CAMP focus! 2018–2020
The internationally acclaimed curators – Nicholas Mirzoeff and Temi Odumosu – will each guest curate an ambitious group exhibition on coexistence and the politics of belonging.
It is the first time that CAMP collaborates with external curators. The intention is to introduce different curatorial methodologies and attract new artists to the center.
The exhibition program also includes a solo show about right-wing populism by visual artist Johan Tirén.
State of Integration:
Artistic analyses of the challenges of coexistence
As part of CAMP’s new exhibition format CAMP focus!, the center will launch the 2-year exhibition program State of Integration: Artistic analyses of the challenges of coexistence in the fall of 2018.
State of Integration concept
In the wake of the large influx of refugees and immigrants that arrived in Denmark and the rest of the West in 2015, immigration and integration are once again at the top of the agenda and have created divisions between politicians and populations over how immigration is to be handled. Questions about who should be admitted and what benefits should be afforded to new members of the Western societies are some of the most controversial questions today.
The international community is still far from having found sustainable solutions. There is therefore an increasing need for exhibitions and forums that can debate immigration issues in new and more fruitful ways.
In two different exhibitions, some of the most visionary artists of today will examine why immigration poses such a major challenge to many Western countries, and how refugees, immigrants, and diaspora populations experience demands of integration or assimilation into the majority culture.
More than 20 internationally acclaimed artists, curators, and cultural producers will contribute to the exhibition series, helping us to understand processes behind key concepts such as #integration, #assimilation, #belonging, #parallel societies, #conviviality, and #co-citizenship.
When contemporary art opens up new perspectives of greater complexity and breadth, do we have the courage to embrace them and convert them into alternative models for coexistence and citizenship?
State of Integration exhibitions
Abdul Dube, The only title I want is... human (2011). Courtesy of the artist
This large group exhibition is curated by visual culture theorist Nicholas Mirzoeff from New York University. Decolonizing Appearance is the work of asking questions. What does decolonizing look like? How do the colonized and the colonizer appear to each other? How can the colonized have the right to look, the right to be seen – in short, the right to appear? Decolonization is not a metaphor. It is not a matter for art alone. The work on the walls in this exhibition resonates with conversations in the space, in the Trampoline House refugee justice community center where it is housed, in Copenhagen and beyond.
As nationalism, racism, and xenophobia claim to be the 'common sense' of the global now, it is vital to continue to imagine other presents and possible futures. And to live in them. What would happen when appearance is decolonized? To whom can we appear? By what means? Who is that 'we'? What has to happen for decolonizing to take place where you live?
Decolonizing Appearance brings together collectives and individuals working on these questions in different ways in photography, video, installation, and text. The work addresses issues from Gaza to the Caribbean, Africa, the United States, and Denmark. It is not just something to see, it is something to do, from painting murals and making banners to decolonizing assemblies and workshops. Click here to read more.
Contributors: John Akomfrah / Khalid Albaih / Gurminder K. Bhambra / Abdul Dube / Sonya Dyer/ Jeanette Ehlers / Forensic Architecture / Jane Jin Kaisen / Pedro Lasch / Marronage / MTL / Carl Pope / Dread Scott
We’re saying what you’re thinking is a solo exhibition by acclaimed Swedish artist Johan Tirén, which takes a critical look at the rise of anti-immigration, racist, far right parties in European politics.
Yong Sun Gullach, The Starchild (2019), 3D / 360 installation based on a live performance, 110 x 100 x 250 cm. Courtesy of the artist
Threshold(s) is a dense group exhibition guest curated by British art historian and curator Dr. Temi Odumosu. The exhibition takes a closer look at the concept of belonging and what governs the politics of belonging. When does a place of refuge (a family, city, nation) become home? What is lost and gained in transitions/inhabitations/assimilations? How does coloniality make and mark official immigration structures?
Threshold(s) will showcase five artists with a decolonial practice from the Nordic region: Saba Bereket Persson, Michelle Eistrup, Luanda Carneiro Jacoel, Pia Arke, and Yong Sun Gullach.