3 min read 🤓
the end of an arm, the end of an era
june 28, 2011.
The day after our night at De Dingen in Kortrijk, I drove along with Paul Devens in his small van, crammed with tools and the remnants of his Testing Ground installation, that we had experienced the other day in the Budascoop. We made a stop in the city of Ghent, where we visited the current exhibitions at the S.M.A.K, the Municipal Museum for Contemporary Art.
Here are some pictures of the mostly very minimal & 'syntactic' works (just a word that kept popping up in my head when I saw them) by the Argentinean artist Jorge Macchi, that are on show as part of 'Music Stands Still', a presentation concentrating 'on Macchi’s artistic production over the last seven years'.
 |
 |
 |
I had seen some of Macchi's work before, I realized while walking around the S.M.A.K., as I recognized the delicate cut-outs of maps. It were not so much the images themselves that I remembered, though, but their idea. This is his 'cut-out' of Amsterdam. (I don't remember anymore, however, whether this particular map is or is not part of the exhibition in Ghent.)
 |
Macchi's 'Music Stands Still' remains at the S.M.A.K. until September 18th.
After this brief while of art-breathing in Ghent, Paul and I drove on to Maastricht.
It was my good luck to be able to get to Maastricht on this particular day. Saturday May 21st marked the end of an eventful era of independent & very international sound-art-music experiments in Maastricht, with the definite closure of the Art Space Rondeel. A sad fact, first of all for the city of Maastricht. Sad also for the many young artists that have passed there from all over Europe and the rest of the world, and who would sure have continued to do so. But much less, as they surely, with unceasing energy, will continue to create & produce. But they will be doing so elswhere. A sore pity for a town with the ambition of becoming European 'capital of culture' in the near future.
The 'Last but not Least ARM Party' that evening, in and around the already pretty much emptied artspace, was a worthy farewell to a worthy and valuable project, that will not be lightly forgotten. The ARM was a living proof to the fact that artistic research and experiments, with presentations often consisting for a substantial part in 'work in progress' & realized with the leasts of budgets, is able to attract a substantial and interested audience, also in a relatively small town like Maastricht. I found it touching to one last time meet Vasiliki Tsagari at the Rondeel, and watch her dance her heart out to the live sounds of Kaspar König's curious electr(on)ic instruments. And it was great to once again hear Los Dancing Queens, with Paul Devens drumming, throwing up one hell of a post-punk tantrum. During Los DQ's performance the police arrived, asking for permits (there were none); asking about the piles of rubbish in the courtyard (well, they were moving out, now, weren't they); and wondering about the crowds that continued to drift in ... then summing Kaspar and the organizers to have everybody leave the premises within the next half hour or so.
It's been a great show. It was a great way to go.
 |
 |
 |
Here is a chronological list of other SB-entries that in one way or another reported on events in or related to the, now former, Maastricht Art Space Rondeel.
- june 06, 2008 - Raudio Graffiti: almost live !
- april 01, 2009 - A Block with a Name
- June 01, 2009 - Playing The Popular Classics
- july 09, 2009 - Cover thyself
- november 11, 2009 - Waiting in the Wings, often
- february 24, 2010 - "Zonder Vreesch, want immer Dapper, gaan wij des Zondags naar den Kapper..."
- may 30, 2010 - Auto*noom en un*titled
tags: Ghent, Jorge Macchi, Maastricht, ARM
# .407.
comments for the end of an arm, the end of an era ::
|
Comments are disabled |
