November 29th: A Crime Has Many Stories in Buenos Aires + Interactive Map of Event Sites

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A Crime Has Many Stories
The shortest distance between two points is never a straight line

November 29th 2008, Buenos Aires, Argentina

A Crime Has Many Stories, is an exquisite corpse project commissioned and produced by Eloisa Haudenschild and Steve Fagin of the haudenschildGarage, based on Argentine writer Ricardo Piglia’s short story, La Loca y el Relato del Crimen (Madwoman and the Story of a Crime, 1975) set in Buenos Aires plotted with co-conspirators Judi Werthein, Sonia Becce and Alejandro Ruiz.  Piglia’s text will generate two site-specific pieces and a commissioned story by Argentine writer Washington Cucurto.

In May of 2008, the haudenschildGarage traveled to Buenos Aires to meet with Argentine curator Sonia Becce and Argentine artist Judi Werthein who selected a short list of artists for the project, working in installation, photo and video.  From this short list, the haudenschildGarage and Alejandro Ruiz selected artists Roberto Jacoby, Fernanda Laguna and Rosalba Mirabella.

On November 29, 2008 a multidisciplinary, one-day extravaganza organized by Argentine producer Alejandro Ruiz will begin with a video of Ricardo Piglia’s elegant interpretation of his own text performed especially for our event and premiered at Malba - Fundación Costantini (Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires).

We will travel from the opening reception at Malba - Fundación Costantini to the closing party, in La Boca by way of the projects by Jacoby, Laguna and Mirabella in a movable feast of culture and repast.  The climax of our extravaganza will be the inaugural performance of Washington Cucurto’s savagely brilliant short story, commissioned by the haudenschildGarage, in response to Piglia’s La Loca y el Relato del Crimen.  Cucurto and the literary collective Eloisa Cartonera will do an ensemble reading of the story at their space in La Boca. A catalog of the entire project and a limited edition Survival Kit that will be provided to the audience at Malba to facilitate their journey will be produced in collaboration with Eloisa Cartonera.

The goal of this project is to generate a dynamic event that works across literature, art and the city. Our hope, by joining artists from the 60s with young artists of the present and crossing the boundary of literature and fine art, is to “perform” the continuity and range of Argentine cultures at its strongest.  We feel that the role of South America and Argentina in general has been greatly underestimated on the world stage and we hope this event, in its modest way, will support the growing awareness of the quality and specificity of Argentina’s historical and current contributions to world culture.

This project is dedicated to the wisdom, energy and spirit of generous debate that Olivier Debroise (1952-2008) provided us in regard to Latin American Culture. With our project, we wish to continue that path.

The haudenschildGarage, Spare Parts Projects, conceptualized, commissioned and produced by Director Eloisa Haudenschild and Commissioning Editor Steve Fagin, are a renewable 3-year cycle that encourages the juxtaposition of the crucial, the trivial, and the arcane. Our current cycle of projects includes: Decolonizing Architecture in Palestine/Israel, The Last Book in the US, and A Crime Has Many Stories in Argentina.

The haudenschildGarage is a cultural platform that stands somewhere between a salon and an alternative space, the goal of which is to be a home away from home for cultural experimentation, play and conversation. It routinely presents symposia, lectures and film screenings to the public. Whether international projects, dialogs or commissions, the haudenschildGarage collaborates with international institutions, alternative spaces and emerging artists in a permissive context for opinion and production.

SCHEDULE

4pm – 5:30pm, Malba - Fundación Costantini
Video of author Ricardo Piglia reading his story La Loca y el Relato del Crimen (1975) in the auditorium. Click here to visit Malba’s website.

6pm - 7pm, Space on Avenida Colon
Artist Rosalba Mirabella will be thinking, writing and drawing a crime during her two month voluntary incarceration in a room in Buenos Aires.

7:30pm - 8:30pm, Museo de Calcos
Copies end up having real results with Fernanda Laguna and Roberto Jacoby’s project. Through the dexterity of a series of objets d’art being bequeathed, the passage of the seeming same leads to a world of difference.

9:00pm -12:00am, Eloisa Cartonera, La Boca
Newly commissioned crime story, El Hijo, by author Washington Cucurto, written in response to Ricardo Piglia’s short story, will be performed by the collective at Eloisa Cartonera’s La Boca workshop followed by the closing party. Click here to visit Eloisa Cartonera’s website.

Please come enjoy this journey.  Food and libations will be provided at all stops

For the Spanish version of this text, click here

Map concept and design by Judi Werthein with Rita Haudenschild and Monica Jovanovich

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Biographies of Participants

Ricardo Piglia, 1941 Adrogué, Argentina
Ricardo Piglia is one of the most innovative contemporary writers in Latin America.  He has published three seminal novels Respiración Artificial (1981; Artificial Respiration, 1994), La Ciudad Ausente (1992; The Absent City, 2000), and Plata Quemada (1997; Money to Burn, 2003) and three collections of short fiction, among them Nombre Falso (1975; Assumed Name, 1995).  He is also the author of three volumes of essays, including his most recent publication El Último Lector (2005).  His works have been translated to English, French, Italian, German, Portuguese and Greek.  Piglia has received a number of awards, including the Premio Casa de las Américas, 1967; Premio Planeta, 1997; Premio Iberoamericano de las Letras, 2005; Premio Internacional de Literatura José Donoso in Chile 2005; and the Prix Roger Caillois in France 2008.  He is currently Walter S. Carpenter Professor of Literature at Princeton University, where he teaches Latin American literature. As a critic, Piglia has been a historian of popular culture writing about such authors as Jorge Luis Borges, Arlt, Julio Cortázar, and Manuel Puig.

Washington Cucurto, born Santiago Vega, 1973, Quilmes, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Santiago Vega, better known as Washington Cucurto, is an Argentine writer, poet, narrator and editor.  He is one of the founders and directors of Eloisa Cartonera, a publishing house that disseminates contemporary Latin American literature. With the publication of his first book of poetry, Zelarayán (1998), he burst forth on to the South American cultural scene creating, along with other poets, the style today known as Realismo atolondrado. Both in poerty and novels, the Cucurto experience is an explosion of music and impudence with invented words, insults to politicians and reflections on literary masters. Other books of poetry include La Máquina de hacer paraguayitos (2000), 20 pungas contra un pasajero (2003) and Hatuchay (2005). Some of his novels include Fer (Eloísa Cartonera, 2003), Panambí (Eloisa Cartonera, 2004) and Las aventuras del Sr. Maiz (Interona, 2005).  His poems have appeared in anthologies published in Mexico, Chile and Germany.  His 2003 novel, Cosa de Negros (Nigga Shit), made him a cult author especially among young readers.  These novels and poems describe the Dominican, Peruvian and Paraguayan immigration of the mid-1990s to Buenos Aires.    In 2005, 2006 and 2007 he received a scholarship from Akademie Schloss Solitude, Stuttgart, a public entity funded by the German government.

Eloisa Haudenschild, Buenos Aires, Argentina, resides in California
Eloisa Haudenschild, Director and founder of the haudenschildGarage, is a collector and active supporter of contemporary art.  In the late 1990s Eloisa began traveling to China and forging friendships with young Chinese contemporary artists and curators.  From 2002 -2005, she organized selections from her collection to form the exhibition Zooming into Focus which traveled to five cities in the US, Mexico, China (Shanghai and Beijing) and Singapore. Other holdings in her collection include pieces from the Americas, Europe, and Asia.  The Latin American collection, in particular, began in the early 1990s due in part to Eloisa’s involvement with inSite, a network of contemporary art programs and commissioned projects within the border region of San Diego and Tijuana.  As inSite’s President of the Board of Directors, she has worked with significant Latin American curators such as Osvaldo Sanchez, Olivier Debroise, Cuauhtémoc Medina and has formed close friendships with many Latin American artists including Guillermo Kuitca, Judi Werthein and Ruben Ortiz-Torres.  In 2003, she founded the haudenschildGarage, a cultural platform that stands somewhere between a salon and an alternative space.

Steve Fagin, Chicago, Illinois
Steve Fagin (www.stevefagin.net) is Professor of Visual Arts at the University of California, San Diego. He has produced a series of feature length videos including The Amazing Voyage of Gustave Flaubert and Raymond Roussel, The Machine That Killed Bad People and TropiCola. These films have been featured prominently at museums and international festivals and have been screened on Bravo International in Latin America, Canal + in Europe and PBS in the United States. His work has been featured at a retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art, New York and is the subject of a book from Duke University Press, Talkin’ With Your Mouth Full: Conversations with the Videos of Steve Fagin. His work has been presented at the Museum of Modern Art, New York and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York as part of The Art of the 20th Century.  Currently he is working as Creative Consultant for the haudenschildGarage and is the Commissioning Editor for the Spare Parts Projects. The current cycle that he is co-producing with haudenschildGarage Director, Eloisa Haudenschild, includes Decolonizing Architecture, selected for the current Architectural Venice Biennale, A Crime has Many Stories to be premiered at Malba in Buenos Aires in November and The Last Book to launch in January in conjunction with the MAK Center, Los Angeles.

Monica Jovanovich, Los Angeles, California
Monica Jovanovich is the Managing Director and website/blog moderator of the haudenschildGarage.  She is a PhD candidate in Art History, Theory and Criticism at the University of California, San Diego. Her research in early 20th century art and architecture focuses on urbanism, gender, and the corporate sponsorship of public space in American and Latin American Art Deco.  Monica teaches History of Modern Art, Contemporary Art and American Art at San Diego State University, Point Loma Nazarene University and the Design Institute of San Diego.  She has also worked with the San Diego Museum of Art speaking on American landscape painter, Asher B. Durand (2008). She was involved with the San Diego Museum of Art exhibition Paper Traces: Latin American Prints and Drawings from the SDMA Collection (2006) and has lectured for the Latin American Arts Committee of San Diego, California. In 2007, she presented her essay, Latin American Art Deco, at the annual Art Deco Conference in Los Angeles and it was subsequently published in the annual journal, The Sophisticate. In 2009 she will lecture on early 19th century American Art at the Timken Museum, San Diego.

Alejandro Ruiz, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Alejandro Ruiz is a Licenciado of International Trade from Universidad Argentina de la Empresa (UADE, Buenos Aires) with a specialization in Global Marketing & Entertainment from ICSC (Nevada, USA).  Ruiz is a professor at the University of Palermo, Buenos Aires in the Department of Textile and Clothing Design within the School of Design and Communication and has published The Way of Entertainment: A Creative Challenge (2004) and Creativity (2006). He is President and founder of Global Fashion Group and Ruiz Productions. Global Fashion Group specializes in the design, development and organization of international, multimedia fashion events. Ruiz Productions represents Elite Model in Argentina and organizes events and offers strategic support services, development and implementation of action-oriented design for marketing companies in the major cities of Argentina.  Ruiz consults with companies for the development of product branding and the marketing of mega shows. Ruiz is responsible for the creation of spaces for the dissemination of Argentine culture and design in Latin America, the United States and Europe.

Judi Werthein, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Judi Werthein was born in Buenos Aires and lives in Brooklyn, New York. She graduated with a degree in Architecture and Urbanism from the University of Buenos Aires.  Her work has been exhibited in various institutions including: The Vera List Center for Art and Politics, New York; Tate Modern, London; Centrum Beldende Kunst, Rotterdam; Americas Society, New York; De Appel, Amsterdam; CAC Contemporary Art Center, Vilnius, Lithuania; Studio Gallery, Budapest; Musee de Art Moderne Grand-Duc Jean, Luxemburg; Bard Mseum, The Center for Curatorial Studies Annandale on Hudson, New York.  She has participated in many biennales and similar events such as: Manifesta 7, Bolzano, Italy; 41 Salon Nacional de Artistas, Cali, Colombia; Bienal de Pontevedra, Galicia, Spani; inSite_05, San Diego/Tijuana, USA/Mexico; S-Files, Museo del Barrio, New York, and la 7ma Bienal de la Habana, Cuba.  Her solo exhibitions include: Corporate Logo, Art in General, New York; The Doc Art Center, Ireland; Manicurated, Bronx Museum, New York; Jessica Murrary Gallery, New York; Galeria Ruth Benzacar, Buenos Aires.  Her work has been reviewed in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Miami Herald, Village Voice, Artforum, Art in American, Art Nexus, Frieze, Another Publication, and Flash Art.

Roberto Jacoby, 1944, Buenos Aires, Argentina

Roberto Jacoby, an artist and a sociologist, is considered to be one of the first conceptual artists. In 1966 he co-published the Manifesto of Media Art that proposed a dematerialized art genre that made use of social material, the mass media and various communication structures. Almost all of his work has been collaborative and it has produced various actions, events and happenings.  Jacoby showed at the Instituto Di Tella and in 1969, after the Tucumán Arde communications campaign and the publication of the clandestine magazine Sobre, he gave up working in the visual arts and instead investigated social conflict and political epistemology. In the 1980s, he joined the pop group Virus as a songwriter and staged shows and multimedia parties, among others, the Club Social Deportivo y Cultural Eros. Virtually his entire output since the 1960s has been designed to intervene in the circuit of communication and actions through the use of technology as a tool for collaborative creation. He co-founded Ramona, a magazine of the visual art and grounded Proyecto Venus, a virtual and offline community that issued its own currency and several artists’ networks. He was awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship in 2002.

Fernanda Laguna, 1972 Buenos Aires, Argentina

Fernanda Laguna graduated from the Prilidiano Pueyrredón School of Fine Art, her work combines literature, installation, performance and painting.  Since 1992, Laguna has been active in the local and international art world with multiple solo and collective exhibitions and in 1994 she was selected to be part of Guillermo Kuitca’s program for young artists.  From 1999 to 2008 she and Cecilia Pavón (1999-2001) ran the art space and publishing house Belleza y Felicidad where she curated exhibitions and published books of poetry and fiction including El Loco, La ama de casa, Salvador Bahia, Ella y Yo, Los celos no ayudan-la culpa tampoco, Samanta and amigas. In 2003 she opened a branch of Belleza y Felicidad in Villa Fiorito and in 2008 her workshop for teenagers was included in the public school, Number 44, in Villa Fiorito. Laguna’s work has been featured in many publications such as The Nineties from Fondo Nacional de las Artes, the catalog of Donations and Acquisitions of Malba in 2007, and in 2005, the British magazine ID selected Laguna as one of the two hundred and fifty upcoming artists.  Inés Katzenstein, Argentine curator and art historian, writes “Fernanda Laguna epitomizes what you expect from a present day artist, not only because of her work but also for her activity in the art circuit as a gallery owner and curator. Laguna is a poet and fiction writer as well. She is a creator within a wide range of activities and this makes her a model whose influence will grow with time.”

Eloísa Cartonera, La Boca, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Eloísa Cartonera (www.eloisacartonera.com.ar) is a social and community-related artistic project in Buenos Aries, Argentina. The central office is a cardboard store – a place where cardboard and paper is sold – named “No hay cuchillo sin Rosas” (“There’s no knife without Roses”). There, cardboard collectors, cartoneros, exchange ideas with artists and writers. The cardboard collector is a South American phenomenon and many times there are entire families working as cartoneros.   Eloísa Cartonera invents its own aesthetic; open minded and unbiased, wishing to produce reciprocal learning, fueled by creativity. Books with cardboard covers are edited on the street; these covers, painted by hand with temperas and paintbrush, are made of the cardboard that was collected in the streets.  Eloisa Cartonera publishes unknown, border and vanguard texts of Argentina, Chile, Mexico, Costa Rica, Uruguay, Brazil and Peru. They have a roster of world-renowned authors including Ricardo Piglia, Cesar Aira, Gonzalo Milan (Chile), and Luis Chavez (Costa Rica).

Sonia Becce, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Sonia Becce is an independent curator who lives and works in Buenos Aires.
She has recently curated Felix Gonzalez-Torres: Somewhere/Nowhere, the first major exhibition of Gonzalez-Torres’ work in Argentina for Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires (MALBA). She has also curated shows of Guillermo Kuitca at Museo Reina Sofia de Madrid (2003) and at Biblioteca Luis Angel Arango, Bogota, Colombia (2006). In the same capacity, she has been responsible for, among others, the following group exhibitions: Civilizacion y Barbarie (2004 to 2005), a traveling exhibition to some of the leading museums of Latin America; and Tempranos intereses personales (2005).  She is currently a member of the Advisory Committee of CiFo (Cisneros Fontanals Art Foundation, Miami, Florida). She has been a coordinator for the four series of the Guillermo Kuitca Awards Program in Buenos Aires.

Rosalba Mirabella, 1975 Tucuman, Argentina

Rosalba Mirabella received a Bachelor of Arts from the National University of Tucuman with a focus in painting (1999) and printmaking (2004). In 2001, she obtained a grant from the Fundacion Antorchas for young Argentine artists living in the interior of the country.  She was selected to participate in workshops for young artists of the NOA (Tucuman, 2001/2002) and the Clínicas de Artes Visuales of the Centro Cultural Rojas (Buenos Aires, 2005).  In 2006, she participated in a residency programme at Gasworks (London, UK) and in 2007, she was part of the International Artist Residency RIAA (Ostende, Argentina).  In 2002, she received the Philips Art Expression prize (Sao Paulo, Brazil) and in 2004, the 90th Anniversary Award from the National University of Tucuman.   In 2005, she received the Regional Prize Drawing Osde Foundation (Buenos Aires) and in 2008, the first prize from INCAA / Expotrastiendas de video, and the Fundación Luz Austral award from ¿Cuál Realidad? de Fotografía (Buenos Aires).  She participated in the group exhibitions Viajes Mínimos (CCEBA, Buenos Aires, 2008), South Limit (Buenos Aires, 2008), Puntas del Hilo (Salta, Argentina, 2008), Resplandores (2007, CC Recoleta), Festival Mini Mini Max (2007), Videos con Tuco (Barcelona, Spain, 2007), Interfaces (Buenos Aires, 2006) and her solo show Cuaderno para dejar olvidado en un taxi (Museum of Fine Arts in Tucuman, 2004).