Videonale 16. Festival for Video and Time-Based Arts

The 16th Videonale - Festival for Video and Time-Based Arts, under the title PERFORM!, opens on February 16th 2017. The exhibitions at the Kunstmuseum Bonn will feature recent works by a total of 43 international artists.

For the second year running, the Videonale has a specific thematic focus. Under the heading 'PERFORM!', VIDEONALE.16 revisits the beginnings of video technology in its relation artistic performance, as both a means of documentation and a kind of technological double. It asks after the meaning of video performance in the contemporary world, in which not only artists, but also often the spectators play the role of performers in artistic works.

In addition, PERFORM! refers to the way in which performance has come to dominate all aspects of our lives. Whether consciously or unconsciously, our lives have become a kind of permanent performance: through our constant interaction with digital devices, in which we inevitably leave behind traces of ourselves; through the constant demand for self-presentation online; and through the demand for our self-optimization as economic subjects. Our every movement has become a choreographed performance, staged in public spaces over which we have very little control.