Open Call:

Enacting text / Performing Social Progress

Deadline for receiving proposals: 07 May 2012
Announcement of selected participants: 08 May 2012

Photographer: Marielle Lyseggen, Mia Habib in a Couple Dance

Workshop Period: 16-25 May 2012
Location: Academy of Music, Theater and Fine Arts; Muzeul Zemstvei
Participants: 10 persons will be selected from Moldova, Romania and Ukraine
Organizers: KSAK-Center for Contemporary Art, Chisinau & Les Ateliers du Vent, Rennes

Workshop Contents and Structure:
The workshop is a new practice-oriented platform organized in collaboration by Les Ateliers du Vent and the Center for
Contemporary Art- ksak in Chisinau. The workshop's point of departure will be the texts and legacy of Urmuz (author of absurdist short
prose and poetry, influential for the development of Dadaism and the Theatre of the Absurd), Daniil Harms (Soviet-era surrealist
and absurdist poet, writer and playwright, founder of the avant-garde collective OBERIU, or "Union of Real Art"), and
Henri Michaux (Belgian-born French painter, journalist, and poet, who explored the inner self and human suffering through dreams,
fantasies, and drug-induced experiments; Michaux's work show his interest in Surrealism, but he never joined the movement, and his
writings avoid all classifications), which will foster the process of creation of specific forms between performing art, contemporary
dance and performance practices, involving students, artists and teachers from state institutions from the Republic of Moldova,
Romania and Ukraine. Invited tutors from the Les Ateliers du Vent and from Norway and Romania will coordinate the theoretical and
practical sections, as well as the final presentation of the workshop results. The aesthetic position of Urmuz and Daniil Harms,
centered on a belief in art's independence from real world rules and logic will be questioned in the new social and political
circumstances, based on the reuse and reevaluation of their short prose and poetry. The participants can choose to work as a group
or individually, the same way they can choose between working with one of the tutors and getting advice from all of them.

Guest tutors & content of the theoretical and production workshop:
Mia Habib (synopsis) (Oslo, Norway) is a choreographer, dancer and researcher. Identity, religious and cultural
convergence, and the individual in relation to oppressive structures and regimes are recurring themes in her work
* Theoretical presentation/lecture: Dance as Interventions & Micro Politics, moving through meaning while loosing it.
* Production workshop: The participants are invited to share a set of quotes with the group related to their questions and
work in the frame of the workshop (possibly quotes relating to the texts from Harms, Urmuz, Tzara) . These quotes will be
available for the group to form a map/landscape of content/ questions for the workshop.

Alexandru Antik (synopsis) (Cluj, Romania) is a lecturer and visual artist, works in genres: installation,
performance, media art. Research on Visual art; Visual communication; Media history; Multimedia and Intermedia.
* Theoretical presentation/lecture: "An inspirative presentation of the actionism", a non-academic presentation about verbal
and visual expressions, absurd and paradoxical of the surrealism, Dada, about genres: artistic actions, happening, performance.
* Practical workshop: The proposal has two approaches, in order to involve participants in the workshop:
1) An initiation in several "brainstorming exercises".
2) Conceptual scenarios of some artistic actions and implementation of these actions.

Alain Helou (synopsis) (Rennes, France) is one of the founders and the main coordinator of the artistic collective
Les Ateliers du Vent. His personal artistic practice is rooted in multidisciplinarity. Director and actor and poetry lover.
* Theoretical presentation/lecture: The limits of representation concerning links between performance and performing art.
* Production workshop: Using the text «Le drame des constructeurs» by Henri Michaux, reading it but not performing it,
just taking it as a source of inspiration, to create something else, in resonance with it but also and mainly with specific
issues of the participants and considering the specific political and social situation in which they are involved.

Skills gained by taking the workshop:
At the end of the theoretical workshop the participants will have obtained basic information about performing art,
contemporary dance and performance practices. At the end of the production workshop each participant will perform a solo piece
(up to 10-20min. duration), which will be presented in the frame of the Tandem project exhibition at the Muzeul Zemstvei, Chisinau.

Practical information:
Selected participants will receive reimbursement for travel costs (train or bus), their accommodations and meals will be
covered by the organizer for the duration of the workshop.
There are no participation fees.

Criteria and submissions:
The applicants should be nationals or residents of Moldova, Romania & Ukraine. We are looking for inspired proposals from
visual artists and actors – students from the Art Academy in Chisinau and from the region. The interested students must prepare
a proposal package containing the following documents: a CV (1 page), a short statement about their particular interest in this
workshop (150 words), a proposal for a performance (500-600 words). The application documents should be sent as a single file (.doc,
.rtf or .pdf) by email. If the applicants would like to submit samples of previous works, the package can be sent by post
to the address below, but the electronic documents should also be sent separately by email to:
Lilia Dragneva: dragneva@gmail.com
Alain Helou: cheloups@gmail.com
Address: Center for Contemporary Art, Chisinau -[KSA:K],
Str. Banulescu-Bodoni 5, ap. 2
MD-2009, Chisinau,
Republica Moldova
GSM +373 (0) 69237056
Tel/fax: +373 22 237272

Center for Contemporary Art-[KSA:K] is a non-profit, independent institution registered in the year 2000. The new
strategy of the Center is the development of cultural forms and art practices, which would reflect the dynamic of the social, political
and economic transformations of the society. Center pleads for the advocacy activities in promoting of the cultural
policies suitable for the defining and the consolidation of the artist's position and contemporary art practices in the society.
http://www.art.md

Les Ateliers du Vent is a multidisciplinary artist collective founded in 1996. They have carried out more than one
hundred projects; investment and redevelopment of four sites and a great desire to share the work and discoveries with local
people and the city in general. Ever since the beginning, the collective Les Ateliers du Vent has considered the international
dimension of their work as an anchor for their local activities. “The house we are building would be meaningless without large windows
open to the world. “ They promote varied, enriching exchanges among artists and between artists and the audience. These exchanges
are becoming a tangible, physical network to allow regular confrontation of constantly moving identities.
http://www.lesateliersduvent.org

This Workshop is produced in collaboration by KSAK-Center for Contemporary Art, Chisinau & Les Ateliers du Vent,
Rennes in the frame of TANDEM Project.

Enacting text / Performing Social Progress Workshop is a part of Drifting Identities Project developed in the
frame of HEICO Network.

This project is supported by European Commission, ECF (European Cultural Foundation), Amsterdam and ICR, Chisinau (Institutul
Cultural Roman).

Project partners: MitOst, CAE, CCM, SFM, Robert Bosch Foundation, Alliance Francaise de Moldavie, Teatrul Spalatorie,
Academy of Music, Theater and Fine Arts, Chisinau.