Allegories Of Good And Bad Government
Installation
text W139
The project Allegories of Good and Bad Government is the result of a long-running discussion between visual artists Hans van Houwelingen and Jonas Staal and Amsterdam’s alderman for art and culture Carolien Gehrels (PvdA, labor party). All three of them put to discussion, from the perspective of their own practices, the mutual influences and interests between the domain of the artistic and the political. Their dialogue conveys the will to discuss the apparent ideological vacuum, which paralyses both art and politics and lends legitimacy to the current government’s massive spending cuts on culture.
Allegories of Good and Bad Government consists of three parts: a four-day debate, an exhibition and a lecture program.
- The four-day debate takes place from 1-4 May with four artists and four politicians who reflect openly on their own strategies as well as the possibility of collaboration with others.
- The discussion will be accompanied by an exhibition in W139 of both artistic and political cases, such as an artwork, a policy a commentary or something else selected by the participants.
- The lecture program What Project Will Art and Politics Share? discusses in three lectures the relationship between art and politics in the past, present and future.
Colophon
Project | Allegories of Good and Bad Government
Initiators | Hans van Houwelingen, Carolien Gehrels and Jonas Staal
Concept by | Metahaven
Type | Installation / Conversation
Date | April 23 - May 29, 2011
Location | W139, Amsterdam
Architecture | Paul Kuipers
Photography (top) | Idan Shilon
Link | w139.nl
Serie of three fresco panels
(1338-1339)
Ambrogio Lorenzetti (1290—1348)
Palazzo Pubblico, Siena
W139