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the Utopia Project

 

Interactive art project by Maureen Bachaus

 

What does a Utopian society look like? Is it an impossible reality? A daydream? An achievable reality? Or a matter of personal perception? The challenge to work with these questions and concepts came from the exhibition centre for contemporary art the 'Flux Factory' in New York City. 

 

'BAUM' 

Maureen Bachaus is a member of the multicultural art collective 'BAUM'. This art collective participated in the Utopia Month at Flux Factory' in New York City, which consisted of exhibitions, art projects, lectures, performances and online debateswith various art projects, including this interactive art-video project. 

 

Utopia Project 

Within her work, Maureen Bachaus often enlightens social themes through personal perspective. For this project she decided to let go of the countless pre- existing theories and decided to explore whether or not it is possible to build a new and virtual Utopia. A focal point of the work is based on the personal perception of people from different cultures with different backgrounds. This new Utopia currently has two pillars: A reconstructed visual environment and a number of crucial life lessons.

 

 

Utopia Project - part 1
'Life lessons' - relay ride video-project

This video project is part of the 'one-question' videoseries, consisting of short interviews in which people from different backgrounds and cultures respond to the same question. In this case: what is your most important life lesson? Say you could carry a life lesson to a totally new and blank world, what would it be? The interviews will be published on this website.

The project is an international 'relay ride' project. The artist is the medium who passes the message through and who launches the idea in different countries and cultures. The interviewee gives the project to another (yet unknown) person.

 

 

Utopia Project - part 2
'Perception' - interactive video-project

Ever heard of the 'disruption'-theory? This theory assumes that you can come to completely new ideas if you approach a subject in a totally different way: upside down, as it were.  For this video project you are asked to respond to the following: film a subject with your mobile phone for 15 seconds capturing something in your environment that you sincerely find ugly, or something you feel socially or politically should be different and changed.

The videos will be literally turned upside down and combined with other videos. By looking at a subject upside down, new insights and ideas can arise, as well as a possibility to deal with a problem or issue from a totally different angle. The combined video's will form a new, symbolic world that is focused on an open way of thinking about Utopian and dystopian aspects of life. The videos will be broadcasted via this website.


This video project is a 'sharing' project: the idea should be passed through unlimitedly, the participants eventually create the actual artwork. The artist is merely the person who passes the message through and who launches the idea in different countries and cultures.

 

Participants: 

Benoit Piret (Belgium), Elina Mukhina (Russia), Heleen Huberts (Netherlands), Jeroen Huisman (Netherlands), Jeton Muja (Kosovo), Joris van der Vleuten (Netherlands), Karin Winkelmolen (Belgium), Nino Lomadze (Georgia), Steven Verstuyft (Belgium), Tatiana Fiodorova (Republic of Moldova), Maurizio Frigerio (Italy), Flordeliz Layug Canlas (Italy), Morgan Tucker (Netherlands), Piotr Zoladz (Poland), Bojana Janeva Semova (Macedonia), Marielle Mertens (Netherlands), Shivkumar K V (India), David Borawski (US), Michael C. Gutierrez (New Mexico), Gert Scheerlinck (Belgium), Agnieszka Golaszewska (Poland), Bob Polak (Netherlands), Paulo Jesus (Portugal), Stephan Groß (Germany), Derya Erdem (Turkey), Amanda Rice (Ireland), Toshiki Yashiro (USA/Japan), Beatriz Albuquerque (Portugal), Eduardo Alonso (Spain), Flako Rojas (Venezuela/Belgium), Katy Unger (US), Matt DeFord (USA), Lucie Kordacova (Czech Republic/United Kingdom), Roberta Orlando (Italy), Kyle Alden Martens (Canada), Alan Dunn (United Kingdom), Maximilian Schranner (Germany), Little Shiva (Belgium), Ajsha Reid (USA).

 

 

 




 

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