ENTERart

“But is this art?” In front of a work of contemporary art most of us tend to feel awkward, reluctant, distant. The more an artist attempts to reach out to us and to make his art a part of our life, the more we wish to step back, thinking, maybe, that this is not “art” or that we haven’t got the means to understand, judge or enjoy a certain “contemporary” kind of artworks. Can we “appropriate” contemporary art? And do we have valuable reasons to do so? 

ENTERart workshops are responding to this kind of questioning with the help of anthropology in order to take into consideration the needs and experiences of the workshop’s participants Our aim is not to educate pliant viewers of contemporary visual arts or to simply inform on past and recent developments in art and anthropology. We also do not wish to contribute to the “memorization” of current political theorization that tends to prevail in contemporary artistic – and anthropological- discourse. On the contrary, we seek to provoke or revive critical controversies concerning these and many other stereotypical conceptions and practices inside but also beyond the “art world”. 

ENTERart is addressed to those who are veritably interested to experiment with interventions in their everyday life made with “tools” inspired by contemporary art (in general, not only visual arts) and humanities. The participants make these “tools” by themselves according to their needs, independently of the knowledge they may already have in these fields. The workshop’s meetings may include speeches given by the coordinator and guests, but it is the participants’ active interest in the projects they propose (in groups or on their own) and in the whole process of searching for evidence and arguments that remains at the core of the work we do together. The projects are completed by the end of each circle (February and May) in close collaboration with the coordinator.

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