“I think of myself as a conceptual cross-disciplinary artist and work with whatever media arises from the process. For close to 60 years, I’ve worked with sculpture, video, sound, installations, performance, and text. My central point of departure is work-as-inquiry—bringing the processual space to an interactive level that includes myself, the viewer, and other possible collaborators into an ontological dialogue. I remain committed to cybernetics and the inherent nature of electronic media – real-time feedback – as a multi-layered space from which to bring forth ideas that have visceral underpinnings. Concurrently, I am interested in bringing out the fallibility of technology – making work that sometimes even suggests a loss of technology. I work in liminal domains that a number of dichotomies call forth: mind/body, material/non-material, intuition/self-consciousness, sense/non-sense, etc. Other than that, I try and remain open and alert to the everyday happenstance surrounding me. More times than not this is what feeds my art and life—this is where the epiphanies and flashes occur. For quite some time there has been much to do about “socially responsible (or engaged) art.” From my point of view, I see that as something of a misnomer since the central tenet of art at its core is radically political with a life of its own—in the eye of the hurricane so to speak. The bottom line is self-expression in the most primal sense—procreation and the manifestation of concepts and matter into an experiential visceral space that brings you in—disturbs, enlightens, and, poses questions about one’s being and perceptions. Once this is gone due to various rules, regulations and a multitude of cultural agendas humanity loses the sacred mystery of wonder.” —Gary Hill

Gary Hill (b. 1951, Santa Monica, CA) has worked with a broad range of media – including sculpture, sound, video, text, installation and performance. His longtime work with intermedia continues to explore an array of issues ranging from the physicality of language, synesthesia and perceptual conundrums to ontological space and viewer interactivity.  

Exhibitions of his work have been presented at museums and institutions worldwide, including solo exhibitions at the Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain, Paris; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; Guggenheim Museum SoHo, New York; Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Basel; Museu d’Art Contemporani, Barcelona; Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg; Center for Contemorary Art, Tel Aviv; West Den Haag, Den Haag and most recently at the Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology (MAAT), Lisbon and the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts, Guangzhou, China.

Ismar Čirkinagić was born in 1973 in Prijedor, Bosnia and Herzegovina (at that time the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia). He came to Denmark in 1992, following the breakup of Yugoslavia, the brutal war, and ethnic cleansing in his region of Northwestern Bosnia and Herzegovina. Between 1992 and 1995, he spent nearly three years in various refugee camps in Denmark before obtaining permanent residence. For him and some of his fellow compatriots, who later became an active part of the Danish cultural scene, this period of war and exile was a turning point in their lives and a vital source of inspiration for their works.

In 1997 Čirkinagić enrolled at the Copenhagen Art School and was admitted to The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in 2000. His professional career began in 2006 after completing his master’s degree.

Most of his artistic practice is thematically related to socio-political context. It is mainly produced in the form of conceptual installations, consisting of videos, photos, texts and object-based elements.
His earlier works resulted from extensive research on war and the post-war period in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which focused on the violent process of disintegration of society and its postulates. During this period, the artist formed a number of personal beliefs and visual principles that were later implemented in more recent projects. These ideas merged with other thematic content, creating a recognizable visual vocabulary, based on complex narratives, articulated through simple minimalist elements, which often seemed emotionally withdrawn at first glance. A good example of this type of transitional work can be seen in the exhibition Smoking Gun in Kunsthal Aarhus
and Bricks of Enlightenment in Nikolaj Contemporary Art Center, both awarded by The Danish Arts Foundation.

While different art media intertwine in his installations, his photography projects are mostly clear-cut, singlemedium exhibitions, such as Negatives beyond the green, With Matter Through Time, or Ocean Europe.

Čirkinagić has had exhibitions in museums and art centres in Denmark and internationally. Danish exhibition venues include Nikolaj Contemporary Art Center, Kunsthal Charlottenborg, Art Museum Brandts, Esbjerg Art Museum, Sorø Art Museum, Randers Museum of Art, HEART Museum of Contemporary Art, ARKEN Museum of Modern Art, ARoS Art Museum and National Gallery of Denmark. Internationally, he has exhibited at Centro de Desarrollo de las Artes Visuales, in Havana, Artsi Vantaa Art Museum in Finland, Metropolitan Arts Centre in Belfast, The Lviv National Art Gallery in Lviv, Mestrovic Pavilion, in Zagreb, Collegium Artisticum in Sarajevo, National Museum of
Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo, as well as the ARoS Triennial, the SOCLE DU MONDE Biennials, and Liverpool Biennials.

Čirkinagić’s artworks can today be found in several public art collections such as Ars Aevi Museum of Contemporary Art, Sarajevo, The National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sarajevo, The Danish Arts Foundation, New Carlsberg Foundation, Denmark, The National Museum Of Photography in Denmark, ARoS Art Museum, Arken Museum of Contemporary Art, Denmark, Sorø Art Museum and the SMK- National Gallery of Denmark.

He lives and works between Copenhagen and Prijedor.

An award winning multi-media artist, and alternative-pop singer-songwriter, is enjoying a creative rebirth fluidly expressing unique visions of film, visual art and music.

“In a world of increasing complexity rampant with ambiguity there is (perhaps) but one choice: to be here and now. As simple as that may sound, to live and work from this vantage point everyday life has a way of keeping one true to one’s art and one’s art has a way of keeping one true to life.
Art is a kind of emancipation from the social descriptions of reality. Having glimpsed this, it is responsible to take dreams, visions and thoughts as far as one possibly can. Hopefully the creative results will reach engaging audience and invite cultural intercourse.” – Magdalena Hill

Wieland's work spans short films, drawings, installations, ceramics and lecture-performances. His narratives are constructed through idiosyncratic and often absurd combinations of images and language, blending autobiographical and fictional elements into poetic, dreamlike spaces. Wieland constructs a deeply emotional and singular world where memories hover between truth and fiction. His first-person narratives weave together the personal with the political and slowly develop into a humourous analysis of social norms and repressive dynamics.

Gernot Wieland (1968, Austria) lives and works in Berlin, Germany and Brantevik, Sweden. Recent solo exhibitions include Minor Corrections, T H E P I L L ®, Paris, France, Songs for the Unwanted, Musée d’art moderne et contemporain de Saint-Étienne, France; Landscapes, Phileas, Vienna, Austria; You do not leave traces of your presence, just of your acts, KH Künstler:innenhaus Bremen, Germany; Square, Circle, Square, Argos centre for audiovisual arts, Brussels, Belgium; Halb Nackt, Belmacz Gallery, London, UK; Turtleneck Phantasies, Kindl – Centre of Contemporary Arts, Berlin, Germany; Diebstahl und Gesänge, Kunst Halle Sankt Gallen, Switzerland; Salzburger Kunstverein, Salzburg, Austria; …like ink in milk Quartz Studio, Turin, Italy; Berlinische Galerie, Museum of Modern Art, Berlin, Germany; “Hello, my name is…”… and …”Yes, I’m fine.”, Maumaus/Lumiar Cité, Lisbon, Portugal.