[spectre] kapelica gallery > terror=decor, a series of panels: Torino-Beirut-New York

[jurij krpan]

TERROR=DECOR
A series of panels: Torino - Beirut - New York

TORINO, Monday, May, 12 2003, 5 pm
Amantes, Via Principe Amedeo 38/a, Torino

TERROR=DECOR is a series of art projects which ZIGA KARIZ started in 
1997. The latest TERROR=DECOR: ART NOW will take place at the 50. Venice 
Biennial as the exhibition in the Slovenian Pavilion from June,13 till 
September, 30 2003. The project questions the aesthetics of the violence 
of armed utopian movements, which, influenced by the art industry, are 
transformed into decorative images that can find its way into every 
surrounding, every single apartment belonging to precisely the same 
structure of power which the radical utopian movements had once criticized.

Topic: we have planned a series of panels in which we are intending to 
confront the different principles of aesthetics which encourage the 
commodification of utopian ideologies. The panel will address such 
issues as the images of violence in mass culture, inherent in genres 
spanning from documentaries to high concept movies, which pave the way 
to ideologies of power and which can be recognized in totalitarianisms 
of the cultural industry/ art market.

Panelists: the participants will include former political radicals, 
political commentators who shape the everyday public opinion and media 
theoreticians reflecting upon the effects of media manipulation.

Participants in Torino: Ziga Kariz, artist, Alberto Franceschini, 
cofounder of Brigatte Rose, Antonio Caronia, media theoretician, Jurij 
Krpan, commissioner of Slovenian Pavilion (A+A Gallery) in 50. Venice 
Biennial, Alessandro Stillo, moderator.
The panel in Torino was prepared in collaboration with art space Amantes 
and Arci, Nuova Asoociazioni Comitato di Torino.

Date: three panels are to be organized before the Venice Biennial. The 
panel in Torino is on May, 12 2003, in Beirut is planned for the second 
half of May and in New York on May, 28 2003.

Issues: the following issues are to be examined:
- the relationship between the preconceived gaze at a painting as an 
aesthetic surface and gaze of the painting's creator.
- different forms of presentations of terrorists acts (Brigatte Rosse, 
Hamas, al Qaida), thushighlighting the differences between the archaic 
and modern categories of terrorist utopias
- the potential application of these images to elite art production
- the fictional representation of violence in Hollywood films and its 
influence on the attitude towards real violent scenes
- the questionable effects of the commodification of violence in 
relation to the institutions abusing these effects, including art and 
politics
- the connection between surveillance which results in greater freedom 
and surveillance which inhibits it: the problem of conscious waiving of 
the rights to privacy
- the transcripts/reports of the panels will be included in the 
catalogue published before the Venice Biennial



Kapelica Gallery - Gallery for contemporary investigative arts
Kersnikova 4, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenija
tel.: +386 1 43 80 302, fax: +386 1 43 80 202, gallery at kapelica.org