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- Trip in Ghent, with guided visit in S.M.A.K. -Francisca García & Mario Navarro | Unearthed Conversation
Trip in Ghent, with guided visit in S.M.A.K. -Francisca García & Mario Navarro | Unearthed Conversation
Francisca García and Mario Navarro, Unearthed Conversation, Film Still
1:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m.
Guided tour of S.M.A.K.
The exhibition Unearthed Conversation by Chilean artists Francisca García and Mario Navarro focuses on the Atacama Desert at the mouth of the Loa River in northern Chile. This landscape is shaped by diverse narratives: archaeological finds from the ancient Chango culture, similarities with the landscape of Mars, the presence of the world's largest telescopes, and the scars left by the Pinochet dictatorship.
Unearthed Conversation shows that human “discoveries” are inevitably accompanied by desire, appropriation and colonisation. By drawing attention to silent material witnesses of a culture, they contrast vulnerable, early forms of discovery with the optimism surrounding contemporary technology.
In their work, Francisca García (°1969, Santiago) and Mario Navarro (°1970, Santiago), each from their own perspective, delve into the visible manifestations of the world around us. Although they each have their own artistic practice, they are collaborating on this project at S.M.A.K. What connects them is their “forensic” attitude towards image, landscape, politics and utopias.
14:30 - 15:00 | Coffee break
15:15 - 16:15
Visit to Kunsthal
The exhibition Peace Nuts by Belgian artist Kasper De Vos (born 1988) takes the acorn as its starting point, a natural form designed to fall and bring forth new life. He recognises a striking similarity between this form and the bomb, a man-made object that falls to destroy. The similarity between the acorn and the bomb forms the starting point for a production process in which monumental wooden acorn shapes are made from tree trunks of different types of wood. The wood was collected during a trip through Austria and the works were finished during a residency at Jester in Genk.
Kasper De Vos lives and works in Ghent, Belgium. He studied sculpture in Antwerp and Ghent (2009−2012) and completed a postgraduate degree at the HISK in Ghent. His sculptures and installations arise from a tactile and visual pleasure, a play of formal and substantive associations that make us marvel and dream.
Audiovisual artist and curator Firas El Hallak transforms the Kunsthal Gent pavilion into a place of deep tranquillity and shared attention with The Dome Sessions. This audiovisual work is an exploration of sound and space that stems from the unique architectural and acoustic properties of the unfinished Dome in Tripoli, Lebanon, designed in 1962 by renowned Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer.
Firas El Hallak is an audiovisual artist and curator who works at the intersection of visual storytelling, spatial practices and community engagement. He is based between Belgium and Beirut and is the artistic director of Splinter vzw.
4:30 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Visit to Barbé gallery | Charlie De Voet
17:20 | Return to S.M.A.K.
Participation fee: 5 euros | free (Supporting Members)
Active and Supporting members can register in advance via info@vriendensmak.be. Cancellations made less than three weeks before the date will not be refunded.
The trip will be by bicycle, departing from S.M.A.K. Members who come by car can go to the locations independently and possibly take members without transport with them.
