The project Utopia Travel was realized in spring 2002 after 2 years of preparation.
The basic outline of the project utopia travel was the transport of a selection of videotapes from Cairo to Vienna following the transition from the upper part of the African continent over the Middle East towards Europe.
A taxi car equipped with a video-monitor served as a mobile unit distributing the contents of the videotheque on the distances between the capitol cities of the respective countries.
The video-archive contains pre-selected video material produced by artists/ film directors originating from and in most cases living in one of the countries on the route. The works were compiled through a research within pre-established networks followed by direct interaction with artistic communities and collaborations with regional institutions as universities, media-labs and art centres.
The requested visual material was chosen by consideration of the topic of a notion of cultural, social and political reality found in the fragment of the particular society of their origin.
National and cultural limitations, given by geographical borderlines and the assumption of different habitat with certain historical influences, produce specific diversities in the visual ciphers of information.
During the travel the spaces of presentation including the taxi and alternative structures opened the opportunity, to take part in a polylogue on issues, considering the complexity of singular societies as well as the construct of political territories.
In that sense the project understands itself as a temporary in itself non-institutional platform focusing on the matter of translation and transmissibility of local cultural codes as different aspects of interrelated parts of history.
The entire project is considered to be process oriented, while continuously depending on vague structures of regional political situations and the unreliable quality of travelling.
After the journey the videoarchive has been shown in several institutions:
So far: Grazer Kunstverein, Graz - Austria / Forum Stadtpark, Graz - Austria / Kunstpavillon, Innsbruck - Austria / Bandits mages - Festival des arts multi-media, Bourges - France / Gallery La Box, Bourges - France / Kunstverein, Munich - Germany / Transmediale, Berlin - Germany / Lawrence O´Hanna Gallery, London - Great Britain / The Israeli Center for Digital Art, Holon - Israel / DEAF04 V2_Dutch Electronic Art Festival, Rotterdam - Netherlands
Homepage Utopia Travel: http://www.utopia-travel.org
David Rych: http://www.parakanal.com/rych/