[artinfo] Call for applications: UNIDEE

[Art&Education]

Call for applications: UNIDEE - University of Ideas 2016

UNIDEE - University of Ideas
Cittadellarte - Fondazione Pistoletto Onlus
Via G. B. Serralunga 27
13900 Biella
Italy

<http://www.cittadellarte.it/unidee>www.cittadellarte.it/unidee

UNIDEE - University of Ideas launched in 2015 
within the unique and special context 
of <http://www.cittadellarte.it/>Cittadellarte - 
Pistoletto Foundation in Biella. Having inherited 
a long experience of residencies for 
international artists (2000-13), the experimental 
educational prototype or model combines theory 
with practice. 

UNIDEE - University of Ideas offers an 
educational programme based on a weekly research 
and project laboratory under the guidance of a 
mentor who is an expert in the theme of that 
specific module; as well as the active 
participation of a guest with the objective of 
examining the topics in their complexity and many 
facets, trying to maintain a balance of the 
thought forms (theories) and free or 
unforeseeable situations (creative processes).

Through its residential dynamics, UNIDEE is 
designed to form artivators, people who intend to 
use art as a methodology, practice and language, 
becoming agents for the activation of responsible 
actions and processes to be carried out in the 
territories in which they live and their 
professional activities.

Encouraged by the high number of participants 
(111 presences from 16 different countries) and 
their enthusiastic feedback and proposals for 
future developments to 2015's experimental model, 
the intention for 2016 is to continue to analyse 
and thus fine-tune this educational method 
through the close examination of three other 
macro-topics: <http://www.cittadellarte.it/unidee/statement.html>research, 
gift and alteration. With an interdisciplinary 
approach and in accordance with the trinamic 
principle of Michelangelo Pistoletto, the three 
semantic areas are considered in their 
inter-relationships as sites for generating forms 
of resistance, new possibilities in meaning, and 
social transformation.

Among the weekly residencies, 2016 UNIDEE 
programme will open to two new experimental 
modules lasting two weeks in collaboration with 
STEALTH.unlimited (second week taking place @ 
Stoking House at City in the Making in Rotterdam) 
and with Adrian Paci (second week taking place @ 
Art House in Shkodër, Albania). The desire to 
expand the two laboratories in space and time 
come from the singularity of the proposed 
contexts, able to offer new pathways of sense and 
content to the collective discussions begun in 
Cittadellarte, and thus offer a more articulate 
critical analysis of the macro-themes being 
studied. 

In 2016, the historic support of the Fondazione 
Zegna in the development of the UNIDEE programme 
will be consolidated through the co-project of a 
laboratory and research module conducted by 
Martino Gamper.

The originality of the UNIDEE programme to invent 
new residential formats lies in its 
collaborations with Universities and Fine Arts 
Academies (students gain ECTS credits upon a 
negotiated agreement), and in its development and 
achievement of the two projects co-financed by 
the European Union: Ottomans and Europeans and 
Understanding Territoriality: Identity, Place & 
Possession - TIPP. How the long-production 
residency remains aimed at international artists 
will be determined by collaborations with 
institutional partners: Illycaffé s.p.a., Inlaks 
Shivdasani Foundation, Qattan A. M. Foundation, 
the RESÓ network, without forgetting the Unfunded 
Residency and the Connective Residency.

For further informations and applications please 
visit the UNIDEE - University of Ideas 
<http://www.cittadellarte.it/unidee>website or 
contact <mailto:unidee at cittadellarte.it>unidee at cittadellarte.it

Programme Director and Curator: Cecilia Guida
Programme Coordinator: Roberta Bernasconi
Assistant Director and Curator: Giulia Crisci