Christian Jankowski A life that changes your week Press Release and Exhibition Leaflet

Christian Jankowski A life that changes your week

Karaoke, a hunt for food, a puppet conference, a holy artwork, a talk in Athens, a magic transformation into a dove and a poodle and an encounter with an Italian TV astrologer.

One week only: 6 October to 12 October (open daily) Grand Karaoke Opening on Wednesday, 5 October, 6pm For one week only, Para/Site Art Space will present works of Christian Jankowski, one of the most talked about multimedia artists of his generation.

Christian Jankowski lives in New York and Berlin and participated in numerous International Biennials (1997 Lyon Biennale, 1999 Venice Biennale, 2001 Berlin Biennale, 2002 Vilnius, 2002 Whitney Biennale) and in numerous solo and group exhibitions around the world.

The multimedia artist (in every sense of the word) cleverly merges reality, fiction, story telling, amateurism and professionalism in his videos. His work is a mix of performance and video art and his well-constructed stories are hilariously funny takes on life and the art-world, featuring performances by local amateurs and professionals.

A life that changes your week will bring together ten of Christian Jankowski’s one channel video works from the past 14 years. The centerpiece of this exhibition is The Day We Met, a video installation originally produced for the Artsonje Center in Seoul. Jankowski professionally filmed three background videos for the biggest karaoke machine manufacturer in Korea that are currently included in machines worldwide.

A life that changes your week Para/Site Art Space G/F, 4 Po Yan Street, Sheung Wan, Hong Kong info@para-site.org.hk, www.para-site.org.hk Tel: (+852) 25174620 Fax: (+852) 25176850

Open every day during the exhibition from 11am –7pm

For more press information, please contact Christina Li at 2517-4620.

Christian Jankowski 改變你一星期的一生 唱卡拉 OK 搵食之旅 木偶會議 神聖的藝術作品 一個在雅典的講座 變身成一隻白鴿和一隻貴婦狗 巧遇一位意大利占星家

只此一星期： 十月六日至十二日（天天開放） 隆重卡啦 OK 開幕酒會： 十月五日（星期三）晚上六時 Para/Site 藝術空間將為大家帶來近年炙手可熱的多媒體藝術家 Christian Jankowski，舉 行七天的個人展覽。 現居於紐約和柏林的 Christian Jankowski 的作品曾見於無數的國際雙年展（如 1997 年的 里昂雙年展、1999 年的威尼斯雙年展、2001 年的柏林雙年展、2002 年的費爾紐斯雙年 展和惠特尼雙年展等等），還有在世界各地舉行個人及團體展覧。 Christian Jankowski 作品主要由行為藝術和錄像藝術作品組成。他能巧妙地將錄像中的現 實和虛構、專業和業餘混合起來；精雕細琢的故事，透過專業和業餘的演員演繹，以風趣 幽默的手法，表達他對生活和藝術世界的種種看法。 改變你一星期的一生將於一星期內展出 Jankowski 於過去十四年的十件錄像作品。展覽焦 點是他為韓國首爾的 Artsonje Center 創作的一件錄像裝置作品「The Day We Met」。此 外，他還跟韓國最大的卡啦 OK 伴唱機製造商合作拍攝了三段音樂背景片段，並加入現在 生產的伴唱機內。

改變你一星期的一生 Para/Site 藝術空間 香港上環普仁街四號地下 info@para-site.org.hk, www.para-site.org.hk 電話: (+852) 25174620 傳真: (+852) 25176850

十月六日至十二日，天天開放 （11am – 7pm）

新聞界及展覽查詢 : 請致電 2517-4620 與 Christina Li 聯絡

A Life that Changes Your Week - Prolonged for three more weeks until 25. October Para/Site Art Space presents works of Christian Jankowski, one of the most talked about multimedia artists of his generation.

Christian Jankowski lives in New York and Berlin and has participated in numerous International Biennials (1997 Lyon Biennale, 1999 Venice Biennale, 2001 Berlin Biennale, 2002 Vilnius, 2002 Whitney Biennale) and numerous solo and group exhibitions around the world.

The multimedia artist (in every sense of the word) cleverly merges reality, fiction, story telling, amateurism and professionalism in his videos. His work is a mix of performance and video art and his well-constructed stories are hilariously funny takes on life and the art world, featuring performances by local amateurs and professionals.

A life that changes your week will bring together three of Christian Jankowski's video works.

Most of Christian Jankowski’s works are produced site-specific. In that case it means they are produced for a specific situation, mostly with local participation. That they later can be exhibited everywhere and function in a universal art context is only one quality of the intriguing and funny works he produces.

In the Para/Site Art Space window we exhibit Telemistica. In Italy nighttime television is filled with Fortunetellers that can be called in from the public. For this work that was produced for the prestigious Venice Biennial, Christian Jankowski called in to find out how his participation at this important exhibition will develop. The forecasts where then shown at the exhibition.

For his work Puppet Conference, the artist brought together America’s most important puppets for a conference in Pittsburgh, the home of one of the first and most important puppets in the world. The puppets discuss their standing in the world, art and media. Like most of Jankowski’s works, Puppet Conference researches and questions these relationships. In 16mm Mystery, the artist itself, like a sniper, climbs up the stairs of a high-rise with a 16mm camera. When he starts to project the film on a screen, a building in the background collapses. We do not know is that powerful that has been shown on the screen, but when the artist packs the projector and screen to leave the scene, he, and the viewer, have a satisfying feeling of the power of the image and the art of filmmaking.

The title of his Para/Site Art Space one-week exhibition A life that changes your week also inspired Jankowski to produce a new work in only a week. The photographic work is a record of the filming of a movie with the same name as the show title. Actors were casted, professional film equipment ordered and a script written in this short time. Filming took place on location, around Sheung Wan. The pictures show scenes of the movie production as well as the actors playing these life-changing scenes. As movies mostly develop around one single narrative event: somebody important dies, some love scene, a crime. The descriptions of the photos are on one side completing and explaining the images; on the other side they are also very personal comments on the film production. Jankowski not only comments on the long and rich film tradition of Hong Kong but also questions the relationship of film, its marketing and the universal meaning of this medium.

改變你一星期的一生 (延長至十月二十五日)

Para/Site 藝術空間為大家帶來近年炙手可熱的多媒體藝術家 Christian Jankowski 舉行個人 展覽。 現居於紐約和柏林的 Christian Jankowski 的作品曾見於無數國際雙年展（如 1997 年的里昂 雙年展、1999 年威尼斯雙年展、2001 年柏林雙年展、2002 年費爾紐斯雙年展和惠特尼雙年 展等等），還有在世界各地舉行個人及團體展覧。 Christian Jankowski 作品主要由行為藝術和錄像藝術組成。他能巧妙地將錄像中的現實和虛 構、專業和業餘混合起來；精雕細琢的故事，透過專業和業餘的演員演繹，以風趣幽默的手 法，表達他對生活和藝術世界的種種看法。 「改變你一星期的一生」將於一星期內展出 Jankowski 於過去十四年的四件錄像作品。展覽焦點是 他為韓國首爾的 Artsonje Center 創作的一件錄像裝置作品「The Day We Met」。此外，他還跟韓國 最大的卡啦 OK 伴唱機製造商合作拍攝了三段音樂背景片段，並加入現在生產的伴唱機內。

Jankowski 的作品大部分在特定地點為特定的情況製作，當中經常涉及當地人的參與。這些 地點特定影片後來於世界各地展出及國際藝術場地播放只是他作品的其中一個有趣和吸引之 處。為拍攝「Puppet Conference」，Jankowski 把美國歷來最受歡迎的布偶都帶往匹茲堡 － 第一個美式布偶及許多其他布偶劇的發源地，為他們舉行一個專業會議。布偶們在其中 討論他們在社會、藝術界和傳播界中的地位。像很多其他 Jankowski 的作品，「Puppet Conference」正是在探討及質疑這些問題。在「16mm Mystery」中，Jankowski 像一個狙擊 手一般，手拿一個十六亳米攝錄機和卷起的螢幕，從樓梯登上一座高樓大廈。當他開始在在 大廈天台上投放影片時，背景中的一棟大廈突然倒塌。過後，他悠然地收起螢幕和攝錄機離 開，觀眾都能感受到這段錄像並藝術那攝人的力量。 是次在 Para/Site 藝術空間的展覽標題「改變你一星期的一生」為 Jankowski 帶來在一星期 裡創作一件新作品的靈感。照片中紀錄了一套跟展覽同名的電影的拍攝過程。短短一星期內 Jankowski 請來了專業演員、拍攝人員和專業器材，更撰寫了劇本，拍攝就在上環藝術空間 一帶進行。一系列的影像有的是電影拍攝花絮，亦有顯出此電影如何「改變一星期的一生」 的劇照。流行電影普遍題材圍繞單一敍述性事件，如重要人物去世、愛情故事或一宗罪案； Jankowski 的照片說明一方面是這些事件的解說和補充，另一方面也是他個人對此「電影製 作」的評論。Jankowski 不但表達了他對香港那悠久而豐富的電影傳統的見解，更提出了他 對電影跟其市場推廣及其意義的質疑。 這作品的模式是根據一套香港性工作者行動組織的電影「姊姊妹妹和紫藤」而成。