On 31 January 2021, the consortium of the IMPROVISA – Life in Motion project, co-financed by the Creative Europe Programme, launched a Call for Artists inviting artists to submit proposals with new approaches to engaging audiences in cultural and heritage contents through the principles of improvisation and the use of mobile technologies.
An International selection committee assessed each of the applications received and selected the following artists:
Claudio Beorchia (Italy)
Ema Ferreira (Portugal)
Paul Wiersbinski (Germany)
Smaragda Nitsopoulou (Greece)
We would like to thank all the applicants who were interested in our call for sending the highly qualified proposals.
Claudio Beorchia (Italy)
https://www.claudiobeorchia.it/
I am an Italian interdisciplinary artist.
I studied Design and Visual Arts at Iuav University in Venice and at the Fine Arts Academy “Brera” in Milan. I hold a Ph.D. in Design Sciences – Department of Design and Planning of Complex Environments, at Doctorate School of Iuav University in Venice.
My artworks have been exhibited in numerous occasions in Italy and abroad (Argentina, Armenia, China, Croatia, France, Germany, Greece, Japan, Morocco, Palestine, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Uruguay). I have been artist in residency in Italy (Lombardia, Molise, Piedmont, Puglia, Sardinia, Sicily, Umbria, Veneto), Albania, Bulgaria, China, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Japan, Netherlands and United States (in New York and Georgia).
I try to see and represent the world in different, revealing, more meaningful ways. I do it through processes of intuition and insight, using slippages and variations of the point of view on devices, clichés, elements of urban space and landscape. I don’t put limits in the choice of languages and materials. I always look for expressive synthesis and formal effectiveness, lightness and irony.
Ema Ferreira (Portugal)
Download CV
https://linktr.ee/EmaFerreira
Ema Ferreira was born in Covilhã, Portugal, on February 14th of 1999. She began her musical studies at Covilhã Band at the age of eight (2007). One year later has joined the Conservatório Regional de Música da Covilhã (CRMC), where she finished the Secondary Music Course in Interpretation – Piano, in 2017 and on Nuno Santos Dias’s class. Currently, Ema attends the third year of her degree in Music – Composition, at Escola Superior de Música e Artes do Espectáculo (ESMAE), in Porto, where she studied under Pedro Santos’, Daniel Moreira’s and Dimitris Andrikopoulos’ guidance. During the academic year 2020/2021, she studied one semester at the Kungliga Musikhögskolan (KMH), in Stockholm, by the Erasmus program and under Per Mårtensson’s guidance.
In 2018 she decided to dedicate herself mainly to the area of musical composition, starting her studies under the guidance of professor and composer Paulo Bastos. In the various subjects related to the area (e.g.: programming, electronic music, orchestration, compositional techniques, among others) Ema also studied with several teachers, as for instance: Pedro Junqueira Maia (UM); Pedro Santos, Carlos Azevedo, Eugénio Amorim, Ângela da Ponte, Filipe Vieira, Rui Penha (ESMAE); Mattias Petersson, Johan Hammerth (KMH).
Electroacoustic music and the multimedia/audiovisual world have been her main area of interest. Until the date, her works were premiered and presented at Escola Superior de Música e Artes do Espectáculo, Conservatório Regional de Música da Covilhã, Festival Música Viva 2019 (Portugal), Kungliga Musikhögskolan (Sweden) and Festival Expresiones Contemporáneas (México).
Paul Wiersbinski (Germany)
https://lacunalab.org/members/paul-wiersbinski/
I studied video art with Mark Leckey and Douglas Gordon at the Städelschule in Frankfurt (Main) and currently live and work in Berlin.
My projects are conducted in between the lines of art, science and technology, touching discourses on artificial intelligence, entomology or cybernetics and referring to the history of performance and video art, as well as utilising notions of jest and improvisation. Often I construct technical prototypes, which are tried out by the public and go through various phases of continuous development.
My work has been presented in intl. Exhibitions: “RECORD > AGAIN!”, ZKM Karlsruhe (2009), “The indifference of Wisdom”, NURTUREart New York City (2013), “Risk Society”, MOCA Taipei (2013), “Showcase”, SPACE London (2018), “Offline Browser“, Hong-Gah Museum Taiwan (2018-2019), “Datami”, BOZAR Bruessels (2019-2020) / festivals &screenings: SALT Beyoğlu Istanbul (2012), Luminato Festival Toronto (2014), European Media Arts Festival, Osnabrück (2010, 2014, 2015, 2017), “IN/OUT“ Festival of the National Gallery Amman (2019) and received various prices and grands, such as support from Hauptstadtkulturfonds Berlin.
I hold lectures and presentations: “Push your art” Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2013), “Art in the Age of Earthquakes” Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin (2016), “Re:publica” Berlin (2019), “The Whole Life Academy“ Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin (2021) and worked as an EU-expert for “Resonances III“ at the Joint Research Centre (JRC) in Ispra (2018-2020).
Smaragda Nitsopoulou (Greece)
https://www.smaragdanitsopoulou.eu/
Smaragda Nitsopoulou is a video artist and film director from Greece. Through her practice, she is exploring the themes of memory and death in the Anthropocene era. Using found footage for her interactive pieces, she is aiming to evoke the ecumenical experience of death among the living. She has participated in several international festivals and art fairs such as Documenta 14, Video Art Miden & Simultan. In 2021 she completed her first feature-length documentary “Death Under Control”. She is currently attending Central Saint Martin’s college aiming to obtain her master’s research degree in moving images. She is a 2018 fellow of the SNF Artist Fellowship program.
