Starke Orte: Powerful Places for Art
A network project involving various artists' associations within the region
Bochum (Turbine Hall) / Photo: Engels & Krämer GmbH
"Powerful Places" is the art project run by the artists' associations of the Ruhr Metropolis and as such will serve as a platform for the future of art in the region. These associations are operating in concert for the first time in their history. A network of places which, due to their architecture, history and function represent something typical of the life, work and culture of the Ruhr region, will be transformed into joint exhibition and performance venues in 2010.
The "Powerful Places" project began in the summer of 2007 at the initiative of the Bochum Association of Artists. Soon afterwards, exciting and undiscovered places were also identified in other cities as venues for an unusual exhibition - these included old industrial facilities and air-raid shelters, a church and various other public spaces available for artistic intervention. All these places are to be reinterpreted and reinvigorated by an interdisciplinary, interactive approach in various exhibitions.
15 artists' associations of the Ruhr Metropolis are preparing a total of 12 "Powerful Places" with unusual artistic creations, installations and performances. Aside from opening up these locations to art, another effect of the project is that the artists' associations of the Ruhr Metropolis are now making more contact with one another and becoming active as a network across the local boundaries that previously existed. The journey through these 12 unusual places begins in March in the air-raid shelter of Sodingen, Herne, and ends in December 2010 at a wall in Dortmund. Further locations in Bottrop, Duisburg, Bochum, Essen, Gelsenkirchen, Witten and Lünen will also be newly interpreted.
This is a project initiative of the bochumerkünstlerbund together with sister art associations Künstlerbund Bottrop, Bund Bildender Künstler Westfalen, Gruppe Duktus, Dortmunder Gruppe, Westfälischer Künstlerbund, Bund Bildender Künstler Ruhrgebiet, Duisburger Künstlerbund, Ruhrländischer Künstlerbund Essen, Gedok Niederrhein-Ruhr, Werkkreis Bildender Künstler, Bund Gelsenkirchener Künstler, Herner Künstlerbund, Künstlergruppe Acht Lünen, and Wittener Künstlerbund.
March 6 - December 2010
Artistic interventions, installations and performances:
March 6 - April 4
Air-raid shelter Sodingen, Herne
from April 21
Wall project, Westfalenhütte Steel Plant, Dortmund
April 11 - 30
Malakov Tower, Prosper II Colliery, Bottrop
April 11 - May 9
Phoenixhalle Dortmund
April 30 - May 23
Scheidt’sche Hallen, Essen
April 30 - September 19.
Landscape Park Duisburg-Nord
May 1 - 30
Turbine Hall, Bochum
May 14 - June 6
Historic Deanery Dortmund-Mengede
May 30 - July 3
Atelierhaus Westfalenhütte Steel Plant Dortmund
June 19 - November 28
Blockhouse Air-Raid Shelter Gelsenkirchen
August 15 - September 30
Former training centre Weichenwerk, Witten
September 6 - 12
Lippeauen Nature Reserve, Lünen
You can find further information (in German) at:
www.starkeorte.de