24 Jul 2010

Outpost for Contemporary Art: Vlatka Horvat Performance in the LA River

Outpost for Contemporary Art is extremely pleased to announce that Vlatka Horvat, an Outpost artist-in-residence in October 2008, will return to Los Angeles this July to execute her 8-hour performance, 'This Here and That There,' in the Los Angeles River.

In this performance, the artist continuously rearranges 50 chairs over a period of eight hours. Each successive chair arrangement implies a set of possible relations between their imagined occupants, evoking a range of possibilities related to human interaction – dialogue, encounter, communication, and conflict.

In some arrangements, the stage seems to be set for many different scenarios: meetings, presentations, discussions, exams, interrogations, concerts, riots… Other chair configurations tends to defy altogether the everyday codes of chair-arrangement in public spaces, suggesting instead more intimate, abstract, or enigmatic encounters.

The artist's tireless generation of more and more spatial propositions is marked by a certain Sisyphean quality as she builds structures and set-ups, then dismantles them in order to build new ones. Moving and reorganizing the chairs through a series of short-lived arrangements, she seems to be preparing the ground for events that don't actually happen – an activity that is at once comical in its obsessive determination and pathetic in its anticlimactic resolution/dissolution.

Location: The Los Angeles River under the Fletcher Bridge in Elysian Valley, near Ripple St, 90039. The Fletcher Bridge connects Silver Lake to Northeast Los Angeles and is near the intersection of the 5 and 2 Freeways. Limited street parking available on Ripple Street and nearby. Easy bike access via the L.A. River bike path - enter at Los Feliz or Glendale Blvds or at Riverside/Victory/Zoo. For bicycling directions, use Google 'go by bike' directions. Easy access via Metro bus lines 96 and 603. Visit www.outpost-art.org for map and more details.

Date: Saturday, July 31, 9am - 5pm. Viewers are free to come and go as they please and are invited to observe the performance from the east bank (entrance through east bank gate off Fletcher) as well as from the Fletcher Bridge above the site.

About the Artist
Vlatka Horvat (b. 1974 in Čakovec, Croatia) is a New York-based artist working across different media—from photography and video to performance, installation, and works on paper. Her work is currently included in 'Greater New York' show at MoMA PS1 in New York, 'Clueless: Geometry of Misunderstanding' at Manifattura Tabacchi in Torino, 'Natural Renditions' at Marlborough Gallery in New York, and Mardin Biennale in Mardin, Turkey. Recent projects include For Example for the 11th Istanbul Biennial, Or Some Other Time, a solo exhibition at the Kitchen in New York, as well as exhibitions at annex14 in Bern, Galerie Xippas and Galerie Anne Barrault (both in Paris), White Columns and Rachel Uffner Gallery (both in New York), and the Contemporary Art Museum in St. Louis. Vlatka's performances have been presented at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin, PACT Zollverein in Essen, Kunstenfestivaldesarts in Brussels, and Ankantara festival in Lisbon. Forthcoming in 2010: Austrian Cultural Forum in New York, Aichi Triennale in Nagoya (a collaboration with Tim Etchells), as well as performances at Tanz im August festival in Berlin, Biennale Bern, and Internationale Keuze Rotterdam. More info www.vlatkahorvat.com

About Outpost for Contemporary Art
Outpost for Contemporary Art is a non-profit that promotes cross-cultural exchange by developing international artistic projects that stimulate social interaction and emphasize process over end result. Devoted to bridging the local and the global, Outpost creates networks of art, artists and art audiences that span continents while connecting local communities.

This performance was coordinated for Outpost by Evelena Ruether and concludes Outpost's Eastern European program cycle, which has been made possible through the generous support of The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Harpo Foundation, Peter Norton Family Foundation, Trust for Mutual Understanding, Pasadena Art Alliance, Jerry & Terri Kohl Family Foundation, Department of Cultural Affairs, City of Los Angeles, Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors through the Los Angeles County Arts Commission, and a growing membership base from Los Angeles and beyond.

Outpost's headquarters are located at 1268 North Ave. 50, Los Angeles, CA, 90042. For more information, visit www.outpost-art.org.