© Image taken from: https://www.facebook.com/rupertvilnius

ARTIST TALKS: WITH VANJA SMILJANIC AND SAROOT SUPASUTHIVECH

Rupert, Goethe-Institut Vilnius, and the Academy of the Arts of the World (Akademie der Künste der Welt, ADKDW) present the culmination of the first Mutual Empathies cycle in Vilnius. 

For this event, artists Saroot Supasuthivech and Vanja Smiljanić will screen past moving-image works, share their participatory research still in progress, and converse with the audience about their projects. 

Both artists have parallel projects assessing our individual, emotional responses to compounding global crises. Supasuthivech has excavated the layered connections between migration, folkloric song, and the construction of nationality. Smiljanić has researched regional ethno-cosmology, extraterrestrial visions, and tuning our senses to engage the unknowable.

Mutual Empathies is an experimental residency framework developed by the three institutions, that brings together Germany-based artists with those beyond Europe for a series of residencies and public programming. It aims to platform artistic positions that would not otherwise meet, responding to the countless, difficult ecopolitical questions looming for global society.

The twin values of cultural discourse and close listening are more important than ever. Existing rifts in the media and social policy landscape are widening, and many of its long-trusted pillars seem content to watch these crevasses grow. While this can appear overwhelming, we look to the practice and implementation of empathy as a critical function in imagining positive futures.

In February, both artists will travel to Cologne for a residency at the Academy of the Arts of the World, with a final presentation at the ADKDW Studio opening on Saturday 15 February, and running through the following Saturday, 22 February.

Vanja Smiljanić (Belgrade RS, 1986) is a visual and performance artist based between Cologne and Lisbon. Smiljanić’s interdisciplinary projects combine visual arts, video, and performance to investigate how ideology emerges from the alienation of others, employing her body as a narrative vessel.

Saroot Supasuthivech (Bangkok TH, 1991) excavates the layered narratives of ritual sites, questioning the recording and construction of official history and identity. He uses installation, image, and sound to synthesise these projects, constructing intense hyperrealities and rites of remembrance.

Location: Medūza, Šv. Jono g. 11, Vilnius.
Date and time: 18:00, 25 January.

Curator: JL Murtaugh
Coordinator: Aistė Frišmantaitė
Communication: Aistė Marija Stankevičiūtė
Graphic design: Marijn Degenaar