Basically
Accelerator’s spring programme is imbued with elements of play, games and the celebrational as subversive strategies for empathy, and survival. With a wide range of practices, this spring’s artists come together in their interest in expanding normative social systems. The presence of play manifests itself on several levels, from the desire to create meaningful encounters with open ends, to an effort to loosen up accepted conventions in dance, film, and audience relations.
Lester St. Louis, Ezra Fieremans, Nikima Jagudajev and Ashley Morgen. Photo: Jean-Baptiste Béranger
Nikima Jagudajev, Lester St. Louis, Lara Dâmaso and Yevheniya Kravets. Photo: Jean-Baptiste Béranger
About the exhibition
Accelerator presents Brussels-based artist and choreographer Nikima Jagudajev’s first exhibition in Sweden, with their work Basically. Jagudajev is interested in social relations as spatial relations and how we come together in meaningful and considerate ways. Inspired by playful ways students subvert the educational system, Jagudajev has developed a prefigurative practice they call ‘re-schooling’. Some of the most creative and heartfelt acts of our early education, like self-organised play, gossip, flirting, passing notes, were extra-curricular yet located within the institution. Basically is an ongoing live project where the exhibition is a hybrid production site, residency space, schoolyard; a context to practice and perform within.
At Accelerator, visitors are enveloped into an open-ended game simply by being in the space. A group of nearly twenty artists, dancers, and musicians hold the rules of the game constant, folding in the audience in visible and invisible ways. Over different formations and phases, they shape the space with elements such as live music, food, a mythopoetic deck of cards called POWDER, the design process of the Arcane Clothing collection, oracles in still life form, non-linear choreographies and unscheduled time that leaves room for contingency. The work is governed by the formal rules of the game as well as by the subjective interpretations that occur in interactions with and between the participating artists and the visitors. In Basically, the creation and re-creation of the environment is central.
Since 2020, Basically has taken different forms and gestures, like a durational performance on a beach, or as a vinyl. The piece grows through accumulation and divergence. At Accelerator, Basically‘s longest iteration to date, what you encounter is one moment in a long-term long-form megawork. There is a synchronistic aspect to the exhibition as it is set up in cycles over the entire exhibition period. Depending on when you arrive you will experience high or low intensity phases of the work and different aspects of Basically are activated at different times. Visitors are invited to experience how the work’s characters write the world of Basically into existence – and to become a part of this open world, role playing game. You come and go as you please, the work has no clear beginning or end. Staying for a while is recommended!
About Nikima Jagudajev
Nikima Jagudajev (1990) is a US born, Austrian/Uzbek artist and choreographer. Jagudajev’s work has taken form in venues including a solo exhibition at Bergen Kunsthall (Norway), WIELS (Brussels), Shedhalle (Zürich), Kurimanzutto (Mexico City), Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève, The Whitney Museum of American Art, MoMA PS1 and the Rockbund Art Museum (Shanghai) as well as in the context of Material Art Fair’s Immaterial (Mexico City), 89+ at LUMA/Westbau (Zürich), kunstenfestivaldesarts (Brussels) and as part of the Marrakech Biennale (Morocco). They were a 2016 DanceWeb recipient and returned to teach at ImPulsTanz in 2017. Future shows include Centre Pompidou Paris as part of MOVE festival, Mumok (Vienna) and Dhaka Art Summit (Bangladesh) as well as a performance at KAAP’s Dansand! Festival (Ostend).
Credits
Creation, direction & choreography: Nikima Jagudajev
Musical collaboration & technical direction: Jordan Balaber & Lester St. Louis
Dramaturgy: Louise Trueheart
With: Samuel Baidoo (dance & lighting), Matilda Cobanli (food & dance), Lara Dâmaso (dance & music), Ezra Fieremans (dance & music), Ama Kyei (dance), Yevheniya Kravets (dance), Ashley Morgen (music & movement), Mona Namér (dance, music & textile contribution), Laura Stellacci (textile design & dance), Amina Szecsödy (music & dance), Gry Tingskog (textile contribution & dance), Ellen Söderhult (dance & music), Louise Trueheart (dance), Maria Muehombo (MIMI) (music & movement), Lester St. Louis (music & movement).
Video editing: Salomon Leonard Poutsma
Musical contribution: Amina Szecsödy, June Jenkins
Graphic Design: Laurel Atwell, Zöe Field
Powder deck contribution: Ayomoy Arrono, Laurel Atwell, Sanne Dodier, Nina Emge, Olivia Erlanger, Che Go Eun, Zoë Field, Polina Filipova, Padyn Humble, Melanie Matthieu, Abigail McNamara, Saye Oyama, Salomon Leonard Poutsma, Ra Tack, nick von kleist (nvk), Maïra Villena, Petra Webb, Amalia Wiatr Lewis
Photography: Melanie Matthieu, Stine Sampers
Mix & Master: Chris Pawlusek
Production: Hiros
Residencies: Decoratelier, kunstenfestivaldesarts2021, workspacebrussels, Frankfurt LAB, Im_Flieger, KAAP, Dhaka Art Summit
Partners: Bergen Kunsthall, WIELS, Dhaka Art Summit, Mumok, Oktoberdans, BIT Teatergarasjen, Shedhalle Zürich, KAAP, de Brakke Grond
With support from: workspacebrussels, WIELS, Bundesministerium Kunst, Kultur, öffentlicher Dienst und Sport, Vlaamse Gemeenschap, C-Takt, Phileas – The Austrian Office for Contemporary Art, Re-imagine Europe, Vlaamse Gemeenschapscommissie, IASPIS, Dansens Hus, Austrian Embassy Stockholm
Exhibition team Accelerator:
Richard Julin, Curator & Artistic Director
Therese Kellner, Curator
Presented in collaboration with:
With support from:
logo austrian embassy
