhibitions include the 56th Venice Biennale and the 2nd Berliner Herbstsalon, Maxim Gorki Theater, Berlin. Ellen Karin Mæhlum is a visual artist and printmaker based in Oslo. She studied at Bergen and Oslo National Academy of the Arts, and at the Royal University College of Fine Arts in Stockholm. Her works have been acquired by several public collections, including the National Gallery in Oslo, The Museum of Contemporary Art in Oslo, Norway. Mæhlum has exhibited extensively in Norway and internationally.
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OFFICE FOR CONTEMPORARY ART NORWAY (OCA): Lars Paalgard studied at the Trondheim Academy of Fine Art, Trondheim, Norway (1978–82) and the Jan van Eyck Academie, Maastricht, The Netherlands (1983–85). He has participated in exhibitions in Norway and abroad, and his works feature in public collections such as those of the Arts Council Norway and Trondheim Municipality. Paalgard was one of the initiators of G.U.N (Galleri Uten Navn / Unnamed Gallery) and Sound Of Mu in Oslo. Recently his work has been presented in solo exhibitions at Vestfossen Kunstlaboratorium, Vestfossen (2014) and Galleri 69, Oslo (2016), and was part of the group exhibition Silent Revolt at The National Museum of Contemporary Art, Oslo (2016). Oddvar I.N. Daren is an artist who works across genres with paintings, objects, sculptures and land art. He trained at the Trondheim Academy of Fine Art, Norway (1977–81) and the Jan van Eyck Academie, Maastricht, The Netherlands (1982–84). He has held solo exhibitions at Bodø Kunstforening, Norway (2015); Trondheims Kunstforening, Trondheim (2013); Galleri F15, Moss, Norway (1986) and Henie Onstad Kunstsenter, Bærum, Norway (1985). His work has recently been presented in group exhibitions at The National Museum of Contemporary Art, Oslo (2016) and Trondheim Kunstmuseum (2007, 2017). Oswaldo Maciá is a Colombian artist based in London, he works primarily with sound and smell. Maciá grew up in Cartagena de Indias where he attended the school of fine arts. He has later studied at Llotja school in Barcelona as well as Guildhall and Goldsmith’s College in London. His olfactory-acoustic sculptures have been exhibited all over the world and is held by Tate among other international collections.
Highlights from our programme in 2018
Mette Henriette is a Sámi-Norwegian interdisciplinary composer, saxophonist and performing artist whose work has shown around the world. In 2017, she premiered the solo performance ‘In Between’ at documenta14, a piece reflecting on nomadic lifestyles which took place inside Athens Concert Hall. Later the same year, she performed at the opening show for the Indigenous festival Riddu Riddu celebrating the 100th anniversary of the first Sámi political assembly of 1917. In 2015, she released her debut double album on the renowned German record label ECM Records. NORWEGIAN PEN: Easterine Kire’s first book of poetry (Kelhoukevira, 1982) was the first book of English poetry to be published by a Naga. Her latest book, Son of the Thundercloud (Speaking Tiger 2016), won the Book of the Year prize for fiction at the 2017 Tata Literature Live Awards. Kire is also a member of the band Jazzpoesi. The actress Juni Dahr founded Visions Theatre in 1988. Dahr has worked with medieval themes, Henrik Ibsen’s drama and modern experimental theatre throughout her career. Through her many female roles in classical drama and the one-woman performances produced by Visions Theatre, she has contributed to a renewal of how female characters are portrayed in Norwegian theatre. Born in 1952, Ole Robert Sunde made his debut in 1982 with the poetry collection Hakk I hæl. Since his second book, Fra dette punktet trekker jeg en omkrets (1982), he has used a variety of genres – poetry, essays, prose and novels – to develop a remarkable, heterogeneous body of work. He has won the Aschehoug Prize and Gyldendal Prize for his writing. His novel Krigen var min families historie (2012) was nominated for the Nordic Council Literature Prize.
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Fuki Hamada, artist-in-residence at Artica’s workshop, 2018. Photo: Daga Wojtanowicz
Karo Akpokiere, artist-inresidence at Artica’s workshop, 2018. Photo: Daga Wojtanowicz
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The artist Fuki Hamada´s work in progress, detail, 2018. Photo: Daga Wojtanowicz
Artists in residence on a hike in Todalen, 2018. Photo: Eli Skatvedt
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The visual artist and printmaker Ellen Karin MĂŚhlum on excursion, 2018. Photo: Alexander Lembke
The actress Juni Dahr at Taubanesentralen, 2018. Photo: Daga Wojtanowicz
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A SELECTION OF OUR OTHER EVENTS:
ARTIST CONVERSATIONS, AN ARTIST WALK AND A PRINTMAKING WORKSHOP Artist Walk The artists Oddvar I.N Daren and Lars Paalgard (nominated by our Key Partner Office for Contemporary Art/OCA) invited the public to join them on a “Situare Walk”; a stroll to Taubanesentralen in Longyearbyen. Daren and Paalgard are famous for their conceptual work with landscapes, and it wasn’t their first visit to Svalbard. The walk focused on the Humus Line project, which began in the Netherlands in the 1970s and will be completed on Svalbard. On this project, Artica and the artists worked with the Norwegian Polar Institute and the Store Norske mining company. Exhibition and printmaking workshop The graphic artist Ellen Karin Mæhlum (nominated by our Key Partner the Queen Sonja Print Award) put on an exhibition at Galleri Svalbard. Under the title Observed at 79°N, Mæhlum presented a series of large-format prints from her stays with the researchers at Ny-Ålesund, created using her unusual, painterly printmaking technique. Mæhlum spent two periods with Artica in 2018, which she used to study Svalbard’s glaciers and talk to researchers from UNIS. The project was shared with the public by Mæhlum holding an artist presentation and demonstrating her unique printmaking method at Artica’s workshop. Author talk The author Ole Robert Sunde (nominated by our Key Partner Norwegian PEN) talked to chief librarian Elin Anita Olsrud about his latest book Penelope er syk (“Penelope is ill”). Sunde was invited to Artica during the Polar night to complete the follow-up to that novel. He also wrote a number of essays about Longyearbyen for various newspapers, including Klassekampen and Dagbladet.
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Longyearbyen literature festival The human rights activist and social critic Larry Siems travelled to Longyearbyen from New York to talk to the writer and publisher Anders Heger about the book Guantanamo Diary. The author of that book, Mohamedou Ould Slahi, participated by Skype. Our encounter with the charismatic and thoughtful former Guantanamo prisoner Mohamedou made a deep impression on the audience. The event was a collaboration with our Key Partner Norwegian PEN. Teresa Grøtan presented her book for children and adolescents Før øya synker (“Before the Island Goes Under”), which looks at how young people view climate change, from Svalbard to Kiribati, Bangladesh and the United States. Grøtan had previously stayed in Svalbard as a resident at Artica while working on the book, nominated by our Key Partner Norwegian PEN. Drawing workshop at the youth club Karo Akpokiere (nominated by our Key Partner the Queen Sonja Print Award) held a drawing workshop at Longyearbyen youth club. He told the youngsters to draw their future “dream town on Svalbard”, to find out what Longyearbyen would really look like if they were given the means needed to create the town they wanted. The result was countless creative, funny and sincere ideas. Scratch Workshop This workshop was a collaboration with Joachim Solum, whose job involves communicating with children and adolescents at the Norwegian Museum of Science and Technology in Oslo. Joachim introduced the programme Scratch to the children of Longyearbyen. Scratch allows children to create their own games and animations. This two-day workshop was held at the Longyearbyen public library.
Artica Svalbard – Annual report 2018
TENTacle-workshop og -parade TENTacle workshop and parade: The Dutch artist Floortje Zonneveld, who lives in Longyearbyen, collaborated with Artica on a week-long workshop that she hosted jointly with her fellow artist Josephine Beijer. Focusing on reuse, the two artists collected second-hand tents that were beyond repair from companies and individuals in Longyearbyen. These were then transformed into wind sculptures that ended up taking part in a colourful parade from the ropeway hub via Burmaveien down to the town centre. The head of culture in Longyearbyen let us mark the project by hoisting one of the largest sculptures up the municipal government’s flagpole. Open public debate Artica held an open public debate at the arts centre focusing on the question: “Do we need a more open debate about the challenges and dilemmas created by Norwegian security policy?” This event was a collaboration with our Key Partner Norwegian PEN and their whistleblowing committee, which consists of the journalist Kai Sibbern, who worked at the Norwegian state broadcaster NRK for many years and Rune Ottosen, a professor of journalism at Oslo Metropolitan University. They were joined by the author Bård Wormdal and the journalist and author Birger Amundsen, who has worked with scientific satellites and lived on Svalbard for many years. The strong interest from local people demonstrated that this issue is important to many people. The event was live streamed on Norwegian PEN’s Facebook page and recorded as a podcast that was later made available on our website.
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Longyearbyen film club The film director Matthieu Rytz visited Artica Svalbard and the Longyearbyen arts centre for the presentation of his film Anote’s Ark. The film looks at how global climate change is affecting the island nation of Kiribati in the Pacific Ocean, which is literally on the point of sinking, and tells the story of former president Anote Tong’s battle to save his people. The film screening was followed by a conversation with the director that clearly affected the audience, moved by the natural empathy of one island community with another one. We will continue to focus on climate change in our ongoing partnership with Longyearbyen film club.
Arctic Action We hosted the opening of the performance art festival Arctic Action at Artica’s workshop. The festival, which is organised by the local performance artist Stein Henningsen, presented a group of ten international performance artists in a mixture of indoor and outdoor performances.
Spitsbergen Makerspace Artica kick started the Spitsbergen Makerspace, an association run by volunteers from the local community. Artica provides technical equipment for use in a variety of collaborative, future-oriented workshops and projects that combine art, technology and environmentalism. Arctic Chamber Music Festival Artica hosted an enjoyable and intimate concert at its workshop, and we will take this partnership to the next level by bringing in our own sound artists and musicians in 2019. Writing club The American author Kelsey Kamacho, who lives in Longyearbyen, led a creative writing workshop at Artica’s premises. It was clear that the residents of Longyearbyen had been crying out for something like this: an English-language creative writing workshop involving tasks, presentations and the discussion of texts. Students from UNIS, local council workers, journalists, artists, guides and freelancers were all there, and after the workshop a writing group was set up on Facebook that will hold regular meetings at Artica. This series of workshops will continue in 2019.
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TENTacle wind sculpture workshop and parade, 2018. Photo: Daga Wojtanowicz
TENTacle wind sculpture workshop and parade, 2018. Photo: Floortje Zonneveld
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Longyearbyen Litterature festival 2018 and Norwegian PEN. Anders Heger and Larry Siems in conversation with Mohamedou Ould Slahi (via skype) about the book Guantanamo diaries. Photo: Eli Skatvedt
Open debate meeting at Rabalder in Longyearbyen, 2018. Artica and Norweigan PEN.
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Drawing workshop with the artist Karo Akpokiere at Longyearbyen Youth club, 2018. Photo: Eli Skatvedt.
Creative writing workshop with the writer Kelsey Camacho at Artica’s workshop, 2018. Photo: Eli Skatvedt.
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“Ars situare” walk. Lars Paalgard and Oddvar I.N Daren in Taubanesentralen, 2018. Photo: Alexander Lembke.
“Ars situare” walk. Lars Paalgard and Oddvar I.N Daren in Taubanesentralen, 2018. Photo: Alexander Lembke.
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4. ORGANISATION AND KEY PARTNERS
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The Board is elected by the founders. The Board is the highest decision-making body of the foundation, and it is responsible for its administration. The Board shall ensure that the foundation adheres to the articles of association and its purpose, and that the necessary controls are in place. The Board is also responsible for drawing up and revising the foundation’s strategy. THE BOARD FOR 2018–2019
Anne Berit Figenschau has been the director of the Northern Norway dept of the Norwegian Tax Administration. She is also a board member of the Norwegian Olympic and Paralympic Committee and Confederation (NIF). A K Dolven is an internationally-acclaimed artist. As one of the most significant artists in Norway, her work has been widely exhibited nationally and internationally. Marit Anne Hauan was the director of Tromsø Museum (until August 2017) and is a Researcher at the University of Tromsø. Her publications include numerous articles, books and podcasts.
Chair Anne Berit Figenschau Board Members Anne Katrine Dolven Marit Anne Hauan Kjetil Trædahl Thorsen Moa Björnson Jan Martin Berg
Kjetil Trædal Thorsen is an architect and co-founder of the architectural firm Snøhetta. Jan Martin Berg is the director of Galleri Svalbard in Longyearbyen. Moa Björnson has been head of development in Træna Municipality, Nordland County, since 2015
TEAM ARTICA Director Eli Skatvedt Coordinator Didrik Paulsen
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KEY PARTNERS Norwegian PEN, which was founded in 1922, is the Norwegian division of PEN International, the world’s largest organisation dedicated to promoting the rights of writers and freedom of expression. Norwegian PEN focuses on activities related to freedom of expression, and it strives to increase public awareness of the value of free debate and free expression, nationally and internationally. The organisation helps writers, journalists and publishers in countries where freedom of speech and freedom of information is under pressure, where colleagues are harassed, persecuted, monitored and imprisoned because they exercise their right to express their opinions. Norwegian PEN administers the Norwegian part of the international cities of refuge for persecuted writers. The network is run by ICORN (International Cities of Refuge Network). Today, there are 14 Norwegian cities of refuge; more than 60 persecuted writers have come to Norway as ICORN guest writers since 1995.
Queen Sonja Print Award (QSPA) was founded in 2011 by HM Queen Sonja of Norway and the renowned Norwegian artists Kjell Nupen and Ørnulf Opdahl, together with master printer Ole Larsen (of Helsingborg, Sweden). The QSPA Foundation’s objective is to generate interest in and elevate contemporary graphic art, especially among emerging artists. The foundation wishes to encourage the art of printmaking and inspire ambitious artists to establish themselves on the international art scene. QSPA bestows what is currently the world’s largest international print award on an emerging artist working within printmaking. In addition to this award, the Kjell Nupen Memorial Grant is awarded to a young and promising graphic artist from a Nordic country, an artist still in education or one who has just finished his/her art training. The QSPA Foundation collaborates with prominent museums, artists, curators and fine art print publishers from around the world in order to support and stimulate this important artistic field.
Office for Contemporary Art Norway (OCA) is a non-profit foundation created in 2001 by the Norwegian Ministries of Culture and of Foreign Affairs. Its principle aim is to foster dialogue between art practitioners in Norway and the international arts scene, and to support artists and cultural practitioners based in Norway in their activities around the world. To this end, OCA’s discursive, exhibition, publication, residency (in Oslo and internationally) and visitor research programmes focus on bringing to Norway the plurality of practices and histories at the forefront of international artistic debates; they are very involved with actively participating in such debates nationally and internationally. OCA has been responsible for Norway’s contribution to the visual arts section of La Biennale di Venezia since 2001.
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5. WHAT ARE WE DOING IN 2019?
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Our organisation, the team that runs Artica Svalbard and the partnerships that we have forged give us a good, solid platform for developing an ambitious and even more extensive programme in 2019. This is a selection of the projects and events that we are looking forward to sharing with you over the coming year. THE ARTIST RESIDENCY PROGRAMME Artica Svalbard will continue working to become one of the world’s best artist residency programmes. In order to achieve this, we have made various investments to improve the quality of our workshop, and we are taking on an extra member of staff, whose responsibilities will include public relations and social media platforms. In collaboration with our Key Partners, we are developing several projects that will start in 2019. Some are directly related to the artist residency programme, while others are independent and are organised through special working groups. The knowledge and expertise of our partners are vital to us and to our future development. ARTISTS NOMINATED FOR 2019 Queen Sonja Print Award Julie Ebbing Emma Stibbon Giancarlo Scaglia Office for Contemporary Art Norway (OCA) Dominique G. Forster Sille Storihle Norwegian PEN Juni Dahr Fadi Abou Hassan Hans-Olav Thyvold Benedicte Meyer Kronenberg
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EVENTS/PROJECTS Artica Listens From 2019 onwards, our main annual event will be called “Artica Listens”. In both 2019 and 2020 the theme for the event will be the Svalbard Treaty, as we approach the 100th anniversary of the treaty next year. Many people are unaware of the Svalbard Treaty, and we want to inform people about it and promote reflection and constructive discussion ahead of next year’s anniversary. Within Artica Listens, we are running the project Artica Writings Extended: The theme is the same, but this time it is based on literature and the written word. A series of articles by various Norwegian and international writers will follow over the coming months, and the project will be concluded in the autumn at an event to present and debate a selection of the pieces that have been written. 120 Hours 120 Hours is the world’s biggest international architecture competition for students. We have worked with the project group on this year’s assignment, which is based on Longyearbyen. At a time when Svalbard is clearly suffering from a housing crisis, due to the risk of landslides and the demolition of over 140 housing units, we want to make our voice heard in the discussion over the future urban development of the town. This year 120 hours will focus on long-term, environmentally friendly and sustainable urban development. Installation at Vinkelstasjonen in the Adventdalen valley and artist conversation at Artica The Colombian artist Oswaldo Maciá spent the month of November 2018 at Artica, nominated by our Key Partner the Office for Contemporary Art (OCA). Maciá, who mainly works with sounds and smells, went on a number of local excursions to places in and around Longyearbyen to record the sound of the wind. His project will culminate in a major presentation at Vinkelstasjonen in the Adventdalen valley in 2019. It’s name is A Gift to Svalbard, as it is about giving something back to a place that has traditionally been
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exploited in so many different ways (for mining and tourism, for example). We will fill Vinkelstasjonen with sound, light, smells and printmaking, and ferry the local people out to Adventdalen in buses. Arctic Chamber Music Festival We will follow up last year’s collaboration by doing even more and participating in the project group for the festival. This year we will bring in two international musicians/sound artists: We will present one work of sound art and one music video entitled Guitar sounds by the German musician Schneider TM at Taubanesentralen. At Artica’s workshop, the Venezuelan musician and sound artist Rubén Dhers will present a new installation.
OTHER EVENTS AND PROJECTS We are planning many new projects for 2019. They include presenting Spitsbergen Makerspace – a future-oriented ideas lab focusing on technology and reuse – and an international chef residency, which will see chefs from all over the world come to explore using local raw ingredients from the Arctic. We will also incorporate the culinary arts into our artist presentations and other events. In addition to all of this, we will continue to work with a number of local festivals and events, including once again bringing international authors to the literature festival through our Key Partner Norwegian PEN. We will expand our collaboration with Project Isfjorden, with four different international artists helping to organise workshops to create public sculptures and installations out of the rubbish collected during beach clean-ups, which will then be displayed in Longyearbyen town centre. Our series of creative writing workshops in collaboration with local authors will also continue, with further sessions being held at our workshop this spring. We will also present various other artists over the course of the year. Streaming and podcasts Digital platforms are exceptionally important to Artica Svalbard. Live video streams and podcasts have a vital role to play, and after starting to use them in 2018 they will be fully up and running in 2019. As we said earlier, local and global issues are intertwined on Svalbard, so we want to have an even more international slant in the future. From 2019 onwards, most of our events and our activities will be streamed.
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6. FINANCIAL STATEMENTS
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