SARIEV Contemporary Gallery and Open Arts Foundation present:
INTRODUCTION TO CONTEMPORARY ART
in Capital LIGHT
SARIEV Contemporary Gallery, Open Arts Foundation and Capital LIGHT are pleased to announce the launch of the "Introduction to Contemporary Art" column in Capital LIGHT The first text of the column is from the Saturday, June 22 issue of the magazine.
The "Introduction to Contemporary Art" column by SARIEV Contemporary Gallery and Open Arts Foundation continues the lineage of their joint educational program. In it, the pages of Capital LIGHT introduce the audience to the latest trends, the leading art cities and the most interesting events, what is the role of collecting and who are the most influential curators, artists and more.
For over eight years, Open Arts Foundation and SARIEV Contemporary Gallery have been working to promote contemporary art in Bulgaria and to build awareness and understanding of it. Driven by this mission, they created their joint educational program.
One of its key projects is the platform "Introduction to Contemporary Art". It was launched in 2011 with an educational course in Sofia, followed by a series of lectures by artists and curators in Sofia and Plovdiv. The platform was developed years ago with the curators Vera Mlechevska, Svetlana Kuyumdzhieva and Vesela Nojarova. So far, six editions have been realized in Sofia and two in Plovdiv. This year, the platform has started its expansion with new formats and ways of communication with the audience - in Plovdiv an Introduction to Contemporary Art Club has been launched, and in Sofia lecture tours with the artist Lachezar Boyadzhiev have started.
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What to expect in the first issue of the column
"Three Kilometres of Happiness" is a text by Bulgarian curator and critic Maria Vassileva about Hristo Yavashev-Christo and his installation The Floating Piers on Lake Iseo in Italy. In the article you will be able to read more about the installation, which opened a few days ago and is described as the artist's most complex work to date. Maria Vassileva is one of the curators in Bulgaria most familiar with Christo's work. In 2015, she curated the first exhibition in Bulgaria with works by Jean-Claude and Christo.
The full text can be found HERE, as well as in the print edition of LIGHT this Saturday, June 25.
More about our educational program
The Introduction to Contemporary Art educational platform includes:
- Lectures with guest speakers (artists and curators from Bulgaria and abroad) moderated by Vera Mlechevska in Sofia annually since 2012.
- Lecture tours with Lachezar Boyadzhiev in Sofia since 2016
- Educational course Plovdiv with moderator Vesela Nozharova annually since 2015 and 2016.
Club "Introduction to Contemporary Art" - Plovdiv since 2016.
Along with the "Introduction to Contemporary Art" platform, the educational program of SARIEV Contemporary Gallery and Open Arts Foundation also includes:
- The publishing project "Introduction to Bulgarian Contemporary Art" - the first bilingual history of Bulgarian contemporary art. The first book on contemporary art in Bulgaria. The book is to be presented in the summer of 2018.
- Since its inception in 2008, Artnewscafe newsletter has aimed to inform about exhibitions and events in the field of contemporary art across the country. It is distributed digitally through its own mobile app for iOS and Android, a mailing list, a free downloadable pdf and a Facebook page. In 2015, the website www.artnewscafe.com/bulletin was launched, where in addition to news, interviews and critical texts are published.
- Collectors Forum is a project that aims to promote collecting in Bulgaria. The first edition of the forum was in 2011 and then speakers from the UK, Austria, Hungary, Belgium and Bulgaria.