Let's make sure there is ART at KiezBurn this year
Benjamin Langholz
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Hi I'm Benjamin. I've been to 18 burns around the world including Burning Man, Kiez Burn, AfrikaBurn, Borderland, Nowhere, Midburn, and Burning Japan. I've created grant-funded artworks at Burning Man 2017,2019, AfrikaBurn 2018,2019 and Midburn 2017. You can see my work here www.benjaminlangholz.com
KiezBurn is an amazing event, but I feel it's lacking art. When I say this I don't mean it's lacking in artistic gestures or creative endeavors, in this area we are overflowing. But the kind of art that to me, and I believe many others is one of the things that defines a burn. Large scale, interactive, installation artwork. The kind of thing that blows your mind, inspires you and makes you say wow out loud.
For an artist, this kind of artwork is expensive, takes months of planning, and is an incredible gift. Sadly I do not believe the Dreams Platform is an effective way to create opportunities for this kind of art to arrive at our event.
I am proposing and volunteering to organize an Art Department for KiezBurn 2020. I want to publicize an open call for installation art to have concepts submitted and reviewed within the next month. Then myself along with whoever else is willing to volunteer will select 3-5 artworks that we feel will bring the feeling of burner art to KiezBurn, and are likely to be executable. I would then propose that some of the funds leftover from last year, let's say €15,000 (someone who has an eye on the money could give a better idea here) and distribute it to these artworks in order to secure meaningful funding for them early on to at least get them started towards being able to create their vision. The art department would then continue to support and keep an eye on the projects up until the end of KiezBurn when they are uninstalled and taken offsite.
To be clear I am not proposing at this moment to do away with the Dreams Platform. In fact, I would encourage the artworks selected by the Art Department to seek additional funding through the Dreams Platform once it's available. I propose that this Art Department and art funding happen well before, with separate funds, and entirely independently from the Dreams Platform.
walto Mon 9 Mar 2020 4:31PM
oops, pressed the wrong button a couple of times. moved now.
Franzi Sun 8 Mar 2020 7:10PM
Update
We are hitting play again on the advice process
We had our "How we work together" meeting on Saturday March 6th and agreed on an iterated version for the advice process. Everyone currently affected by the pause please read through the iterated process and continue with the updated version of the advice process. All the details you find over here.
Jeff Spirlock Sat 29 Feb 2020 11:43AM
After reviewing the 2019 Dreams platform (dreams.2019.kiezburn.org) it is pretty clear to me why there was not a mass amount of art on the playa last year. Many of these dreams are related to camp infrastructure. Which is pretty insane to me. I'm all for helping people bring their art but if you don't own a sound system I don't feel like Dreams should be used to bring some massive booming sound system. If your camp isn't 80-90% funded then you shouldn't be draining funds from Dreams to build your camp. Infrastructure is NOT a Dream from my point of view, it is a necessity to functionality. That includes camp infrastructure or event infrastructure. These should be separate budgets.
Paul aka Khromo Thu 13 Feb 2020 5:05PM
@CJ Yetman I know that. And I agree with you. But YOU told me I was coming across as hostile because I was not making proposals in a different thread, did you not?
At this point, we're going around in circles and you're contradicting yourself and frankly,YOU are coming actross as hostile and obstructionist, and I'm not sure if that is your intention.
Best we continue this in person and not virtually, I think.
Karlo Walz Thu 13 Feb 2020 11:44AM
I see this process in steps:
a) decision of an art department (to get some expensive art which will get money a bit in advance on our playa)
b) decision on the amount (see above.. my vision is 50% of the art grant for 2 projects)
c) setup of the art department with people
1 art dep head (should be from Kiezburn) and 2 teams.. one for each project...
I would like to have as head not an artist as this will lead to bias of artwork and maybe people.
I would prefer to have someone from Kiezburn org.
The question is how is the process of finding this decision?
Paul aka Khromo Thu 13 Feb 2020 10:33AM
Then why not join the dreams boart instead?
How would you improve the platform? What do you see as the flaws?
I don't mind the dreams platform, but I see as reeking of the democracy people love to hate in burner cultrue (it's vote-based and popularity wins out over merit, as people vote for their friends).~
That said, I'd be opposed to getting rid of it totally if the suggestion arose.
Paul aka Khromo Wed 12 Feb 2020 6:50PM
@Vlad -the dreams platform is still open and joining the art group is open to everyone - so not just experts.
Paul aka Khromo Thu 13 Feb 2020 3:04PM
@Karlo Walz Apologies :)
Karlo Walz Thu 13 Feb 2020 11:47AM
Paul and others.. Can you please avoid sarcasm or ironic or words not translatable..
This is not radical inclusion anymore.. and native english speaker plays there advatages in full!
walto · Wed 11 Mar 2020 12:55AM
The Dream-Team has listened to the input from the community and taken a strong focus towards art installations and performances (away from Kieze & infrastructure). We hope & believe this will address the key concerns regarding big art in terms of timing, funding and guidance. See implementation here.
We regret we were not able to come to a consensus with this art committee proposal during the advice process of the Dreams platform. It is hard to conceive a Dreams Platform to be successful in parallel to an art grant committee that does not operate through Dreams. For the future, it might be interesting to evaluate what comes out of the experiment Borderland is ran last & this year of having an open committee fund certain bigger art projects on the Dreams Platform.