[spectre] Fw: Report Forum Thessaloniki December 2001

[Misko]

Forwarded by Misko <mpandil@soros.org.mk>
Date:    Fri, 25 Jan 2002 17:33:48 +0100
Subject: Report Forum Thessaloniki December 2001
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FORUM 2001
ARTISTIC MOBILITY IN A MULTICULTURAL EUROPE
7 - 9 December 2001 / Thessaloniki

1. General report on the Forum 2001

The FORUM 2001 on Artistic Mobility in a Multicultural Europe concluded its proceedings on 9th December. The exhibitions organised to coincide with the Forum will continue until the end of January 2002.
For the second year in succession the State Museum of Contemporary Art, the Thessaloniki Contemporary Art Centre, the Macedonian Museum of Contemporary Art, the independent cultural agency Apollonia-European Artistic Exchanges, based in Strasbourg, and ArtBox/Arts Management, based in Thessaloniki, have collaborated, in pursuit of the initiative started last year, in a project to establish a regular annual institution whose objective is to activate mechanisms for cultural exchanges among the states of south-eastern Europe and to pave the way for long-term collaborations and joint ventures.
Thus for three days (7-9 December 2001) the city of Thessaloniki has played host to a number of eminent figures from the world of the arts, who have tried, among other things, to examine the possibility of setting up the network SEECAN and the way in which it might function.
More specifically, the delegates focused on the difficulties encountered by artists in seeking to travel in the region and take an active part in the programmes arranged in other European countries. They also discussed ways of promoting all the various aspects and forms of contemporary activity in the arts.

During the presentations and debates among the members of the FORUM organising and advisory committees discussion focused on: the need to establish the FORUM with a permanent base in Thessaloniki and to plan annual conferences at least as far ahead as the year 2004; the establishment of a permanent agency providing coordination and secretarial support for the FORUM in Thessaloniki, the agency to operate on a year-round basis monitoring the networking of the Centres, Museums and various agencies involved in the contemporary arts in the Balkans and south-eastern Europe; the exchange and dissemination of information, and, finally, the creation of a centre for the documentation of contemporary art from south-eastern Europe, in association with the Documentation Centre of the Skopje Centre for Contemporary Art and the French Institute of Thessaloniki.

The exhibitions organised to coincide with the FORUM 2001 and were open as follows:

- 'Dromos' an exhibition of photographs by Milcho Manchevski: 6 December 2001 - 6 January 2002 (State Museum of Contemporary Art, Lazariston Monastery)
- 'Beauty and the Beast': 8 December 2001 - 8 January 2002 (Macedonian Museum of Contemporary Art)
- 'Tappeto Volante', project by the Stalker Group: 8 December 2001 - 31 January 2002 (Alatza Imaret)
- 'Festival of Balkan Video Art': 7 December 2001 - 7 January 2002 (Mylos Centre)


Comments by Zoran Eric and Shalva Khakhanashvili :

The initiative that started with the first Forum organized in Thessaloniki in October 2000 set the platform that has proven to be very productive and important for the development of regional network and co-operation. This years Forum continues to put new energy in the same direction. Besides the academic debates of the Forum that sometimes did tend to focus on local problems with cultural institutions, it was clear that there should be more initiatives for projects in and with the region; for more frequent bilateral cooperation of the countries in the region; and finally for more firm infrastructure that would support the regional network SEECAN and its ongoing and future projects. 
Zoran Eric
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There are few ideas, that I could give as observations during the Forum. 
1. The Forum, organised already second time, I observe that it progresses and taking the importance. The Forum, strong and representative not only for Greece but for whole Region is an important instrument for further art-exchange process. The very active participation of local art milieu is a optimistic note to make. 
2. Hope, that SEECAN network would become more important, then we saw in Thessaloniki. Probably, we should delegate more the Bureau, which would make a reports on such a Forums and give the possibilities to generate the concepts and ideas coming from all the consultative committee members, which are so NON existant !
 3. Though the fact of 1st issue of SEECAN is great! It's evident that in future we would need a sort of Editorial Board, which would make a research and application of the topics representing the countries of regions on the equal basis. Or, making the topics covering the certain countries per issue, with more deep analysis and visual materials and not only a list of realised events! And probably the Bureau should be consulted at least before the issue is coming out. 
Thank you for the Forum organisers and the Apollonia receiving the interesting reporters and wish this activity will become more precise in character and permanent in time. 
Shalva Khakhanashvili


2. SEECAN Advisory Board Meeting

1.  journal 
- first issue
The first issue of the journal of the network SEECAN has been published in December as a supplement within the polish magazine Arteon. It contains 20 pages and the articles have been mainly written by members of the network or with the help of them : Luchezar Boyadjiev, Nada Beros, Nicolas Petrovitch, Huseyin Alptekin,.
The graphism has been made by Valentin Stefanoff who has been employed for 2 months for this mission.
You should receive this magazine very soon.

- next publication
We should decide of an editorial committee (3 persons) that will be in charge entirely of the concept of this next issue. This team would work closely with one person in charge of the conception/graphism of the magazine. We are waiting for your suggestions concerning the 3 persons for the editorial committee.
We also think that the idea of being hosted in another magazine was quite efficient in term of diffusion, we would like to have your remark about it.


2. Database
The database launched by Melentie Pandilovski concentrates the information about Contemporary Art in South-East Europe. One of the aims of this project is to build the information infrastructure of the South East Europe Contemporary Art Network, assisting the process of sharing of data between artists and institutions in the region. Needless to say that this will represent an important move as art historians, curators, artists, aestheticians, students, and journalists will have a better insight for the artistic and cultural scene of the Balkans. The web site of the Database can be found on www.seecan.org.mk

Conceptually the Database has been imagined to be as straightforward as possible, containing basic important data and recent information in the field of contemporary art from the entire region, such as: 
- Cultural institutions with contact and addresses (Contemporary Art Centres, Cultural Ministries, Galleries, Contemporary Art Museums)
- Artists (Biographies, Presentations, Projects, Works/Images) 
- Opportunities (Artists' Residencies, Summer Universities, Programs of the Universities)
- Artistic Revues/Magazines
- News
- Activities, Forums, Conferences, Summer Universities, Biennales
- Grants and Funding (Programs of Ministries/ Foundations)
-  General Information about SEECAN (Members/ Bureau/Consultative Committee).

The Database is being produced by the Contemporary Art Center in Skopje, which has produced several other functioning and complex databases such as the Database and Information System for Contemporary Art Institutions in Macedonia. 

IMPORTANT : We are still waiting for more informations concerning certain countries, please if you have informations to give for the database, contact Melentie at : misko@scca.org.mk



Apollonia for the network SEECAN





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Melentie Pandilovski
Director
Contemporary Arts Center  - Skopje
Orce Nikolov 109, 1000 Skopje
Republic of Macedonia
Tel/Fax: +389.2.133.541
Tel/Fax: +389.2.214.495
Mobile: +389.70.217.075
http://www.scca.org.mk
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