17th International Contemporary Art Festival SESC_Videobrasil

September through December 2011

SESC Belenzinho | SESC Pompeia | State Art Gallery

São Paulo, SP, Brazil



With a new name and significant structural changes from past editions, the 17th Festival marks the broadening of the project’s scope. Now dubbed International Contemporary Art Festival SESC_Videobrasil, it includes new media and languages. Previously restricted to video works, the Southern Panoramas competitive show is now accepting other artistic experiments, such as installations, performances, artist books, photography and painting.



In addition to maintaining its traditional character as a showcase for recent production from Latin America, Africa, Asia (except Japan), Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Oceania, the competitive show now opens itself up to the multiplicity of mediums that defines current production. This change aligns the Festival with the nature of contemporary artistic practices and confronts the huge output of representations that constitute visuality in the world today. Videobrasil takes on a brand new format and becomes the first contemporary art festival in the country.



Established within this context, the 1st Videobrasil Open Studio Prize further strengthens the character of the new proposal. The Prize selects young artists based in São Paulo to produce collaborative artwork at Casa Tomada, a facility for production, reflection, and interaction in São Paulo. The resulting artworks will feature in the Southern Panoramas show.



Parallel to the competition, the Festival will feature an exhibition by Olafur Eliasson, the first ever in Latin America by the leading contemporary artist. The exhibition is curated by Jochen Volz. The Danish-Icelandic artist’s projects, whose large scale is an uncommon feature in contemporary art production, appeals to a broad audience, as is the case with Waterfalls (2008), consisting of waterfalls over the Hudson River, in New York, and the Weather Project (2006), featuring a huge artificial sun inside the Tate Modern gallery, in London. Eliasson’s installations, sculptures, photographs, and urban interventions question our processes of comprehension, perception, and cognition.



The 17th International Contemporary Art Festival SESC_Videobrasil is promoted by SESC São Paulo and Associação Cultural Videobrasil, which were also in charge of the Brazilian tours of the exhibitions Sophie Calle – Take Care of Yourself (2009) and Joseph Beuys – We Are the Revolution (São Paulo/Salvador, 2010).



See the regulations.





Southern Panoramas A Pivotal Role For Other Circuits Featuring video, performances, installations, objects, publications, paintings, photography and other artistic forms, Southern Panoramas aims to create a key role for artistic output from various regions throughout the geopolitical south. The participants include well-known names on the international circuit – such as the Lebanese Akram Zaatari, the Australian Shaun Gladwell and the Argentinean Marcello Mercado – and others only beginning to exhibit internationally, such as the Italo-Chilean Gianfranco Foschino (Chile), featured this year at the IILA Pavilion at the Venice Biennale. This edition’s participants were chosen from 1,295 submissions, the largest number ever received by the Festival. The presence of artists from the geopolitical south also increased, particularly from Eastern Europe, Asia and the Middle East. "The number of submissions has grown with each edition", says Solange Farkas. "What is most extraordinary is the growth in languages and the representation of regions from the South, which really allows us to draw a panorama of contemporary production across the axis". Diverse in terms of strategies and languages, these works remain close to the major issues of the contemporary world, with a range of concerns not limited to the field of the visual arts. Transit is one theme that recurs throughout these works, as is a questioning about nature and architecture and devices capable of mapping emotions and conducting an inventory of memory. Southern Panoramas includes four works specially commissioned for the Festival through the Videobrasil Open Atelier Prize. The award, conferred on winning projects, benefits young São Paulo-based artists. These works are currently being developed at Casa Tomada, a space geared towards artistic production, reflection and interaction under the orientation of artists, curators and researchers in the Brazilian visual arts.