Sofia Arsenal - Museum For Contemporary Art
2 Cherni Vryh Blvd., Sofia, www.samcaproject.org
Videoholica 2011 Special Selection
May 3 – June 3, 2012
Reception: May 3, 2012, Thursday, 6 pm
Sofia Arsenal - Museum For Contemporary Art
2 Cherni Vryh Blvd., Sofia
Sofia Arsenal - Museum For Contemporary Art (SAMCA) presents Videoholica 2011 Special Selection in a solo exhibition from May 3 till June 3, 2012.
The selection of Videoholica 2011 presents 17 video works created within the period 2008 - 2011, with prevailing authors from Europe but with a strong participation of Asian video artists as well.
The special selection of Videoholica 2011 is another cross section of the best video artists and their video works, which were awarded by the international jury of the 4th festival edition. The jury of Videoholica 2011 was composed of the following members: Cohn Drennan (Dallas, USA), Adelina Popnedeleva (Sofia, Bulgaria), Floriane Davin (Rennes, France), Mariyana Hristova (Varna, Bulgaria), Simon Guiochet (Rennes, France), Isabelle Henrion (Rennes, France) and Celia Eid (Brazil / France).
The special selection of the 4th Videoholica is said to represent authors, who do not put up with mere recording of reality, even in cases when at first sight they seemingly do just that. The present-day plots of the video works analyze the unification and toxification of individuality in contrast to the passive reality; poetry in tune with the tension of human effort; colors - lost and transformed by the image compression. No matter whether they enjoy laconism or verbosity as their creed, the artists draw out the extract of the shaking and transforming power of creativity from the contingency circumstances of the creative situation - on the verge of death, or in the chaos of everyday life. The video artists reveal a solid balance of fancy images and imaginativeness in simulative (simultaneous) unreality of the moving image – subject of their work. This sample of artists explores the limits of the visible and foreseeable in an attempt to rationalize what we miss behind the hollow imagery of the aggressive media culture.
Peripheral to the Sofia art scene, Videoholica, the Varna Video Art Festival has been occupying a broader and broader share of the international artistic space as an independent, alternative and unpretentious distributor and archiver of video art. Proving that not in vain Videoholica was "distinguished" in 2010 for its "viral distribution" by the insignia of Stalker, a Graphic Design Studio (Varna), the Festival, over its four-year history, beyond the national initiatives, has participated and has been represented in many prestigious international events of visual arts, among which are the following: THE LOOP FESTIVAL 2011 in Barcelona (Spain), OCT (Contemporary Art Terminal) at the He Xiangning Art Museum, Shenzhen (China), International Video Festival in Kansk (Russia), University of Ideas/ UNIDEE in Biella (Italy); EXiS2011 Experimental Film and Video Festival (South Korea), Gyeonggi Creation Center/ GCC (South Korea); International Festival of Experimental Art Bilbao-Vitoria-Gasteiz (Spain); OSTRALE‘010 - International Exhibition of Contemporary Arts in Dresden (Germany), Casoria Contemporary Art Museum / CAM, Naples (Italy), Athens Video Art Festival Athens (Greece), ESPRESSIONI Performing Arts Film Festival in Milan (Italy) and many more.
The exhibition is realized in collaboration with Videoholica Association, Varna (www.videoholica.org) and National Art Gallery, Sofia (http://www.nationalartgallerybg.org).
Pavlina Mladenova, Neno Belchev
For more information:
Pavlina Mladenova, VIDEOHOLICA, tel.: 0895 007 816
Nadezhda Dzhakova, SAMCA, tel.: 0879 834 030