What is normal

The text discusses the role of art engaging in current urban issues, and how critical spatial practice and artistic-urbanistic strategies can contribute as durational involvement (see Paul O’Neill) to direct urbanism – for promoting a more just society by a socially engaged urban planning and development. The two projects 'NORMAL' and 'Harbour for Cultures' presented in this text address questions of what is considered 'normal' in our current society – which is characterized by the unplannable and increasing fears fueled by right wing demagogy. Rather than resigning in helplessness or fear – on the contrary, transparadiso considers this a unique chance to question dominant values of society driven by neo-liberal economics for re-introducing shared values of living together as social beings, for creating new, inclusive communities beyond cultural borders and thus counteracting the increasing isolation based on fear. Both projects exemplify participatory strategies like the 'production of desires' for producing programs beyond the functional, enhancing also poetic moments as non-recognized value in urban planning, and discuss how dialogues (see 'dialogical art', Grant Kester) can be created between conflicting interests. At the same time the projects make use of the 'autonomy of art' as inherent quality of approaching burning issues of society from an angle of the non-functional, the non-efficient – thus counteracting the dominant claims of decision making in our contemporary globalized society.

Art and Aesthetic Education

This paper explores Maxine Greene’s views on aesthetic pedagogy and the notion of social imagination, in addition to Grant Kester’s views on dialogical art. These approaches are a call for action in art education, in addition to aesthetic approaches that can be applied in other fields of education. Aesthetic pedagogy offers educators and students a sense of intellectual autonomy, and may also facilitate alternative ways of generating meaning. I argue that making art is one part of the educational experience, however, aesthetic experiences also occur when people look at art and discuss it collectively. I encourage educators to adopt an approach of discovery, which is fueled by the outcome of open-ended discussions, and mainly focuses on different individual experiences. Educators may create opportunities for change through engaging in aesthetic experiences in their own daily lives and practices. Aesthetic experiences and aesthetic education foster independent thinking in students and encourages them to be more mindful of their feelings, surroundings, and expressions. Young minds should be educated to be inquisitive, to critique, and become open to possibilities and experiences they may have not considered, which transforms learning from passive to active.

TRANSART. Transactions, Transferences and Transitions in Participatory Art

This article centres on the exchange of necessities, projections, ways of behaving and of establishing relations, of people involved in participatory art projects and collective artistic practices. For that, we explore how these exchanges happen, thinking about the transactions (from the point of view of the Transactional Analysis), the transferences and counter transferences (from Freudian Psychoanalysis), the concept of “habitus” (of Pierre Bourdieu’s sociology) and the transitional phenomena (from Donald W. Winnicott’s theory). We cross these concepts with the artistic fact andspecifically with ways of doing art usually appointed under labels such as Participatory Art, Collaborative Art, Relational Art, Dialogical Art, Community Art, Social Engaged Art, Artivism, New Genre Public Art and Useful Art. We pay attention to artistic practices that specifically put the focusof interest on exploring different possibilities of sociability that let people and collectives make transitions (ideological, practical, emotional, material, relational ones…) from one situation or position to another. We call “Transart” to this kind of artistic practice that works under the idea that art isa human creation that experiment with ways of exchange, that facilitate transits and that can contribute to processes of transformation.

After the Solidarity and Consensus Debates: Habermas, Rorty and Fraser as Pragmatist Sources for Activist Dialogical Art

This paper poses a relationship between pragmatist understandings of intersubjective communication and long-term “dialogical art” practices promoting social change. Art historian Grant Kester contends that two dialogical art projects by Suzanne Lacy and Austrian Art collective WochenKlausur reflect Habermas’ theory of communicative action through which the “better argument” is universally validated. Kester simultaneously acknowledges such projects inculcate non-competitive modes of intersubjective exchange that appear contrary to Habermas. I look at the “philosophical narrative” debates between Richard Rorty and Habermas to suggest that Rorty’s eschewal of Habermasian rationalization in favor of affective modes of contingent solidarity, taken with Nancy Fraser’s understanding of enmeshed public/private discourse in the context of feminist counterpublics, draws out the political-ethical orientation of activist dialogical art practices.

Dialogical art as a challenge for competitive environment

Contemporary society is raising important questions related to issues such as social construction or interpretation of reality, the role of culture and the meaning of art. Modernity replaces the determination of social standing with a compulsive and obligatory self-determination which holds for all periods and all sectors of the modern era, as described by Baumann (2001). This paper focuses on the analysis of problems related to contemporary art and its social meaning. The main focus is on projects which encourage their participants to question fixed identities, stereotypical images through a cumulative process of exchange and dialogue. The use of the community concept revolves around the complex forms of identification that exist between individuals and larger collective entities which encourage people to break down their defensive isolation and fear of others (Kester, 2004). The link between the society, history and culture is analyzed in the context of relational aesthetics (Bourriaud, 2002). The theoretical concept of dialogical art is illustrated by dialogical art projects and activist or community-based art practice, namely WochenKlausur projects. As a response to sociological problems of postmodern society, this could be a challenge for competitive environment, which often tends to position marginalized groups into disadvantaged situations.

Attitude that Matters

In this article, I compare the operativity of radical avant-garde and new dialogical art forms from one selected viewpoint. I discuss the issue of the artist's attitude as a significance-producing element in the artwork. For decades, artist-issued interpretation of art has been problematic. Thus it is interesting to question the significance of the strong definition of the artist's attitude, inherent in the theories of the new dialogical art. New dialogical art-forms are for example new genre public art, community art, socially engaged art, public engaged art, littoral art, activist art, dialogical art, and conversational art. In the Finnish discussion, the concept of community art is the one most commonly used.