“Manifesto Series: Souvenirs for an Ideal City” with four Dutch artists

Tue, Nov 28 - Tue, Nov 28  2017

On November 28, 7-9 PM, Ingrid van der Heijden, Arjen Oosterman, Joep van Lieshout and Marga Weimans will be part of “Manifesto Series: Souvenirs for an Ideal City” at Storefront for Art and Architecture. 

Manifesto Series: Souvenirs for an Ideal City

As a contemporary form of commercialized nostalgia, souvenirs are the ultimate cliche in the representation of a city. Pocket-sized, critical, and cheap, they populate tourist sites all over the world with a patina of innocence.

Souvenirs produce collective imaginaries made up of lines that follow the profiles of superlative sculptures, buildings, and stories. They have become the reference points that anchor a particular culture in time, representing (consciously or not) political, cultural, and social values.

Manifesto Series: Souvenirs for an Ideal City is organized as part of Storefront’s current exhibition, Souvenirs: New New York Icons. The event invites an international group of architects, designers, photographers, curators, and researchers to reflect upon the objects and imaginaries that define the global city. Participants will reimagine the icons of the city and will present manifestos for new “souvenirs for an ideal city” in an effort to explore the concept of iconography and what icons mean for the city today.

The Manifesto Series is one of the Storefront’s ongoing event series formats. It seeks to encourage the formulation of positions and instigate spirited discussion and exchange in a dynamic and polemical context. The format, therefore, differs from that of other talks and presentations. Rather than putting forth a synthetic lecture or a series of projects, participants are invited to deliver a concise, point-by-point manifesto, with the hope that their positions will provide the grounds for discussion to test various hypotheses in real time.

Joep van Lieshout

Joep van Lieshout: sculptor, visionary, and enfant terrible. At sixteen, Van Lieshout got himself accepted at the Rotterdam Academy of the Arts. After graduating, he rose to fame quickly, with functional sculptures that raise questions about the society at large and nature of art.

In 1995 van Lieshout founded his studio, Atelier Van Lieshout; ever since he has been working under the name of the studio to undermine the myth of the artistic genius. Over the past two decades, Atelier Van Lieshout has produced a veritable cornucopia of works which straddle art, design, and architecture: sculpture and installations, buildings and furniture, utopias and dystopias. What these works have in common are a number of recurring themes, motives and obsessions: systems, power, autarky, life, sex, death. The human individual in the face of a greater whole.

With this body of work, comprising both autonomous and commissioned artworks, he has gained a strong international reputation. The Atelier has exhibited at museums and galleries worldwide, with shows at MoMA, New York, the Hayward Gallery, London, and Centre Pompidou, Paris. Additionally, the Atelier has worked on numerous commissions for both public and private clients.

Marga Weimans 

Marga Weimans is an ambitious, international oriented fashion house, which expands itself to multiple disciplines including fashion, architecture and fine arts. Weimans graduated as a fashion designer at the prestigious Antwerp Royal Academy of Fine Arts, one of the world leading fashion programs. Her graduation collection The Power Of My Dreams won an I-D award in 2005 which is organized by worldwide fashion magazine I-D. With this collection she was also nominated for the Design Prize Rotterdam. Since her succesful graduation Weimans’ work is purchased by and exhibited at the Groninger Museum. In recent years she has achieved many successes. Her collections were presented in two haute couture weeks in Paris and in several exhibitions in Dutch Museums. Weimans pushes the boundaries of the fashion industry with her designs. She is interested in the combination of fashion and architecture. Her collections are very broad: from haute couture to pret a porter, including architectural showpieces and minimalistic dresses. The designer worked together with several artists from other fields like industrial designers and architects. Weimans wants to show her personal development and innovation in the designs. The realistic everyday environment of her studio is reflected in her work and transforms into a sublime dreamlike world. She incorporates elements of nature and space and uses earth tones and natural fabrics.She works with 3D perspectives and her designs include architectural materials like wood, iron and resin. She also creates her own fabrics by mixing fabric with fiberglass. in this way, Weimans’ designs tell a personal story of how her creative ideas come about. Because of her black roots Weimans is also interested in exploring the role of black women in our current global, complex culture. With her collection “Source of Power Collection”, Weimans gave an image of the eccentricity, political incorrectness and dignity that come to play analyzing the contemporary black woman.’

Storefront for Art and Architecture 

Storefront for Art and Architecture advances innovative and critical ideas that contribute to the design of cities, territories, and public life. Storefront’s exhibitions, events, competitions, publications, and projects provide alternative platforms for dialogue and collaboration across disciplinary, geographic, and ideological boundaries. Since its founding in 1982, Storefront has presented the work of over one thousand architects and artists.