Past Residents TOK
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TOK conducts a presentation at Small Projects, Tromso, Norway in 2015
TOK is curatorial duo based in St. Petersburg and founded by Anna Bitkina and Maria Veits in 2010 as a platform for conducting interdisciplinary projects in the fields of contemporary art and social sciences. TOK’s research-based art and educational projects have a strong social component and deal with current issues that are widely discussed both in Russia and internationally such as migration, public space and citizens, development of education, deprivation of social resources, forming collective memory, use of natural resources, growing role of the media in the global society, changing political climate and many others.
The exhibition States of Control, curated by TOK, will be on view at HIAP’s Gallery Augusta and Alkovi Gallery from 17 August–1 October 2017 in the context of TOK’s residency in the Connecting Points project.
States of Control aims at constructing a continuous dialogue between artists and the public of different ages and generations in order to stimulate critical thinking around the topics of information manipulation, the history of propaganda, post-truth and constructing news during times of political unrest. The project proposes and tests different methods of historical analysis, journalistic investigation, and creation of additional media discourses. What are the limits of control when it comes to controlling media and who actually owns information? Is it possible to avoid propaganda at all? Or will the ones in power always impose their vision on the oppressed and rewrite facts and history according to their interests? The initiators of States of Control create a safe and censorship free environment where these questions can be discussed and opposing political statements can be accepted and taken under consideration for further analysis.
Participating artists: Khalid Albaih, Mark Boswell, Culturunners, Stephen Duncombe, Yevgeniy Fiks, Kalle Hamm and Dzamil Kamanger, Alevtina Kakhidze, Mikhail Kaluzhsky, Agnieszka Kurant, Rabih Mroué, Emily Newman, Mikhail Tolmachev, Tamir Zadok.