JAI. Jardun artistikoentzako institutua (2020) = JAI. Instituto de prácticas artísticas (2020) = JAI. Institute for artistic practices (2020)

The JAI -Jardun Artistikoentzako Institutua- syllabus emerges as a new initiative that is, however, rooted within the artistic context linked to the region that is home to the institutions that propose it: the International Centre for Contemporary Culture, Tabakalera, the venue for the programme in San Sebastian, and the Basque Museum-Centre of Contemporary Art, Artium, in Vitoria-Gasteiz. It does so acknowledging a particular tradition of knowledge transmission in the field of contemporary art rooted in the Basque Country's artistic context. An experience that combines the predisposition to discuss the social function of art and the continued dialogue on its material practice, which has materialised in different educational projects, in many cases pioneering and experimental. 

Based on this, JAI is presented as a summer school with the intention of establishing a space for the development of these exchanges and intersections. For this purpose, the programme brings together professionals from very different backgrounds, capable of identifying the potential of the artistic practice to look at the contemporary world and establish a critical relationship on the use of its languages.

Aware that proclaiming other ways of accessing art involves paying attention to multiple forms of knowledge ‒and without seeking to accumulate skills or lead to any type of specialisation‒, this syllabus aims to highlight the value of the relationships which take place in artistic processes and methodologies between form and content, subjectivity and materiality, perception and thought.

Professional tutoring

The teaching staff will be made up of professional agents who are currently part of the exhibition and public programmes of both institutions. Tabakalera and Artium have invited professional voices from very different backgrounds, capable of identifying the potential of artistic practice to look at the contemporary world and establish a critical relationship on the use of its languages. 

The proposed mechanics are designed to provoke each guest artist to offer a unique vision of their own creative processes. This places the programme's methodology alongside the relationships that are woven in the workshop space, in the concrete practices that are developed at each moment and situation, and not in a theoretical procedure. This methodology will be translated into practice through exercises, workshops or other meetings proposed ad hoc.

Ibon Aranberri (artist), Asier Mendizabal (artist and teacher at KKH, Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm) and Itziar Okariz (artist) will be the tutors of this new Institute, in which Katinka Bock, June Crespo, Diedrich Diederichsen, Jon Mikel Euba, Kobe Matthys-Agency, Lily Reynaud Dewar, Camila Sposati and Zbynëk Balandran will participate as teachers. In addition, the Institute will have a Study Committee formed by Beatriz Herráez (Director of Artium), Oier Etxeberria (Head of Contemporary Art at CICC Tabakalera, San Sebastian) and the three tutors mentioned.