21 Mar 2016

Three Masters in Visual Arts at HEAD – Genève

The applications deadline is approaching for HEAD – Genève's Masters in Visual Arts: CCC. Research-Based Master Program, TRANS– Education, Mediation and WORK.MASTER. Contemporary Artistic Practices.

The Research-Based Master Program CCC addresses students interested in developing new vocabularies for articulating the political and social implications of a changing world. Research methodologies, artistic thinking and public display strategies operate today in profoundly shifting geospatial and techno-political constellations. Globalisation, migration, computation and climate are a few of the keywords that point to reordering processes on a planetary scale within contemporary societies. Teaching team is composed of Cécile Boss, Kodwo Eshun, Pierre Hazan, Aymon Kreil, Doreen Mende, Marion von Osten, Denis Pernet, Eric Philippoz, Anne-Julie Raccoursier, Gene Ray, Janis Schroeder and guests include for the year 2015-16 Ursula Biemann, Laboria Cuboniks (Helen Hester, Katrina Burch), Glass Bead, Anselm Franke, Aurélien Gamboni, Armin Linke, Julia Moritz, Griselda Pollock, ruangrupa (Farid Rakun), Françoise Vergès, Grant Watson and Eyal Weizman, among others.

TRANS– encourages and develops practices that question the relationships between art and society. Within this framework, transpedagogy – blending art and education in order to create innovative forms of knowledge production and exchange – is taught and applied. At the very core of the curriculum, TRANS– sets up a three-semester long collaborative project that involves the participants along with cultural and social actors: this nucleus creates a shared workspace in which this interdisciplinary group cooperates with a series of institutional and non-institutional partners. Trans proposes different forms of public address (projects, open seminars, un-conferences, meetings, etc.) to open the frame for discussion about the role of artists in society. The program is coordinated by Olivier Desvoignes and Marianne Guarino-Huet (microsillons). Teaching team and international guests artists and researchers group include Fanny Bénichou, Claude-Hubert Tatot, Janna Graham, Pablo Helguera, Olivier Marboeuf, Mathieu Menghini, Syndicat Potentiel and Nora Sternfeld.

Rather than offering a formatted curriculum, WORK.MASTER seeks to adapt it to the sensibility of each personality it gathers, to the inventiveness of each methodology it helps building, and to the non-orthodox, emancipated propositions of its students. WORK.MASTER's ambition is to help them developing highly personal and singular – if not eccentric – conceptions of what it means to produce art today. The idea is to be able to wander and ponder, to take walks and trips, to extend conversations beyond their reasonable length, to produce books, exhibitions, and many other formats apt to challenge the conditions of reception and production of art, to get involved with Genève's art scene and to project one's work both locally and internationally. This year, WORK.MASTER has initiated projects and classes with artists such as Stuart Bailey, Mathieu Copeland, Verena Dengler, Tobias Madison, Mai-Thu Perret, Lili Reynaud Dewar, Laurent Schmid and Dan Solbach. Seminars are led by theoreticians and historians Lars Bang Larsen, Yann Chateigné, Catherine Chevalier, Jill Gasparina, Christophe Kihm, Charlotte Laubard and David Zerbib.

Requirements: Bachelor degree or equivalent – Letter of interest – Research statement and project description – CV and Portfolio – Two letters of referees – Thesis can be written in English and/or French – Geneva is located in the French-speaking part of Switzerland.

The application details and online form can be downloaded on www.head-geneve.ch

The deadline is April 8.