Participating artists: Beata Berggren, Erica Bergman, Stefan Berntzen, David Helander, Anna Henriksson, Ingela Johansson, Moa Krestesen, Jonas Larsson, Stefan Larsson/QNQ, Katarina Pirak Sikku, JM Schmidt and Anna Westin. Curator: Power Ekroth.
Dispatched is the title of the 2005 graduation exhibition from Umeå Academy of Fine Arts at Umeå University. The exhibition is based on the situation in which the 12 new artists find themselves. They have been sent out from five years of relatively sheltered existence into a reality filled with other actors, such as gallery owners, curators, critics, artists and not least the public. The title of the exhibition also refers to the works of art that the exhibiting artists have now despatched to an audience.
At Bildmuseet, the twelve artists demonstrate their versatility – in both their choice of medium and their content and expression – and are really given space. The visitor will encounter the diversity represented by today’s artists as a whole. You could describe the exhibition as a kind of litmus test for what the art world in a ‘glocal’ world looks like today. It includes paintings, video documentaries, photography, performance, installations, conceptual art, sculpture, video installations and even a soapbox car.
The catalogue includes a selection of the artists’ work and texts produced especially for the exhibition, as well as a longer essay by Daniel Birnbaum – one of the curators of the 2003 Venice Biennale and this year’s Moscow Biennale – on what an art school actually is and means today. There are also texts by six young, active players within the art field: gallery owners Peter Bergman and Natalia Goldin Lundh, curators Stella d’Ailly and Niklas Östholm, and writers Natalia Kazmierska and Kim West. They will take part in an open seminar on May 6, in collaboration between Umeå Academy of Fine Arts and Bildmuseet.
This year’s guest coordinator is Power Ekroth, a freelance curator and writer, and editor of SITE magazine. She is also a critic for the magazines Artforum.com, Contemporary, Flash Art and Kunstkritikk.no.
