[spectre] Re:(6) Is the ICC (Tokyo) closing?

[Andreas Broeckmann]

shu lea wrote:
>Where we go from here?
>we are going or already gone.
>I claim myself as an institutional squater, the intervention tactie
>has shifted grounds. The field of media practices shifting to mobile,
>distributed network is in parallel development of the shrinking media centers.
>We did not stop (net)working. We are mining the urbanscape.
>Sure, pilgrimage and accreditation do ensure you are still 'seen' (by whom
>is another matter). But we are going places, the sprouting of small 
>media ventures in 'backspaces'.........

i agree with shu lea that we are 'already going' - in a way we are in 
a process that requires us to redefine the position of media culture 
in a broader cultural context.

for me an important question is whether such tactical artistic work 
as shu lea's is possible without institutions that help you realise 
bigger productions and create a critical mass in terms of general and 
special audiences for those productions to keep on rolling. shu lea, 
tell me if i am wrong, but it seems that much of your work for 
instance in the last years has been dependent on institutional 
structures that have provided venues and organisational structures 
for raising funds and for promoting the projects even when they 
happened in urban spaces, right?

another important question is, of course, whether the institutions 
that exist actually serve that purpose and help the production and 
presentation of artworks; we have been through many discussions over 
the last years, complaining about bigger institutions (which are 
still really small when compared to the high-culture titanic 
structures of theatres and museums) becoming more and more 
self-absorbed.

i cannot really say much about the actual role that the ICC has 
played in japan over the last 10 years, besides being a beacon of 
internationally oriented activities with high-profile events, and 
certainly an important motor of discourse. what i am concerned about 
is that, just as the existence of ICC, ZKM, AEC have until now worked 
as an argument to support smaller media art initiatives all over the 
world, the demise of the ICC could be used by local politicians 
everywhere as an argument that 'media art is finished' ... - so, not 
least, i am afraid that we might face a communication problem when we 
talk about public funding, if this trend continues.

so much for the moment. back to work.

greetings,
-a