Sachgebiete

Beschreibung:

251 S.; zahlr. Illustr.; 25 cm; fadengehefteter, illustr. Orig.-Pappband

Bemerkung:

Sehr gutes Ex. - Englisch, spanisch u.a. - In a conference, responding to a question on the Ataskoa project that she carried out in 2005 in the Basque Country's Aralar Mountains. The project brought together diverse individuals, groups, community networks, classes, ages, and genders from all over the country, including Intza, the little mountain village. Even contrasting voices were present: both car lovers and collectors who enjoyed showing off their antique cars and environmentalists who took the event as an opportunity to protest against the automobile culture and the pollution it causes. Although there appears to be an evident political cause for the environmentalist group in this project, the artist is actually not concerned with creating projects which walk the line between art and activism. She is more interested in the micro social models in which she foresees and creates possibilities for unexpected, intimate and unique encounters between people. 'All works of art produce a model of sociability which transposes reality, or might be conveyed in it. So there is a question we are entitled to ask when faced with any aesthetic production: "Does this work allow me to enter into dialogue? Could I exist in the space it defines, and how?"'3 Nicolas Bourriaud put forth the coexistence criterion when terming the art of the 1990s 'relational art', which he defines as 'a set of artistic practices which take as their theoretical and practical point of departure the whole of human relations and their social context, rather than an independent and private space'.4 The 'relationality' of the artwork with its physical, urban, social, political and economic environment and historical context, moreover, its engagement with the publics, is also a focal point in Lopez's practice. In this respect, her work can be considered to be in the vein of 'relational aesthetics'. However, although her projects are mostly based on mediating human relations, visuality and form are a significant part of her projects that embodies relational aesthetics with form. She initiates festive gatherings or event-based projects that allow micro socialisations in which there is always a strong visual component and in which spatial and formal organisation plays an important role, making each project a singular and unique work of art. Articulating the politics of everyday life, in each project, she tailors specific strategies and plans in order to research and test how and in what conditions individuals from different parts of society can come together to act together, especially in the precarious times we are living in. However, Lopez's practice goes beyond cultivating human relations and empowering the publics to bring forth their capacity for change. ? Coexistence and hybridity underlie her work, as in the Football Field project that she developed in the context of the 9th Sharjah Biennial, 2007. Having converted an existing square into a football pitch in which the ordinary functions of the square continued to exist, and benches, lampposts and passers-by interfered with the game, she developed a situation where both the players and the square's usual frequenters not only adapted to the situation, but also experienced the urban public space in an unusual way, one that created unique interactions and communications. Challenging the top-down design and set functions of architecture and urban public spaces, with slight alterations and interventions, she endeavours to reinvent public spaces through the actions, use and daily routines of diverse publics. Lopez starts her projects either from the spatial context and site-specific content of a place such as the Aralar Mountains, the polders in the Netherlands, or the bridge over the Danube river, and builds events from this starting point, or by spotting and highlighting existing public spaces that have the capacity for such temporary micro social confrontations and hybrid interactions. uJith In Situ (2012), for instance, she spotted 9 public spaces in Urdaibai where short moments of encounter are possible: for example, the water fountain where people went to fill their bottles, the level crossing where people would wait behind barriers for the passing train, and the two benches at the entrance of the Bermeo Town Hall that invite unusual encounters. On the other hand, with Making Ways (2013), which she carried out for the 13th Istanbul Biennial, she excavated the spontaneous collective movements of the residents of Istanbul at the pedestrian crossing in Karakoy, a central transportation hub where traffic and pedestrians coexist side by side. She made an aerial film of this pedestrian crossing, from which she extracted and highlighted the collective routes that pedestrians took randomly for two minutes and fifteen seconds between 6.03 p.m. and 6.05 p.m. on 2 August, 2013. Having revealed the latent potential in the daily practices of Istanbulites, the practice of self-organisation through simple daily actions, she created a 'user's manual' providing possible instructions on how to cross the roads, and perhaps more: 'Taking action is easier when a group is generated', or 'Self-organisation creates collective ways'. ? (S. 32 u. 33) ISBN 9788479077365