‘Cinema U 8

Frame & Frequency screenings @ Visarts Center

VisArts, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, is a hub for the visual arts that engages nearly 30,000 visitors annually through contemporary art exhibitions, a studio artist program, art classes and camps, VisAbility Art Lab (a supported studio for artists with disabilities), community art programs, the annual Rockville Arts Festival, and event space. Founded in 1987, VisArts is committed to our mission of transforming individuals and communities through the visual arts.

VisArts
155 Gibbs Street
Rockville, MD 20850
USA
https://www.visartscenter.org/

Launch of the solo feature – Ukrainian Video Art – Oleg Chorny / Gena Khamruk

Curatorial note

Turmoil & Error
The World is in turmoil, the human civilisation is in turmoil, culture is in turmoil, the artists are in turmoil – violence and war in Ukraine and elsewhere, the war of the political systems and ideologies, genocide, racism, intolerance, climate change, pandemic, expulsion, refugees, globalization – and all simultaneously! The global crisis!
And what function might art have in all that mess? What message may transport these Peace Letters?
In any case much more than just promising support and solidarity, rather summoning the positive creativity when we, that’s the world community, are staying together brainstorming, acting in respect and responsibility for each other. Art as a tool for sensitizing and encouragement and – Peace. The selected artists – coming from different continents and cultural backgrounds – show and offer their positive creativity via their audio-visual creations.

The solidarity screenings in Rockville consist of two parts –

Peace Letters 1 / featuring videos by 20 Ukrainian artists –
curated by Yarina Butkowska (Lviv/Ukraine) – videos from the years 2002-2009 including
Kateryna Babkina, Borys Pasichniy and Julia Pavlovska, Oleg Ushchenko, Olexiy Khoroshko, Mykola Kondratenko, MaxFlood, Svitlana Oleshko & Mykhaylo Barbara, Viacheslav Poliakov, Yuriy Kruchak & Yulia Kostereva, Oksana Chepelyk, and –
curated by Wilfried Agricolas de Cologne – videos from the years 2010-2020, including – Lena Nosenko, Lidia Starodubtseva, Kostia Vozniuk, Vera Abakumova, Oksana Chepelyk, Alexander Isaenko, Nataliia Mashtaler, Oleg Kharch, Oleg Chorny, Alexander Yeltsin.

Peace Letters 6 / a selection of art videos curated by Wilfried Agricola de Cologne, including
Shelley Jordon (USA), Dee Hood (USA), Abdoul-Ganiou Dermani (Togo), Francesca Ruth Levi (UK), Jana Schmück & Johannes C. Gerard (NL) , Justyna Maluchnik (Poland) , Hagit Kastel Nachsholi (Israel), Marie Magescas (France), Wilfried Agricola de Cologne (Germany), Albert Merino (Spain), Ian Gibbins (Australia), Marcantonio Lunardi (Italy) , Mária Judóvá (Czech Republik), Francesca Lolli (Italy), Monika K. Adler (UK), Laura & Sira Cabrera (Spain), Yssa Marie Flores (Philppines), Bruno Pavic (Croatia)

The Peace Letters to Ukraine Project is initiated by the Cologne based media artist and chief-curator Wilfried Agricola de Cologne for The New Museum of Networked Art as a networked artistic action in reaction on the war against the Ukraine in solidarity with the Ukrainian people.

Yarina Butkovska
curator of Ukrainian videoart at The Peace Letter to Ukraine Project

journalist, author and presenter of different radio projects, writer, DJ, editor, reporter, curator

Born in August, 4th,1982 in Ternopil, Ukraine.
Lives and works in Lviv, Ukraine.

1999 – 2004, studying in Lviv National University on journalism faculty
2000 – 2003, Radio «Initiative» 102.5 fm – Author/presenter of projects on cultural and social thematic, DJ: «Radiometro», «Pret a porte», «Art review», «Virmenska, 35th », «CinemaTest», «Radio theatre»…
2002 – 2003, Radio «Lviv wave» – Journalist in newsroom: reporter, editor
2003 – 2005, TV channel «HTA» – Journalist in newsroom: cultural and social thematic reporting
2005 – 2007, Radio «Ternopil» – Editor in news department
2007– 2008 – curator of the First International Festival of Videoart «Kinolevchyk»

Currently employed @ Andrei Sheptytsky National Museum in Lviv

Agricola de Cologne @ http://and.nmartproject.net/?p=82

was launched on 1 January 2000 as an artist brand, standing for the

• curator of media art, designer of culture, interdisciplinary media artist, director of experimental shortfilms and videos
• founder and director of The New Museum of Networked Art – the experimental platform for art and new media (2000), a global network on different virtual and physical levels
• founder & curator of The Audiovisual Art Collections @ The New Museum of Networked Art including several thousand of art films & videos on the topics “memory” & identity”- a big share has “The Collective Trauma Film Collections – including Shoah Film Collection, The Refugee Film Collection and Never More! Hiroshima/Fukushima
• founder & director of artvideoKOELN – the curatorial initiative „art & moving images“ (2005)
• founder & director of CologneOFF – International Festival Platform (2005), including CologneOFF International Videoart Festival, animateCologne – Cologne Art & Animation Festival, 1minutCOLOGNE – Cologne One Minute Festival, exDox – experimental documentary festival, diLight – Darkness Into Light Festival, The W:OW Art Film & Video Festival
• founder & curator of The W:OW Project – We Are One World – global networking project (2017)

Besides for a broad bandwidth of dynamic curatorial contexts he is initiating in physical & virtual space like JavaMuseum (2001), NewMediaFest (2002), Violence Online Festival (2003), SoundLAB & VideoChannel (2004), CologneOFF (2005), netEX (2007), AVMCI (2012), Agricola de Cologne is standing also for the co-curator & co-organiser of events like festivals & exhibitions of contemporary art, but also for the jury member of divers festivals.

Since its introduction in 2000, Agricola de Cologne is represented as an artist & curator on more than 500 festivals and media art exhibitions in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Knoxville, Pittsburgh, Toronto, Montreal, Mexico City, Guadalajara, Merida, Caracas, Maracaibo, Buenos Aires, Rosario, Montevideo, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Belo Horizonte, Santiago de Chile, Quito, Bogota, London, Paris, Lyon, Marseille, Toulouse, Madrid, Gijon, Sevilla, Valencia, Barcelona, Lisbon, Oslo, Bergen, Stockholm, Helsinki, Tampere, Kopenhagen, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Tokyo, Nagoya, Seoul, Manila, Hongkong, Bangkok, Phnom Penh, New Delhi, Guwahati, Mumbai, Kolkata, Jakarta, Perth, Melbourne, Casablanca, Rabat, Marrakesh, Addis Abeba, Istanbul, Ankara, Yerewan, Tblissi, Damaskus, Jerusalem, Tel-Aviv, Bethlehem, Gaza, Basel, Zurich, Vienna, Linz, Salzburg, Graz, Kiev, Kharkiv, Riga, Tallinn, Vilnius, Moscow, St.Petersburg, Kansk, Perm, Yekaterinburg, Sofia, Varna, Bukarest, Arad, Timisoara, Budapest, Belgrade, Zagreb, Split, Lubljana, Rome, Naples, Milan, Pescara, Venice, Torino, Bologna, Berlin, Cologne, Münster, Düsseldorf, Karlsruhe, Nuremberg & elsewhere, but also on Biennials like Venice Biennale 2003, 2005, Biennale of New Media Art Merida/MX 2003, Biennale of Electronic Arts Perth/Australia (2004), Biennale de Montreal (2004), Biennale of Video & New Media Santiago de Chile (2005), ISEA Nagoya (2002), ISEA Singapur (2008), ISEA Belfast (2009), Kochi Musziris Biennial (2016/2017)

His media art context “CologneOFF nomadic – videoart in a global context” is travelling since 2010 as a nomadic festival project around the globe with permanently changing programs.

Agricola de Cologne –> http://agricola-de.cologne
artvideoKOELN –> http://artvideo.koeln
Cologne International Videoart Festival –> http://coff.newmediafest.org
CologneOFF – International Festival Platform –-> http://coff.newmediafest.org
The New Museum of Networked Art –> http://www.nmartproject.net

Press Release 5 May 2022

Peace Letters Catalogue May 2022

Peace Letters from Rockville to Ukraine Logo

Peace Letters to Ukraine 8 – Visarts Center Rockville – catalogue