Maker Art Selected Artwork
- Robert Jarvis
- Jonas Runa
- Ken Rinaldo
- Amy Youngs, Iris Meier et al.
- Lina Dovydenaite
- Sun Xiaoxing
- Timo Kahlen
- Daniela Lucato
- Fabrizio de Potestad i Fornari
- Robert B. Lisek
- Ken Rinaldo
- Rodrigo Gomes
- André Sier
Artists
MAKER ART – PANDEMIA
167 applications from around the world
50 selected artists
54 art works in competitio
CURATOR´S STATEMENT
The New Art Fest is in its fourth edition. This time, and against the psychosis caused by a virus, we decided to raise the stakes: everything online, and an international ‘open call’ in full worldwide closure. One hundred sixty-seven candidates responded. We chose 50.
There are artists mainly from Europe, America and Asia. The United States, Germany, Portugal and Brazil are the countries with the most presence. I also highlight the Chinese participation in this edition of Maker Art.
Pandemic was the inevitable leitmotiv at the moment when we decided to maintain the project despite the uncertainty. The relationship between art and catastrophes, or isolation, is not new. But the crossing of these two realities with the planet of biological and digital viruses, yes, is a unique, remarkable and lasting experience.
Some artists responded directly to the leitmotiv challenge (pandemic), others preferred an indirect response, others not even that, proposing recent works but previous to the epidemic. The result is asymmetrical. The sudden immersion in the digital networks of billions of people, things and processes, is still one of the strongest inspirations of the responses given to the call launched by the festival.
More and more artists find technological immersion in their laptops and mobile phones a way not only for creation (their virtual studios) but also for the diffusion and sharing of their artworks. In some way, we can say that the place for art is moving fast. It is a global, socially assertive and tectonic move that the old bureaucratic and speculative structures of official art, the so-called ‘contemporary art’, are unlikely to resist.
António Cerveira Pinto
BACKGROUND
Maker Art is born out of an internacional Open Call, materializes in an online exhibition of ‘new media art’ and becomes a laboratory and meeting point between creators, educators, cultural institutions and industry.
Maker Art is an exhibition and a workshop, where ‘new media art’ projects are presented as if in a beta stage, probably in search of a business angel to make them true.
Maker Art 2020 will be 100% online, addressing Pandemia as an inspirational leitmotiv. From all the accepted applications a limited number of artists will be selected for the exhibition.
Artworks in the online exhibition will automatically apply to the Black Raven Award. The winner will receive a monetary prize, as well as the festival’s trophy: the Black Raven.
MILESTONES:
- Submission: May 22 thru July 6, 2020;
- Exhibition dates: July 29 thru September 16, 2020;
- Award Ceremony: 16 September 2020.
BLACK RAVEN AWARD
This year’s Maker Art prize was decided by an international jury composed by Boris Debackere, director of the V2_ Lab for the Unstable Media, in Rotterdam, Mónica Mendes, director of the Department of New Media Art at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Lisbon, and Régine Debatty, curator and art critic, founder of We-Make-Money-Not-Art.
The jury unanimously decided to give the Black Raven Award to Ariene, 2020, by Rodrigo Gomes.
The jury also decided to give an Honorary Mention to Sound of Isolation, 2020, by Kristina Petuknica.
The Black Raven Award compounds a monetary prize of 1000 euros with its emblematic trophy, a black raven, the official symbol of Lisbon, printed with 3D technology.
Maker Art Pandemia, as part of the 4th edition of The New Art Fest, received 167 applications from more than 38 countries. All 56 works selected by festival’s organisation can be seen online at the festival’s website.
Juri
Rodrigo Gomes encapsulates two contemporary phenomena in an astute, yet entertaining video. Initially, he traces the stock image of a pretty model who has surreptitiously taken over our visual landscape. Secondly, the video addresses one of the most alarming dimensions of AI and machine learning: deep fake. The former is charming, the latter treacherous. Both act like viruses that could potentially shape our experience of politics, news, entertainment, advertisement and maybe even our daily life.
The jury highlighted the depiction of a pandemic that is transforming our cultural space while we still pretend that everything is fine
A pure product of the COVID-19 lockdown, this video shows how life in tight space, surrounded by noisy neighbours and increasing restrictions of movements, can become the catalyst for creativity. Reminiscent of a period when everything seemed to fall into a muffled hysteria, Kristina Petuknica demonstrates how an eloquent audio-visual experience can be orchestrated by one artist on her window view with a mobile phone, a violin, ambient noise and a couple of electronic units.