The Goethe-Institut and Bozar, together with iMAL in Belgium and Cairotronica in Egypt, are organising a media arts residency programme in spring 2022. They are looking for four artists from the Arab world and from Europe to engage in a two-week residency in Brussels (Belgium).
The general topic of the Halaqat project is ‘Politics of Spaces and Bodies’. With this theme in mind, artists can tell stories of power, limitation and impact over spaces and bodies, in the real world, as well as in the digital realm. What is the place of public and private space in both regions and in the different countries? And how do people deal with this? How do we experience physical and digital space? How will it be in the future and what role can technology play in this? The notion of bodies, in turn, relates to issues of gender, power, bodily contact, mobility and the role of body language.
The programme is composed of two sessions, from which the selected participants can choose a preference: one from 14-27 March 2022, and one from 16-29 May 2022.
The residency programme focuses on prototyping, experimenting, and exchanging ideas with fellow artists from different backgrounds, as well as local cultural players. For each session, the programme will bring together two artists to give them the opportunity to develop their respective projects. The residency will also be the occasion for them to explore common grounds, share knowledge and provide each other constructive feedback on a regular basis.
The participants will be given access to iMAL’s infrastructure as well as its Fablab, the philosophy of which is centred around knowledge sharing, DYI culture and open source communities. Artists will be invited to work alongside iMAL’s team, with a shared goal: to produce and experiment autonomously, building on each other’s expertise. Therefore, artists will receive a basic support but are expected to have a minimum knowledge of available machine use.
Applicants must have nationality of and current residence in a state of the League of Arab States or an EU member state. Applicants from an EU pre-accession country or the United Kingdom will be taken into consideration as well.
Each resident will be provided an artist fee of 1000 € and a production budget of 2500 € for their participation to the two-week residency. The organisers will cover the accommodation, travel costs and food, as well as possible expenses linked to the visa procedure.
