In 2005 we undertook a significant expansion of our facilities at the Instituto Sacatar, building two visual arts studios, a woodshop, a writer’s studio and an administrative building.  This year we are completing the plan envisioned over five years ago with the construction of two additional studios.

 

 

 

 

While all of our studios are simple rooms that can serve multiple purposes, the new Estúdio Mar is considered a studio for composers and musicians.  Located in the furthest corner of the property, with panoramic ocean views, the Estúdio Mar will provide a space where musicians can experiment while making music with minimal disturbance to the other artists in residence.  Next to it will rise the Estúdio Ar, a small dance/theater space.  The Estúdio Ar will have large retracting doors that will transform the dance floor into a stage for the occasional theatrical presentation on site.  The audience will sit on chairs and benches beneath the ancient mango tree that anchors this corner of the property.  We anticipate that construction of both studios will be complete by the end of June. The first choreographer/dancer to use the new studio is scheduled in August.

 

 

 

In partnership with Spier Contemporary, a biennial exhibition of recent work produced in South Africa, the Instituto Sacatar awarded Fellowships to two South African artists, each of whom will spend eight weeks at our seaside estate in Itaparica, Brazil.  The selection process was only open to the one hundred artists selected by the Africa Centre to participate in the Spier Contemporary Exhibition 2010 in Cape Town, South Africa.

 

 

 

We received about forty applications from the one hundred artists exhibiting at Spier, all residents of South Africa as dictate the requirements of the Spier Contemporary.  Seven semifinalists were interviewed in Cape Town before the two Fellowships were awarded at the opening reception of the Spier Contemporary on 13 March. The two artists who will come to Sacatar at the end of October are:

 

 

The Africa Centre, which organizes the Spier Contemporary, established partnerships with several other residency programs, awarding five additional residencies, in China, Korea, the United States and the Netherlands.

 

 

Sacatar is pleased to announce the continuation of our partnership with the UNESCO/Aschberg Bursary Programme.  For this year’s bursaries, we received thirty-five candidates who matched the UNESCO criteria: all between the ages of 25 and 35, and from Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Russia, the former soviet states, Australia, New Zealand or the islands of the Pacific.

 

A selection committee convened by Sacatar recommended seven artists to the UNESCO office in Paris, where the final decisions were made.  These are the recipients of the UNESCO/Aschberg bursaries 2010, who will spend eight weeks in residence at Sacatar starting in October:

 

 

 

 

 

 

In partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts (United States), Sacatar will host four women artisans from Gee’s Bend, Alabama, starting the last week in June.  If you do not know the work of the women of Gee’s Bend, it is worth taking a look at the website, www.quiltsofgeesbend.org.  In Itaparica, the four women will collaborate with four local seamstresses, exchanging techniques and practices.  The results of the collaboration will be exhibited at the Textile Museum in Salvador, starting the first week in August.  This will be the first time that any of the women of the Gee’s Bend cooperative participate in an arts residency program, in or outside the United States.

 

 

LOS ANGELES CULTURAL AFFAIRS – At the end of June we will receive the first artist in partnership with the Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department.  Jamie Diamond will conduct theater workshops with local children, during the same residency session of the women of Gee’s Bend.

 

In May, the Cultural Affairs Department will announce a second artist to be awarded a Sacatar Fellowship.  This artist will come for an eight-week residency session at the end of this year.

 

ITAÚ CULTURAL – Itaú, a private Brazilian bank, has a robust cultural program.  In our first partnership with Itaú Cultural, we will host the visual artist Gabriel Netto (Porto Alegre, Brazil) and the curator Verônica Moreira Neto (Brasília), both arriving in mid-August.

 

NATIONAL ART STUDIO KOREA – For the second time we will exchange artists with the National Art Studio, Korea.  In August, Ki Jin Park will leave his studio outside of Seoul to come to Bahia, while the Brazilian visual artist Gaio will move into Park’s studio for an eight-week residency.

 

 

TAIPEI ARTIST VILLAGE – In October Sacatar will host Taiwanese artist Chu Fang.  The Brazilian artist Anaísa Franco, from Rio de Janeiro, already completed her residency earlier this year at the Taipei Artist Village.

 

 

On December 21, 2009, we said good-bye to another group of Fellows, who undoubtedly left Bahia with many fond memories of Sacatar, Itaparica and the strong regional culture of Bahia, Brazil.

 

During eight weeks, Aneli Munteanu (a visual artist from Romania), Rae Howell (a musician from Australia), Rodrigo Castro (a video artist from São Paulo), Sandro Abade Pimentel (a visual artist from Bahia) and Zahra Beigi (a photographer from Iran) immersed themselves in the culture of Bahia, interacting with the local community in many ways, which resulted in a series of events in Itaparica and Salvador.  Here is a tasting:

 

 

 

 

The musician and composer Rae Howell performed on 5 December 2009 at the Museum of Modern Art in Salvador as part of its weekly jazz series, Jam no MAM.  She improvised on the udus, which she had fabricated at the clay works in Maragojipinho, a village dedicated entirely to the production of ceramics, located about an hour from the Instituto Sacatar.

 

 

 

The Iranian photographer Zahra Beigi gave a presentation on Iranian culture at the State University of Feira de Santana (UEFS), located two hours west of Salvador.  The event drew the local arts community, including the arts cooperative GEMA, an organization that has recently begun to collaborate with Sacatar Fellows.

OPEN STUDIO DAY

 

On 19 December, just days prior to their departure, the Fellows decided to host an Open Studio Day, when they shared the work they had done with guests from the local community.

 

In the Estúdio Terra, Aneli Munteanu exhibited photos taken in people’s homes in Itaparica, portraying, in miniature, details of daily life (a toothbrush in a cup, a hair brush on a table top) and paired with fragments from interviews dealing with intimacy that she had conducted with local couples.  In the Estúdio Yemanjá, Rodrigo Castro screened videos he had created during his residency, while outside Sandro Abade Pimentel did a performance, ‘An Egyptian Santa Claus,’ bizarrely juxtaposed with his Christmas tree in homage to Carmen Miranda.  Zahra Beigi shared stories of her experiences in Itaparica through black and white photographs displayed in the inner courtyard of the Casa Grande where the artists live.

 

 

 

The invited guests included people from all parts of the community of Itaparica.  The event began with a feijoada (the traditional Brazilian meat and bean stew) and ended with a spontaneous concert beneath the Estúdio Esfinge, with a local guitarist and Rae Howell on the udus.

 

 

Attention!  We are already accepting applications for our next selection process---open to all creative fields, all ages, all nationalities---for Fellowships to be awarded in 2012 and 2013.   Simply access this site and click on APPLICATION and then SACATAR OPEN APPLICATION PROCESS – 2012/2013 for full details.

 

Complete applications must be sent by postal service and must be postmarked on or before March 21, 2011.

 

 

Some former staff members are moving on to new opportunities and we wish to welcome those who have recently joined the Sacatar team.

 

 

Rafael, former security at the Instituto Sacatar, © 2009, Alex Esquivel

 

RAFAEL worked only one year at Sacatar, as night-time and weekend security.  We are very pleased to announce that he has passed the entrance exam to the university and has begun his studies in cinema.  This is the realization of a deeply-held dream of his and we are very happy for him!

 

 

Santo, on the left, and Augusto Albuquerque, © 2008, Luis Oliveira

 

SANTO: Most of our former Fellows will remember Santo, who worked for many years maintaining and improving our gardens.  We thank Santo for his many years of service and we wish him well in this new stage of his life.

 

 

Patrício, the new gardener at the  Instituto Sacatar, © 2010, Alex Esquivel

 

PATRÍCIO: With Santo’s departure, Patrício has joined the team, working alongside seu José as a gardener.  Patrício has an absolute passion for plants; his own home not far from Sacatar is in a veritable jungle of flowering trees and bushes.  With Patrício’s help, we hope to make the gardens at Sacatar more beautiful than ever.

 

 

 

As the cook at Sacatar, Márcia’s culinary skills have pleased people from around the world.  Today we introduce her to our readers who may not have had the chance to taste her food (but who now can: we include Márcia’s recipe for a traditional Bahian dish, xinxin de galinha, pronounced sheen-sheen dee gah-leen-ya, at the end of this article.)

 

Márcia Rita Daniel de Paula was born in the old Red Cross Hospital in Salvador, but when just a few days old, she crossed the bay to Itaparica where she has lived ever since. Márcia, who is married with two children, has worked at the Instituto Sacatar since its beginning in 2001, and has seen many changes over the years.  She believes that Sacatar provides an incentive for the community to become more interested in the appreciation and the creation of art.

 

She remembers the days before the Casa Nova, where there is now a staff kitchen and pantry (built in 2002).  She remembers the days before the kiosk in the garden, where she now serves the Fellows breakfast, and the days before the administration building or the wood shop (built in 2005).  ‘The administrative office used to be where the library is now, and then it moved to where the guest house is now, before finally relocating to the administration building.’

 

The residency program? So many changes!  According to her, there used to be only the two studios, Yemanjá and Xangô---and in the first year (2001), there wasn’t even a laundry room!

 

Márcia remembers the many times she used to snack in front of the staff bathrooms, where the administration building now stands, and of many memorable moments with the Fellows. In particular she remembers two Fellows, Sunny Taylor and Sidiki Conde. Even though both of them were confined to wheel chairs, they were far more independent than many people she knows in town.  About Sidiki she particularly remembers his smile and that ‘he even killed chickens in his bathroom for dinner!  He did absolutely everything.’

 

…but let’s get cooking. (Maybe Sidiki was making xinxin!)

 

XINXIN DE GALINHA
by Márcia

 

Ingredients:
2 kilos chicken
½ kilo dried shrimp
3 onions
Ginger (to taste)
Dendê (palm oil, to taste; you can substitute olive oil if you must)
Salt (to taste)

 

Preparation: Clean the chicken.  Then mix the onion, salt, ginger and shrimp in a blender.  Marinate the chicken in the blended seasonings for half an hour.  Put the oil in a frying pan and add the seasoned chicken.  Cook on the stovetop, adding a little water when it begins to dry out after about twenty minutes.  Cook for an hour.

 

Serve with white rice and farofa de azeite.  (That’s manioc flour lightly fried in olive or palm oil until just a bit crunchy.)

 

 

 

Mitch Loch, the president of the Sacatar Foundation, and Taylor Van Horne, the director of the Instituto Sacatar, wish to acknowledge yet another collaboration with Marcelo Thomaz (www.marzdesign.blogspot.com), this time for the most recent brochure for the Instituto Sacatar.

 

 

The launch of the brochure in South Africa, © 2010, Mitch Loch

 

Modeled after antique postcard pamphlets and inspired by late 19c photochroms, the brochure was first distributed at Spier Contemporary 2010 in Cape Town, South Africa.

 

 

Here are some recent and upcoming events by our former Fellows.  We regret not being able to include every news item we receive from our artists, but we always enjoy learning about what they are up to now.  Please keep us posted!

ANAISA FRANCO (BRAZIL>Taipei Artist Village, 2009/10) exhibited her recent work, ‘Floating,’ at the Galeria Adora Calvo.  Her piece ‘Paranoia’ was featured in a group show, ‘10 Miradas,’ at the Palacio Garci Grande.  Both exhibitions were held in Salamanca, Spain, in March.

 

ANDREIA PINTO-CORREIA (PORTUGAL, 2006/07) has received a new commission from the prestigious Tanglewood Music Center, with a concert premiere scheduled for 4 July in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.

 

BE WARD (AUSTRALIA, 2008) returned to Australia last year to work in the remote aboriginal community of Papunya, 250 km west of Alice Springs.  It was here that the aboriginal painting movement began in the 1970s.  At the invitation of Be, former Fellow ADRIANA ROJAS PRETEL (COLOMBIA, 2008) spent six weeks in Papunya running circus workshops with the children in the community.  Another unexpected result from a Sacatar Fellowship!

 

 

DANY LERICHE and JEAN MICHEL FICKINGER (FRANCE, 2009) will have a retrospective exhibit, ‘Chimiques Noces,’ at the Musée Tavet, in Pontoise, France, from 19 June to 12 September.   The exhibition will occupy two floors of the museum, with the lower floor comprising older work and the upper floor exhibiting many of the photos taken during their stay in Brazil at Sacatar last year and in Mali more recently.

 

'Itaparica': inspired by and composed during his residency at Sacatar, © 2008, Derek Bermel

 

DEREK BERMEL (USA, 2007): On 4 May 2010, there will be a world premiere at the Disney Hall in Los Angeles, California, of a new work by Derek entitled ‘Canzones Americanas,’ performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic under the direction of Gustavo Dudamel.  The composition in four parts concludes with ‘Itaparica,’ developed from the song above that he composed during his residency at Sacatar.  The Grammy-award winning Brazilian singer, Luciana Souza, will sing the verses, which were graciously translated into Portuguese by former Fellow ANDREIA PINTO-CORREIA (PORTUGAL, 2006/07).

 

 

Disney Concert Hall

 

At 11:30 AM on 23 April 2010 --- California time --- host Sérgio Mielniczenko interviewed Derek during his popular radio program ‘Global Village’ at 90.7 on the FM dial in Los Angeles.

 

 

‘See Through Us, a portrait of homosexuals in Turkey, © 2009, Diana Blok

 

DIANA BLOK (URUGUAY>NETHERLANDS, 2003) recently had published ‘See Through Us’, a book of her photographs portraying the lives of homosexuals and transvestites in Turkey.

 

ÉTIENNE YVER (FRANCE, 2009) did the scenic design for the opera ‘Awatsihu,’ composed by Philippe Forget. ‘Awatsihu’ – an opera inspired by the Amazon and written for five female voices and clarinet – had 12 presentations throughout France between November 2009 and March 2010.

 

HANNAH MORRIS (SOUTH AFRICA, 2008) sends this video that was released during her last exhibition in Cape Town, South Africa, before her move to New York in the USA.  The video recounts, with dry humor, her experiences during her residency at Sacatar, including the visit by the famous---some would say infamous---French artist Orlan, best known for her adventurous plastic surgery.  It is Hannah’s first animated movie and well worth a look:

 

 

 

Illustration for the book ‘Contos de Itaparica’, © 2010, Hannah Morris

 

Two children's books that Hannah illustrated will be published in Brazil in the next few months. The first, ‘Contos de Itaparica,’ was written by well-known Brazilian children’s author Rogério Andrade Barbosa. Together, she and Rogério gathered folk tales/contemporary stories from Itaparica during her residency at Sacatar (August-October 2008). They selected two stories which Hannah illustrated. Published by Grupo SM, one of the largest publishing houses in Brazil, the book should be available in Brazil in May or June of this year.

 

The second is the Portuguese translation of a book she designed and illustrated in South Africa called "uTshepo mde/Tall Enough". This contemporary tale was written by Professor Mhlobo Jadezweni in both his native language isiXhosa and English. Editora Peirópolis (based in São Paulo) will be publishing the isiXhosa/Portuguese edition in the coming months.

 

IVANIA KUNZLER and MARCELO TCHELI (BRAZIL, 2008) received the Funarte 2009 Prize for the puppets they designed during their residency at Sacatar.   Funarte, the Fundação Nacional das Artes, is a federal organization in Brazil that develops public policy and provides support in the visual arts, music, theater, dance and circus.

 

JANE INGRAM ALLEN (USA, 2002) has curated the Cheng Long Wetland International Environmental Art Project, ‘Children and Artists Celebrate the Wetlands,’   which will be open for visitation from April 24 – July 31, 2010, at the Cheng Long Wetlands, Cheng Long Village, Yunlin County, Taiwan.  The exhibiting artists are Myriam du Manoir of France; Shilpa Joglekar of India; Chiaping Lu, Chung-ho Cheng and Yi-chun Lo of Taiwan; and former Sacatar Fellow ROY STAAB (USA, 2006-7).

 

KOSTANA BANOVIC (SERBIA>NETHERLANDS, 2006) screened her movie ‘May I Enter’ on 18 April at the SMART Project Space in Amsterdam, Holland.   ‘May I Enter’ is based on her experiences on the island of Itaparica with the local community of candomblé, a spiritual practice brought by slaves from Africa.  Intrigued by the ceremonies, she wished to learn more.  However, Kostana discovered that she trying to enter a universe whose doors were closed to her.  The anthropologist Mattijs van de Port will give a brief presentation before interviewing the artist.  The same film will be screened later this year in November at the International Film Festival South Africa 2010.

 

 

      
A Kristin Capp photo on the cover of         ‘Night Dog’, © 2004, Kristin Capp

 

KRISTIN CAPP (USA, 2004) has one of her photos on the cover of the most recent edition of the magazine, The Sun.

 

In March her work was part of a small group show at the Galerie Photo4 in Paris, France, where she exhibited photographs that will be published in her forthcoming book, ‘BRASIL,’ including many images taken during her residency at Sacatar.

 

LAURA ANDEL (ARGENTINA>USA, 2004) has released on the Italian label, Rossbin Records, her latest work ‘Doble Mano,’ performed by the Laura Andel Orchestra. ‘Doble Mano’ is a 60-minute composition for 9 musicians with an eclectic instrumentation, including a bandoneón from Argentina, gamelan instruments from Indonesia, and a prepared Fender Rhodes. To listen to some music excerpts, go to: http://www.myspace.com/lauraandelmusic.

 

LUCIO GREGORETTI (ITALY, 2005) completed an opera in two acts based on the life of Caravaggio. The opera---for an actor, polyphonic choir and orchestra---is based on some mysterious incidents in the life of the artist in 1607.  The premiere was in Rome, Italy, in March.

 

The Roma Sinfonietta Orchestra commissioned a piece for voice and orchestra, which will premiere in Rome in September 2010 as part of the 150th anniversary of the unification of Italy.  The Associazione Nuova Consonanza commissioned a piece for chamber orchestra that will premiere in Rome in November as part of the Festival Consonanza Nuova 2010.

 

NICOLÁS TESTONI (ARGENTINA, 2008): Drawn heavily from the mysterious and evocative work he completed during his residency at Sacatar, entitled ‘The Reflecting Postcards,’ Nicolás  screened his video ‘The Reflecting Loop’ at the aluCine - Toronto Latin Media Festival in November 2009. Here is a link to another recent video work by the artist:

 

 

 

PINAR YOLAÇAN (TURKEY>USA, 2006) had images from her photographic series entitled ‘Marias’---work she accomplished during her residency at Sacatar---published in the Italian edition of Rolling Stone magazine. ‘Marias’ has been exhibited in New York (USA), Turkey and Finland.  The exhibit is now opening in Lagos, Nigeria, at the Centre for Contemporary Art, where the large-format photographs can be seen through 28 May.

 

Invitation to the Eadweard Muybridge retrospective in Washington, DC, USA

 

STACEY STEERS (USA, 2006): As part of the Eadweard Muybridge retrospective at the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, DC, USA, Stacey’s animated movie incorporating his work, ‘Phantom Canyon,’ will be continuously screened.  The exhibition runs through 18 July 2010.

SUNNY TAYLOR (USA, 2004) got married in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, on 20 December 2009.  All of us at Sacatar wish her MUCH HAPPINESS!

 

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REPORT FROM SOUTH AFRICA

 

Mitch Loch, the president of the Sacatar Foundation, and I went to South Africa at the invitation of Spier Contemporary, a biennial exhibition of artists currently living in South Africa.  We flew to Cape Town to award two artist Fellowships to Sacatar.   The Spier Contemporary is a ‘snapshot’ of art production in South Africa.  To encourage artists of all types to submit work, Spier established fourteen drop-off points across the country.  The selection committee traveled to each of the fourteen sites to select one hundred artists from the 2700 applicants.  Spier provided each of the selected artists the equivalent of 400 euros to prepare their work for exhibition, plus the shipping costs from the fourteen collection points to Cape Town.  Spier renovated the abandoned Cape Town City Hall, a massive neoclassical structure, with no help from the municipal government, and installed the exhibition in the large renovated state rooms to great effect.  Spier also published a thick hard-bound catalogue of the exhibition. We were very impressed.

 

As part of the Spier Contemporary, there were financial awards as well as seven arts residency prizes, two of them to Sacatar.  Only artists already selected for the Spier Contemporary exhibition were allowed to apply.  We received applications from over a third of the selected artists.  We chose seven semifinalists whom we interviewed in Cape Town and on March 13 awarded the Fellowships to the two artists announced above.

 

We also received an invitation to do a presentation about Sacatar at the Conference on Art and Social Justice, held at the Durban University of Technology from March 21-24. The conference proceeded in spite of student protests on campus. Mobs of rock-throwing students were suppressed by riot police carrying machine guns. So much for social justice.

 

In between, Mitch and I had the thrill of being chased by a bull elephant inside the mFolozi Game Park.

 

It was my first trip to South Africa, a country that has made unbelievable strides since the very recent end of apartheid, only fifteen years ago.  The arts community, as usual, is definitely in the lead in integrating the diverse ethnic identities, long separated during the insanity of apartheid, by striving to provide equal access to opportunities. This was definitely the spirit of Spier and the Durban conference, but there is still much to do. Everyone in the country, regardless of their ethnicity, bears the emotional and many the physical scars of apartheid.  Downtown Johannesburg expresses this reality.  The street level is thrumming with activity. Vendors sell clothes and fruits from stalls lined up along the sidewalks, but the office buildings that soar above the streets all stand empty.  The businesses either left South Africa altogether or retired to the suburbs in fear of the civil war that did not materialize.  Birds fly in and out of the broken windows of the skyscrapers.  Change has been initiated, formally through residential conversions and informally through refugee squatters, to reoccupy these buildings, but in the meantime, Johannesburg is one of the oddest cities I have ever seen.  Its extensive network of parks and its tree-lined streets hold the promise of an integrated and democratic city, but right now, its central core is a ghost town hovering above a vibrant marketplace, just as the memory of apartheid hovers behind the democratic transformation of this extraordinary nation.

 

Taylor Van Horne
Director
Instituto Sacatar

 

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In our last issue of the Jornal Sacatar, we announced that we were introducing a space in which to formally acknowledge former Fellows for their gifts to Sacatar.  In this issue, we celebrate the work of New York City-based photographer Gerald Cyrus who was among the first artists to come to Sacatar.   We were very pleased and deeply moved when several years after his residency he sent us an impressive portfolio of 35 black-and-white photographs that he had taken during his residency, a true snapshot in time of the community of Itaparica.  Browsing now through this portfolio is a local history lesson: naturally, some of Gerald's subjects have grown up, some have moved away, and some have died.  In many cases, buildings and streets have changed since Gerald recorded his observations eight years ago.  Though somewhat cropped here for lack of space, we present here some of the images from his extremely generous gift to the Sacatar Foundation.  Reminiscing about their experience of working with or posing for Gerald, many Itaparicans continue to ask about him to this day.  He and his grin are indeed remembered fondly.  We at Sacatar remain tremendously grateful for Gerald's gift to the foundation and to the community of Itaparica.  Gerald's work can be seen at www.geraldcyrus.com. Thanks, Gerald.

 

Mitch Loch
President
Sacatar Foundation