PRESS RELEASE SEIZING THE IVORY TOWER 15.3.–1.11.15 Exhibition series, curated by Nina Mende #1: Viktorija Rybakova: Oo, A PREVIEW 15.3.–12.4.15 Video installation Venue: 3 ½ Press preview: Thursday, 12.3.15, 14 –16 h Opening: Saturday, 14.3.15, 17–22 h The new exhibition series in the in-between level 3 ½ at KW Institute for Contemporary Art, SEIZING THE IVORY TOWER, follows the exhibition cycle THE RETRACTION OF THINGS, curated by Lukas Töpfer, and is inaugurated with artist Viktorija Rybakova’s piece Oo, A PREVIEW on March 14, 2015. Over the next few months, KW’s assistant curator Nina Mende animates this independent space between the third and fourth floors with emerging and recent artistic positions. Befitting its location in the exhibition house, the series addresses the fascination with the remote, the unnoticed or the concealed. The participating artists in SEIZING THE IVORY TOWER present new productions, or installations developed specifically for 3 ½, which are concerned with any aspect of life that eludes general awareness, purposely or inadvertently. The series focuses on stories, occasions and phenomena in the marginal zones of our personal or public lives, but also looks closely at the artistic strategies themselves used for detecting, investigating or revealing these zones. The chosen works consciously utilize 3 ½ as a space of tension between a personal encounter and public confrontation. In her piece Oo, A PREVIEW, Viktorija Rybakova (born 1989 in Vilnius, Lithuania) choreographs a hypnotic trip through the mental spaces of an exhibition, and its works. The video piece was originally produced as a “preview” for the Lithuanian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, 2013, and leads the viewer through an increasingly deep image world of a playfully unfolding artist book. Rybakova reflects and conserves a concrete exhibition’s formation process, but also lets the object of documentation stand on equal grounds as a convertible, living thought construction. The viewer’s imagination overlays images and associations, expanding the real constrictions of the room into the endless space of the imaginary. The following presentations of the series will open alongside an event in Chora (3rd floor), and will vary in their running period. Participating artists: Luisa Puschendorf and Julia Werhahn, Viktorija Rybakova, Frank Sperling, Luca Vanello, and Franziska Wildt, among others. Viktorija Rybakova: Oo, A PREVIEW is supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania. The cultural programs of KW Institute for Contemporary Art are made possible with the support of the Governing Mayor of Berlin – Senate Chancellery – Cultural Affairs. Opening hours Wed–Mon 12–19 h, Thur 12–21 h, Tue closed Admission Admission free Press contact Henriette Sölter T +49 30 243459-42 [email protected] KW Institute for Contemporary Art Auguststr. 69 10117 Berlin Germany www.kw-berlin.de www.facebook.com/KWInstituteforContemporaryArt www.facebook.com/KWFreunde