FOGO ISLAND ARTS2016 – YEAR IN REVIEW

ANNUAL REPORT TO PATRONS

THANK YOU

Established in March 2016, Fogo Island Arts’ Patrons Program brings together an extraordinary group of individuals who share a commitment to international contemporary art and to creating cultural and economic resiliency for Fogo Island and rural places around the world.

As a Founding Member of the Patrons Program, your support

has helped to foster the success of artists-in-residence, and

contributes to a global dialogue around ideas of art, culture,

business and sustainability.

The following presents programming highlights from 2016, made

possible through the generosity of Patrons like you. From all of us at

Fogo Island Arts, our sincere and heartfelt thanks for your invaluable

support. Together we are building Fogo Island Arts into the future.

Steffen Jagenburg

Alexander Ferko

MESSAGE FROM OUR FOUNDER, ZITA COBB

Art inspires reflection, and is essential to our ability to understand the nature of our humanity. Art holds the potential to critically impact and question our worldview. Art observes the dynamics of global change. Given the scale and speed of this change, it seems we need art more than ever to help us navigate the seemingly boundless complexities of our contemporary lives.

Artistic practice is open to new discoveries, involves

experimentation, free speech and a language that searches for new

forms of expression—engaging all of us at a local and global level.

Fogo Island is a small island confronted with shifts that often originate

well beyond its shores, but the lessons learned here are valuable to

navigating a sensible balance between economic and cultural evolution.

As we try to figure out the best way forward, some things can be seen

more clearly from the periphery. Whether we are an island, a company,

a community, or an individual, we are all trying to understand how we

belong to the world.

RESIDENCIES

Fogo Island Arts’ open call for 2016 artist residencies received almost 1000 applications from 57 countries for five designated spots, resulting in an acceptance rate of roughly 0.5%.

FIA’s 2016 artists-in-residence included 16 Canadian and

international artists working in a wide range of disciplines:

Abbas Akhavan, Wilfrid Almendra, Marco Bruzzone,

Richard Ibghy and Marilou Lemmens, Jeremy Laing, MAP Office

(Laurent Gutierrez and Valérie Portefaix), Ricardo Okaranza,

Lisa Oppenheim, Paul P., Goran Petrović Lotina, Walter Scott,

Augustas Serapinas, and Jeremy Shaw. Emerging curator

Steven Cottingham was selected for the 2016 Hnatyshyn

Foundation-Fogo Island Arts Young Curator Residency.

RESIDENCIES

Steffen Jagenburg

EXHIBITIONSWilfrid Almendra Light Boiled Like Liquid Soap March 25 to October 9, 2016

Light Boiled Like Liquid Soap is a series

of newly commissioned works by Wilfrid

Almendra. Fogo Island Arts presented the

French-Portuguese artist’s first solo exhibition

in Canada, an immersive installation featuring

sculpture, radio transmission and a series

of objects that morph painting and drawing

in a play of transparency. Combining found

and repurposed materials, the works attest

to notions of desire, circulation and flux,

from protective spaces of retreat to global

economies of exchange.

EXHIBITIONS 2.1

Alexander Ferko

Augustas Serapinas: Four ShedsDecember 23, 2016 to April 2, 2017

Lithuanian artist Augustas Serapinas presents

Four Sheds, a site-specific installation at

the Fogo Island Gallery that reconfigures

an abandoned shed into another form of

container. Presented as part of Fogo Island

Arts’ emerging artist exhibition series,

Four Sheds evokes a history of materials,

techniques and traditions, and the human

processes embedded within them.

EXHIBITIONS 2.2

Augustas Serapinas

FOGO ISLAND DIALOGUES

MONIKA SZEWCZYK ON DOCUMENTA 14Toronto, February 29, 2016

The first 2016 event in the Fogo Island Dialogues series of

international conferences, lectures and conversations took place

in Toronto. The sold-out conversation between FIA Board member

Monika Szewczyk and Strategic Director Nicolaus Schafhausen

delved into the origins of documenta as well as the stakes of

presenting the 2017 edition in Kassel and Athens in light of the

European financial and migration crises.

WHAT IS CONTEMPORARY? Fogo Island, August 25, 2016

Director of the University of Toronto Art Centre Barbara Fischer

and Nicolaus Schafhausen’s discussion covered a broad range of

subjects, including artists’ responses to socio-political concerns as

markers of contemporaneity.

PROGRAMS 3.1

ISLANDS, SOVEREIGNTY AND DECOLONIAL FUTURESVancouver, December 12, 2016

documenta 14 curators Candice Hopkins and Monika Szewczyk, in a

conversation moderated by Nicolaus Schafhausen, considered what

it might mean to establish a continuum between the West Coast and

the Southeast of Europe, with special attention given to the work of

Beau and Linnea Dick.

PROGRAMS

Steffen Jagenburg

PROGRAMS OPEN STUDIOSMay 27, 2016

Members of the public were invited to meet artists

Paul P. and Walter Scott as well as Nicolaus Schafhausen

and staff for studio tours and presentations of their work.

ALEXANDRA MCINTOSH & ANNE FAUCHERET IN CONVERSATIONJune 30, 2016

Anne Faucheret, curator at Kunsthalle Wien,

and FIA Director of Programs and Exhibitions

Alexandra McIntosh discussed ideas of desire,

circulation and flux during a conversation

about Wilfrid Almendra’s exhibition

Light Boiled Like Liquid Soap.

REARVIEWS – A WORKSHOP WITH DANIELLE ST-AMOURAugust 28, 2016

Danielle St-Amour, Director of Art Metropole,

Toronto, and co-founder of the publication

project Rearviews hosted a critical arts

writing workshop.

PROGRAMS 3.2

Alexander Ferko

ARTIST TALK SERIESJune 12 – December 21, 2016

Artists-in-residence and special guests presented

a series of engaging talks throughout the summer,

fall and winter.

June 21 – Steven Cottingham

July 5 – Ricardo Okaranza

July 12 – Jacob Proctor

July 18 – Lisa Oppenheim

August 9 – marjioljn kok

August 16 – MAP Office

September 6 – Abbas Akhavan

September 15 – Jeremy Shaw film screenings

September 20 – Marco Bruzzone

October 11 – Jeremy Shaw

November 22 – Augustas Serapinas

December 6 – Richard Ibghy & Marilou Lemmens

December 21 – Juste Jonutyte

PROGRAMS 3.3

FIA FILM 2016: IDENTITIESNovember 3 to December 15, 2016

Inspired by the legacy of the Fogo Process films,

FIA launched a new annual program of politically

and socially engaged film. The 2016 edition featured

four films by Chantal Akerman, Manon de Boer, Marta

Popivoda and Frederick Wiseman that offered diverse

ways of representing and understanding identities

through unconventional and contrasting lenses.

FIA Film 2016: Identities was curated by Goran Petrović

Lotina, a researcher, curator and theorist in visual and

performing arts and film, and artist-in-residence with

FIA in 2016.

PROGRAMS 3.4

PUBLICATIONSGrey light. Left and right back, high up, two small windows,

the fifth volume in FIA’s publication series, accompanies a major

work by London-based artist Hannah Rickards commissioned

by Fogo Island Arts. Edited by Alexandra McIntosh and Nicolaus

Schafhausen, the volume features texts by Melissa Gronlund and

Will Holder, a conversation between Rickards and Schafhausen,

and striking new photographic imagery drawn from the

installation’s physical materials and production processes.

Asta Meldal Lynge

Fogo Island Arts partnered with Eastern Edge Gallery, St. John’s, to

co-present Walter Scott’s participation in HOLD FAST Contemporary

Arts Festival (August 18-21). Scott led a comic writing workshop and

premiered a performance piece during the festival’s Art Crawl that

stemmed from his time in residence with FIA in May 2016.

In September, FIA launched The Islands, an arts writing residency

partnership with Art Metropole with support from Artscape for

2017-18. Three recipients will spend a month in residence on Fogo

Island followed by two weeks on Toronto Island. The partnership

aims to foster critical research and writing about contemporary art,

and will result in a small publication series.

PARTNERSHIPSWith support from CIBC, FIA established the CIBC Artist-in-

Residence Program, which brings one celebrated Canadian

contemporary artist per year over the next three years to Fogo

Island. Toronto/Paris-based Paul P. was named the 2016 CIBC

Artist-in-Residence.

The Hnatyshyn Foundation-Fogo Island Arts Young Curator

Residency program has been successfully renewed for another

three years (2017-19), creating new opportunities for emerging

Canadian curators. Each residency has been extended to six weeks.

Steven Cottingham, based in Vancouver, was the 2016 Hnatyshyn

Foundation-Fogo Island Arts Young Curator in residence.

FIA has partnered with ars viva, a major contemporary art award in

Germany, to fund three month-long residencies on the island in 2017.

Nicolaus Schafhausen and Zita Cobb were members of the jury, which

selected artists Jan Paul Evers, Leon Kahane and Jumana Manna.

Steffen Jagenburg

COMMUNICATIONS & OUTREACH

2016 saw the advent of FIA News, a quarterly newsletter outlining programming, exhibitions, alumni and team news, regular e-communications, and an increased presence on social media.

E-BLAST STATISTICS:

• FIA mailing list of 3494 subscribers

• Roughly 50% open rate (Arts/Artists industry average is 23%)

• List has grown steadily, increasing by 2000 subscribers since Oct 2014

• Goal is to add 1000 new subscribers per year

FACEBOOK:

• 4996 Page likes, with a steady growth of approximately 70 per month

• Reach varies but the December 5 post launching the

call for The Islands residency reached 9245 people.

• Response time to comments/questions: 1 day

Alexander Ferko

SELECTED MEDIA COVERAGEAndy Campbell, “Critics’ Picks: Edgar Leciejewski, Inman Gallery.” Artforum, March 2016.

“Fogo Island Arts to Welcome 2017 Ars Viva Prize Winners.” The Telegram, June 2, 2016.

“News in Brief: Gallery 295 Closing, Fogo Island Arts Residency Launches, Canadian Artist Sues Damien Hirst.” Canadian Art, June 17, 2016.

Harri Welch, “The World’s Most Spectacular Art Islands.” AnOther Mag, July 25, 2016.

“Wilfrid Almendra ‘Light Boiled Like Liquid Soap’ at Fogo Island Arts, Fogo Island.” Mousse Magazine, August 12, 2016.

Joaquim Miro, “Top 15 Sustainable Initiatives in Newfoundland.” L’autre Couleur, August 3, 2016.

Heinrich Schwazer, “Herr Schafhausen, leben wir in einer Postdemokratie?” Die Neue Südtitoler Tageszeitung, August 14, 2016.

Linda Browne, “The Spirit of the North.” The Oak Nordic Journal, October 11, 2016.

Kate Sutton, “Artist in Residence.” Art Basel Miami Beach, December 2016.

Steffen Jagenburg

ALUMNI & STAFF NEWS HIGHLIGHTSFIA Strategic Director Nicolaus Schafhausen was invited to become the first

International Juror of the 2016 Sobey Art Award, Canada’s pre-eminent award for

contemporary Canadian artists under 40.

2016 artist-in-residence Jeremy Shaw received the 2016 Sobey Art Award.

FIA alumni Mark Clintberg (2013-14) and Jerry Ropson (2013) were on the long

list for the 2016 award. Also in residence in 2016, Abbas Akhavan was the

recipient of the 2015 Sobey Art Award.

Artists-in-residence Nadia Belerique (2015) and Walter Scott (2016) were selected

to participate in the 2016 Biennale de Montréal. Belerique also presented her

work at the 11th Gwangju Biennale, The Eighth Climate (What does art do?).

FIA Director of Programs and Exhibitions Alexandra McIntosh was invited to

participate in Periférica on April 14, a public seminar in Ponta Delgada, Azores

that brought together eight speakers on the relationship between centre and

periphery in contemporary artistic creation.

Kitty Scott, Curator of Contemporary Art at the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO)

and a member of FIA’s Advisory Board is curating Geoffrey Farmer’s Canadian

Pavilion exhibition at the 57th Venice Biennale in 2017 and will co-curate the

2018 Liverpool Biennial.Alexander Ferko

FIA PARTNERS

Anonymous

Maxine Granovsky Gluskin & Ira Gluskin

Vicki Heyman

Paul Marks

Liza Mauer

Nancy McCain

Barbara & Dougal MacDonald

Shabin & Nadir Mohamed

Elisa Nuyten & David Dime

Alison Rossiter

Bill & Janet Tibbo

Samara Walbohm & Joe Shlesinger

FIA FRIENDSSherri & Bill Appell

Mark and Johanna Chehi

Jeanne Donovan Fisher

Catriona Jeffries

Joanne & Rob Nelson

Kathy & David Richardson

Christina Steinbrecher-Pfandt & Stefan Pfandt

Laurie Thomson & Andy Chisholm

FIA INSTITUTIONAL PARTNERS 2016Canadian Imperial Bank Of Commerce (CIBC)

The Hnatyshyn Foundation

FIA PATRONS

Alexander Ferko

FOGO ISLAND ARTS ADVISORY BOARD

Zita Cobb

Eleanor Dawson

Paul Dean

Fabrizio Gallanti

Elisa Nuyten

Silke Otto-Knapp

Todd Saunders

Nicolaus Schafhausen

Kitty Scott

Monika Szewczyk

FOGO ISLAND ARTS STAFF

Nicolaus Schafhausen STRATEGIC DIRECTOR

Alexandra McIntosh DIRECTOR OF PROGRAMS AND EXHIBITIONS

Iris Stünzi RESIDENCY PROGRAM COORDINATOR

Cyril Lynch RESIDENCY PROGRAM TECHNICIAN

Steffen Jagenburg

fogois landarts .caLeander Schoenweger