Prior to joining CCA, Viviana produced a range of international projects including curating the Young Artist of the Year Award 2014 (YAYA) at the A.M. Qattan Foundation in Ramallah which supports young Palestinian artists and artists of Palestinian descent; being part of a curatorial team for the 4th Athens Biennale which won the 2015 European Cultural Foundation Princess Margriet Award for Culture; and working as co-director of vessel in Puglia, Italy, which is a platform for critical discussion related to cultural, social, economic and political change through communities. She has also curated with Eastside Projects, Birmingham; Nottingham Contemporary and Nitra Gallery, Slovakia.

Here, Viviana talks us through her first five jobs.

Intern at the Museum of Capodimonte in Naples, Italy, 2005.
I covered various roles but mainly took care of a touring exhibition of tapestries. I digitised the documents of the tapestries related to Cervantes’ major work Don Quixote, considered to be the first modern European novel. Then we organised for 23 tapestries to be exhibited in Rome at the Quirinal Palace, one of the current official residences of the President of the Italian Republic.

Haircut model in Milan, Italy, 2006 – 2008.
I was working as a model for Mind agency taking part in hairstylist training, workshops and shows. My haircut would change every three weeks. Sometimes they would try new products or very extravagant colours on me. It was very good fun!

Translator/Associate Assistant for Baldini e Castaldi Dalai Ed in Milan, Italy, 2006 – 2008.
I was responsible for translation of the Oxford Companion for Art as well as the coordination of a team of translators. I also collaborated with B&C Dalai for their new art website.

Teacher for an elementary school in Naples, Italy, 2008.
I gave classes to parents in deprived communities which focussed on the use of art as a tool to connect with their kids. We explored the origin of art media and art formats. We analysed landscapes and portrait production in modern art and we made our own portraits. It was really inspiring!

Researcher for the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Bratislava-Slovakia, 2008 –2009.
I researched the development of the contemporary art system in Slovakia. The research project was hosted by the University Komenského and the Slovak National Gallery (SNG) of Bratislava. I was working under the guidance of Alexandra Kusa who was the curator for the contemporary art section at that time and is now the director of the gallery. She has been a great inspiration to me! This experience acted as a springboard for my curatorial career.

The current series of events Cooking Pot is now ongoing at the CCA, Glasgow. Find more information here.

More: Facebook | Twitter

//////

We’ve asked professionals in creative industries what jobs they have had in the past to get their foot through the door (or at least pay the rent). For more in the “My First 5 Jobs” series look here.

videoclub is a platform for artists’ film and video. Its intention is to support artists, but also to showcase new artists’ film to the public to increase public engagement with artists’ moving image, and to create opportunities for critical engagement with contemporary art work.

Selected is a collaboration between videoclub and Film London Artists’ Moving Image Network (FLAMIN), and is designed to present a cross-section of work by British-based artists across the UK. In the spirit of Derek Jarman’s life and work as a queer activist and convention-defying filmmaker, Selected celebrates innovation, experimentation and risk-taking in artists’ film.

Selected 5 features early career artists’ film nominated by 2014 Jarman Award shortlisted artists and touring the UK. Included in the programme are works by UK-based Lucy Beech, Tom Lock, Kate Cooper, and Min-Wei Ting presented in conversation with some of the artists themselves.

Friendly Things from the Future by Nicholas-Brooks

The only way she could ever look good is with distance by Richard Sides

This year videoclub celebrates the 5th edition of Selected by continuing to offer a strong sense of commentary on contemporary culture. Kate Cooper’s Rigged explores the objectification of women and the increasing plasticisation of culture; whilst Lucy Beech’s Cannibals presents a satirical look at the cult of self help.

Jamie Wyld, Director of videoclub, says: “Selected 5 screenings offer audiences an opportunity to see work by artists at the forefront of this cutting edge artform and enter into a conversation with them about the thinking behind their work.”

Selected will be touring to six venues in the UK, including: CCA, Glasgow (28 May); CIRCA Projects at The Northern Quarter, Newcastle (10 June); Fabrica, Brighton (11 June); Nottingham Contemporary (21 July); and Whitechapel Gallery, London (23 July).

More: Website | Twitter

//////

Find more events in our weekly bulletin here.

Founded by Glasgow based sound artist and radio producer Mark Vernon, Radiophrenia is a temporary art radio station exploring current trends in sound and transmission arts. Broadcasting from the Centre for Contemporary Arts (CCA) in Glasgow, Radiophrenia aims to promote radio as an art form, encouraging experimental approaches to the medium not catered for by mainstream stations.

The schedule includes live shows and pre-recorded features, the majority of which are comprised of selections submitted to an international open call for sound and radio works. The schedule includes soundscapes, spoken word, documentary, drama, radio experiments, found sound and radical new programme ideas.

The motivation behind setting up the station was to provide an alternative to the often stale and bland radio formats of commercial radio. It is intended as a rallying point for people who are working creatively with sound and radio, particularly in Scotland but also internationally. The aim is to unite local artists, musicians, radio producers and listeners around a free thinking and versatile art radio station that is not afraid to take risks with the type of content it programmes. It aspires to provide a platform for experimental approaches to radio not catered for by conventional stations and to encourage artists who may not normally work with sound to create and experiment with the medium.

A Scottish station focussing entirely on sound and radio art was long overdue. There is an expanding network of independent art stations around the world who support radiophonic art and offer similar broadcast opportunities. Radiophrenia is in part a reciprocal gesture aimed at strengthening these connections and exchanging ideas whilst at the same time drawing attention to some of the great work that is being produced locally.

Shelly Nadashi still

Felix Kubin, Kubin Twins by Dorle Bahlburg

As an integral part of this celebration of radiophonic art we are also presenting a series of specially commissioned ‘live-to-air’ pieces from a mix of local and international artists. Not all of them have worked with radio previously but there has been something in their practice that led us to think they could do something interesting and unexpected with this opportunity. Selected artists have been asked to respond to the unique circumstances of creating a work that is simultaneously a live performance and a radio broadcast, reflecting the fact that there will be an audience present in the theatre in addition to an unseen audience of listeners at home. Commissioned artists include; Felix Kubin, The Resonance Radio Orchestra, Shelly Nadashi, Peter Lanceley, Kathryn Elkin, Nichola Scrutton, Elizabeth Veldon and Jim Colquhoun.

Performances will take place at 7pm daily in CCA 5. Each of these events is free and open to the public. Free but ticketed: Tickets available from CCA Box Office.

The CCA theatre space will be open to the public as a listening room for the broadcasts between 12pm and 4pm each day (except during sound checks).

Radiophrenia will be broadcasting 24 hours a day, 13 – 19 April on 87.9 fm and streaming online www.radiophrenia.scot.

More: Website | SoundCloud

//////

Find more events in our weekly bulletin here.

This year’s Crossing the Line expands upon the relationship between cinema and visual art into the fields of music and poetry, with world premieres of unique experimental works, installations combined with live performances, and boundary-breaking productions from emerging artists.

Below are summaries of the ten screenings and events that make up this year’s Crossing the Line programme.

Nancy Holt: Sun Tunnels

19 February | CCA
Our Extra-Sensory Selves
Allison Gibbs’ new film is the result of research conducted with the Development Circle for Radical Subjectivity in France which shows participants’ journeys as they attempt to reach a higher state of consciousness. Allison Gibbs will be present for a Q&A after the screening.

20 February | Stereo
Square Legs, Round Bowls
A programme of new works using film to inform musical composition and by visual artists that use musical structures in their film work. The event will include work by Torsten Lauschmann, Rob Churm, Joe Howe, Beatrice Gibson, Richy Carey and Anneke Kampman.

22 February | CCA
Nancy Holt: Sun Tunnels / Revolve
Margaret Tait Award-winner for 2014 Charlotte Prodger will introduce this double-bill of work by pioneering American artist and filmmaker Nancy Holt (1938-2014). Sun Tunnels documents Holt’s eponymous site-specific construction in the Utah desert in 1976. Revolve, meanwhile, uses multiple camera angles and repetitions to modulate Dennis Wheeler’s personal narrative of his battle with leukaemia.

22 February | CCA
Beauty and the Right to the Ugly
This piece is set in the Dutch community centre of ‘t Karregat, Eindhoven, built in 1974 as a social project designed to perpetuate communal styles of living and to transfer ownership of living, working and recreational environments back to users.

23 February | GFT
Margaret Tait Award Screening
Named after acclaimed Scottish experimental filmmaker Margaret Tait, this annual award recognises Scotland-based artists who work within film and moving image in an experimental and innovative way. 2014 award-winner, Charlotte Prodger premieres her work.

24 February | GFT
Margaret Tait Residency: O.K. Rick
The Margaret Tait Residency aims to support and develop emerging Scotland-based artists working within film and moving image. Florrie James participated in the residency in 2014 and will screen her short drama set on a fictional island inspired by both Orkney and Shetland.

25 February | CCA
Reading in the Dark
Exploring the overlaps between language and film, Reading in the Dark is the second instalment of the research project of artist Suzanne van der Lingen, who will present this programme of artist film and video with work from Sarah Forrest, Laure Prouvost, Peter Rose and Gerard Byrne.

Reading In The Dark

AlgoRhythm

26 February | The Art School
AlgoRhythm
A series of collaborative art and music events that bring together practitioners from a variety of creative fields who specialise in the use of technology in their practice.

27 February | CCA
Letters to Max
Letters to Max documents the conversations between Maxim Gvinja, former Minister of Foreign Affairs for Abkhazia, a state which seceded from Georgia during the 1992-93 civil war, and acclaimed French artist and filmmaker Eric Baudelaire.

28 February | GFT
Sea Without Shore **WORLD PREMIERE**
André Semenza and Fernanda Lippi of the renowned Zikzira Physical Theatre mark their feature debut in Sea Without Shore: a mix of cinematic physical theatre and dance with sound design overseen by the Oscar-winning Glenn Freemantle and a soundtrack by The Hafler Trio.

More: Website | Facebook | Twitter

//////

Find more events in our weekly bulletin here.

Not Finished Article (NFA) is a collective of four established women artists based in Scotland: Nicky Bird, Alicia Bruce, Caroline Douglas and Sylwia Kowalczyk. They told us a bit more about how they came together.

As a collective we have distinct, yet complementary practices which together incorporate photography, moving image, the found photograph and the museum collection. Portraiture and community collaboration also play a distinctive role.

We meet regularly in our studios to share work in progress and support one another. The group has been meeting informally for several years including summer trips to the opening week of Rencontres Arles photography festival. We secretly named ourselves PPP for a few years and having informal catch-ups at each others flats to share and discuss work (PPP meant Photography, Pizza and Pinot Grigio). This name changed to Not Finished Article when we started to get exhibition offers as a group including 2014 Frames projections at CCA, GI Festival and Street Level Photoworks.

NFA will discuss their collective practice at TalkSeePhotography’s February event this coming Monday 9 February at CCA, Glasgow. They will also reveal a new collaborative outdoor work at Porty Lightbox, Portobello, Edinburgh as part of ‘Exquisite’ International Women’s Day Exhibition running from Friday 6 March until April 2015.

Exquisite by NFA

More: Website | Twitter

//////

See more art & design collectives we’ve featured on the site. Think we should feature your collective? Get in touch.

Now let us make clear that to identify with history does not necessarily refer to the past. It can refer equally to the newest and extreme developments in art. We were concerned with sound itself. And sound does not know its history. -Morton Feldman.

Now in its third year, Counterflows is a contemporary music festival produced by Alasdair Campbell of AC Projects in partnership with Hamish Dunbar of Cafe Oto. It has been devised as a collaboration between two organisations committed to promoting challenging and thought provoking work in the context of what might be called the experimental music scene, looking at marginal music practice within an extensive list of music genres: Free Jazz, electronica, psychedelic pop, drone, hypno-psych voodoo groove, industrial, installation, anachronistic-field recordings, song, non-systematic classical, folk and more. We caught up with Alasdair who told us what to expect from this year’s programme…

The festival is about exploration and collaboration and brings together networks of artists, audiences and producers internationally and locally who share an adventurous outlook to the arts and are willing to participate and examine different practices and methods with the goal of creating new experiences within music and the arts.

A first glance at this year’s festival line-up may incur a confused reaction to the panoply of disparate artists performing. But of course this is anything but confusion. The intention to bringing the different styles and forms together under the banner of Counterflows is to really explore the vast expression of sound that is out there. As critics invent ever more genres and sub genres to classify theses musical endeavours Counterflows’ concerns are with the music itself. Juxtaposing artists whose practices may seem miles apart in the programme is exciting to me and may reveal to us something new that we had never thought of.

This leads nicely on to Joe McPhee, featured artist of this year’s festival. Joe ostensibly comes from the Jazz tradition from the line of Davis, Coltrane, Dolphy and so forth and on through his near contemporaries, Roscoe Mitchell, Henry Threadgill and Anthony Braxton who all share Joe’s multi-instrumentalist approach. But Joe, like all these musicians, creates music that refuses to be pinned down. Throughout the festival Joe will be collaborating in various contexts beginning with a solo set on Friday night before the new free funksters Whilst. Joe playing with Whilst could be a wonderful spontaneous happening.

There are threads that link performances throughout the festival. This is the intention and notion behind Counterflows. Maya Dunietz and Ghedalia Tazartes bring their intriguing exploration of voice to Saturday evening at CCA with Maya also performing the sublime music of Ethiopian born Emahoy Maryam Guebrou. The influences in Emahoy’s music are ancient and modern, African, European and everything else between. This links neatly with John Butcher’s new project Tarab Cuts which he’ll perform at the CCA with Mark Sanders. Tarab Cuts uses digitally transferred music from the Sufi Tarab tradition sourced from 78’s with Mark and John improvising themes and new music with and on top of these sounds. Again a clash of the ancient and modern.

Of course another theme to Counterflows is the commissioning of new projects. And this year is no exception with new work from Cara Tolmie & Paul Abbott, Luke Fowler, Mika Vainio & Lee Patterson and the beginnings of a new collaboration between Ela Orleans and film maker Maja Borg. The Counterflows residency will also explore new things this year developed by Rob Kennedy, Pete Dowling and Karena Nomi. There will be opportunities to find out what they are up to in the CCA’s Creative Lab from 4 – 7pm each evening from the 31 March to 5 April.

What to expect from these new ventures cannot be disclosed, that is the excitement of the process. -Alasdair Campbell

In music, when you do something new, something original, you’re an amateur. Your imitators – these are the professionals. -Morton Feldman

///

Counterflows runs from 4-6 April at various venues throughout Glasgow. For more information see the Counterflows website.

More:  Website | Facebook | Twitter

Emma Dove is an artist and documentary filmmaker originally from the Black Isle and currently working between Glasgow and the Scottish Highlands. Her work is interested in exploring relationships to place and stories hidden within the seemingly banal.

Mark Lyken is a multimedia artist based in Glasgow, he was first introduced to Dove during his Sublime artist’s residency at Cromarty Lighthouse during 2012. Lyken creates painting, sculpture, film and sound work with a current focus on installation and composition. Recent work has been concerned with revealing the musicality of the environment and beauty within the ordinary.

Mirror Lands is a film and sound installation exploring diverse relationships to The Black Isle.

The work weaves together sonic elements of the natural world with an original score. Contrasting local voices intermingle, rise and fall, sharing their personal memories, feelings and perceptions of place. Preconceived ideas of Highland life are challenged and the complex interactions between nature and culture are brought to the fore in this unique audio-visual experience.

The project is a collaboration between Mark Lyken, Emma Dove and Aberdeen University Ecologists from the Lighthouse Field Station in Cromarty.

Mark and Emma took some time to answer some questions about their process and the creation of  Mirror Lands:

What your workflow has been like from day to day?
The first four months of Mirror Lands were basically the inverse of what the last four months have been for us. From July to October last year we were outside every day, cycling to and from the Lighthouse Field Station in Cromarty where we were based, gathering shots and audio quite intuitively and speaking to lots of local people. The last four months, on the other hand, we’ve barely been outdoors and we’ve hardly seen a soul! To begin with it was sifting through hours and hours of audio and video, gradually refining what we wanted to use, then gradually piecing together something that felt representative of those first four months. The project also gave us a chance to realise a long standing dream of setting up our own “Soft Error” label. Our first release is a Mirror Lands box set that launches at the films Premiere with Cryptic at the CCA on March 6th.

Where do you look for inspiration?
Our friends are very inspiring folks and are probably the first port of call for us when bouncing ideas around. Living in the Southside of Glasgow, The Glad Cafe is definitely a hub of grassroots creativity and has a vibrant community vibe – you can just pop in there and soak it all up.
We could fill a whole page with the films & filmmakers that inspire us but a few special ones would be Nicholas Philibert’s “La Ville Louvre”, Thomas Reidelsheimer’s “Rivers and Tides” and “Sleep Furiously” by Giddeon Koppel. We are still discovering a lot of fantastic work – we recently watched ‘Silence’ by Pat Collins and we were literally in awe! On Mirror Lands we were thinking a lot about how different sounds and images work together, so I think we took a lot from sound artists who work very creatively with field recorded material, such as Cathy Lane, Annea Lockwood, Chris Watson, Yannik Dauby. We are lucky enough to have both Cathy Lane and Chris Watson joining us as guest speakers at our preview night. The fact we are opening with Cryptic and have two of our influences lending their support to the project is huge for us! In a more direct sense, we also drew a lot of food for thought from the research being carried out at the Lighthouse Field Station in Cromarty where we were based for the summer. There’s definitely a lot to be said for coffee breaks with a bunch of scientists in a Field Station staff room.

What tools do you use?
A compact run and gun style camcorder, which is especially useful when your main mode of transport is by bicycle! We also use a digital recorder for field recording and some different microphones, including some ‘binaural’ headphones and an underwater hydrophone, which are great fun.
As ever, the more equipment you work with, the more you feel you need… But budget and, as I mentioned, bikes, help rein that in!

Why did you choose The Black Isle?
It chose us, ha, ha. Emma was brought up on the Black Isle and Mark was an Artist in Residence on the Sublime Residencies at the Lighthouse Field Station in Cromarty in 2012. It was through both having worked with the Field Station during Sublime that ideas for Mirror Lands began to percolate and we then decided to return and work on a collaboration together.

Was there a reason you chose to focus on the sea?
The Lighthouse Field Station research focuses primarily on marine mammal and seabird behaviour as there is a large dolphin population in the Cromarty Firth and wider Moray Firth. We had previously joined the Ecologists in their research rib on Dolphin ID field trips – an activity which gives you a very specific experience and relationship to that patch of sea. The initial idea for Mirror Lands was to explore different people’s understandings, perceptions and relationships to that same patch throughout the community. This developed in to exploring a wider understanding of place, but I think the sea is fundamental to most people’s experience of the Black Isle, whether active or passive, it’s impossible to ignore it completely…

What sort of relationship is there between nature and culture and what made you want to explore it?
Our starting point for exploring the relationship between nature and culture was looking at the representation of the ‘natural’ world in natural history programming. But when you start thinking about the question of what is nature and what is culture you realise that neither exists independently of the other. In a chat with Prof. Paul Thompson at the Field Station about this, he mentioned, ‘But what is natural to an animal in the sea? Do they differentiate between a cliff wall and the harbour wall?’ I think this sums it all up quite well… But what we did come to realise is that there is far more that we don’t know about both the ‘natural’ and ‘human’ worlds than what we do – we barely touched upon an understanding of place during our time in Cromarty yet we learned so much from a handful of different conversations. Of course the more questions you ask, the more questions you have…

The film launches as part of Cryptic Nights at the CCA in Glasgow on 6th March and then moves on to Inverness Museum & Art Gallery (IMAG) from March 8th-29th.

Mark: Website | Facebook | Twitter
Emma: Website | Facebook | Vimeo | Twitter

//////

Want to read more blogs by artists? Look here.

With this year’s a-n Degree Shows Guide, guide editor Chris Sharratt and designer Alan Ward of Axis Design have tried to reflect a little of the energy and anticipation of this time, both for the graduating students and the rest of us. The guide also looks to the future and what happens next, once the shows are over and the real world beckons. There are tips on life after graduation, but also advice on buying work at degree shows.

Francis McKee, director of the Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow, offers his take on the wider significance of the degree show, and we talk to four a-n Degrees unedited student bloggers about their work and shows. Elsewhere, Northern Art Prize winner Leo Fitzmaurice picks his top three a-n student blogs, and four established artists – Michael Fullerton, Emily Wardill, Rachel Goodyear and Phoebe Cummings – talk about their first steps after graduating. And of course, there’s a wealth of information about degree shows the length and breadth of the UK.

Did we say we had a spring in our step? We’re positively bouncing…

Find a-n Degree Shows Guide 2012 here.
Read more about a-n and their projects here.

Alex Hetherington is a performance-based visual artist and writer, dividing his time between Scotland and Northern California.

This particular piece is an extract by Alex from, The Consequence, an installation work with Glasgow artist Janie Nicoll at the Centre of Contemporary Art in 2008. We suggest you take 5 minutes to immerse yourself in the work, then click through to see more of Alex’s work.

Find out more about the work here.
See more film work by Alex here.
Visit Alex’s site here.
See more work on Alex’s flickr here.
Follow Alex on Twitter here.