2018
AVRIL CORROON
PINTXO BOATE
Through video, sound and sculpture, Pintxo Boate addresses problems of the shifting and exploitation of culture in the context of the neoliberal city. The essential cultural signifiers of the Basque Country, such as reference points to the coastal places, the sea and the gastronomy, are comically personified as entities that participate in the traditional social ritual of the pintxo pote. Related through video and installation, they talk about how their identities are exploited or amputated by the creation of new cultural districts driven by urban regeneration plans.
The Irish artist Avril Corroon (An Iarmhí / Westmeath, 1991) has a BA in Fine Arts from the National College of Art and Design in Dublin and is currently an MFA student at Goldsmiths University in London, where she lives. She has been selected for the seventh edition of the International Residency 2018. She has also made long term stays at the prestigious Temple Bar Gallery & Studios’ Recent Graduate Residency in her native Ireland and a shorter stay in the Netherlands (Hotel Maria Kapel). She also exhibited her works both in group and in solo exhibitions.
In the past two years, her artistic practice engaged with the community has been very productive. Recently she participated in an exhibition at Crossbones Graveyard, London, a place used in medieval times as a tomb for unconsecrated indigents who were denied to bury elsewhere. The work channels this history with the notion of outcasts in today's society. In 2017 she created a site-specific work: ’Wish You Were Here' on the balcony of an Airbnb apartment which was seen by the public across the street from the gallery balcony of Temple Bar, with the aim to eliminate marketing deceptions of tourism and the economics of exchange. In May, the same year she gave a short performative lecture as part of the Performance Voyage 7 series on the theme of protest songs, curated by the Finnish collective MUU. It focused on methods of mobilization, the creation of accessible manners of participation and the radicalization of public imagination through direct action.
In addition to being a visual artist, Avril is an abortion-rights activist fighting for the physical autonomy of women in Ireland. She is a member and spokeswoman for Strike4Repeal, which in 2017 called a national social strike to organize 56 different protests both internationally and in Ireland.
The jury of this call is formed by the curator Peio Aguirre, the dean of the Faculty of Fine Arts of the UPV-EHU Arantza Lauzirika, and the team of Bitamine Faktoria. Corroon has been selected from among more than 100 candidates from almost 50 countries.
The presentation of the developed project during the residency took place at Kutxa Kultur Plaza (Tabakalera), in San Sebastian.