ASTERISK

Letter to a ISOI Teacher

2011-12-01T14:29:00.029+05:00

Dear Joan Lewin,

Congratulations on being recognized and prized as a Chosen Teacher of the Year as part of the Gestalt Educational Program as given by me. Your participation, enthusiasm, and ability to integrate your grade three curriculum with the concepts to which my workshop and lecture pertained are evidence of your integrity and the level of excellence that characterizes your work.

The atmosphere in your classroom and among your students and their parents was a pleasure for me to experience. Their responses to a theme such as Gestalt showed they were focused and able to make the connections from my words to the visual and to the creative.

Throughout the years that we have known each other and in which I have participated in a variety of in-class workshops with your students, I have been impressed with the way in which you have organized each session with me: taking into account your students’ varying levels of ability, developmental instructional practices or strategies, and the most appropriate arrangement of the classroom.

I look forward to our working together as we explore with your students the world of visual arts.

Thank you for inviting me to develop the Gestalt activities into your classroom and work with this year’s students and their parents as part of my fifteen lecture series as sponsored by the Embassy of Switzerland and Embassy of Germany.

Regards,
Mariano Akerman

Reference. Activities developed together at ISOI between 2010 and 2011:
1. Exploring Pictures is Cool, 16.3.2010
2. Argentinean Art, 25.10.2010
3. Pakistan Art Workshop, 10.3.2011
4. Gestalt in the Collage, 26.10.2011

Letter from the Swiss Ambassador

2011-11-30T16:02:00.015+05:00

Dear Mr. Akerman,

On behalf of the Embassy of Switzerland I would like to extend my sincere appreciation for the time you dedicated in making the "Gestalt Program" a success. The series of 15 lectures, were truly memorable.

While focusing on the Swiss-German contribution to the theory of art and design, the program reinforced our commitment to open a window of opportunity for Pakistani audiences to enjoy and understand the contribution of Swiss-German architecture and design in the 20th century.

The opening of the Gestalt Program at the Swiss Embassy was attended by numerous representatives of the media. It was encouraging to see so much participation by lecturers at educational institutions. I am pleased that the program received good media coverage and the audience reaction was clearly enthusiastic.

The lectures presented at both Embassies received wide applause. It is indeed a great achievement that 2,500 students participated in the lecture series. The enthusiastic response of teachers and students alike was evident from the fact that you received 247 entries for the Gestalt Collage Contest. The success of the entire event testifies to the effectiveness of your presentation and exceptional teaching ability.

During the closing lecture at the German Embassy, I was impressed by the works of the young artists of Pakistan. I really appreciate your initiative and encouragement in granting prizes to the winning students in the collage contest. I believe this appreciation and recognition will greatly boost the confidence of these young Pakistani students.

I look forward to working with you in the near future and wish you all the best.

Yours sincerely,

THE AMBASSADOR OF SWITZERLAND

Christoph Bubb

Embassy of Switzerland, Islamabad

Gestalt Educational Programme concludes with Lecture and 27 Prizes

2011-11-29T15:44:00.030+05:00

"Gestalt Educational Programme Concludes"
International The News, Pakistan, 28.11.2011, City News, p. 14

Mercedes Checa, Troya Roy, Mariano Akerman, Joan Lewin, Jenny Naseem

Our correspondent
Islamabad

The final lecture of the Gestalt Educational Programme (GEP), which was initiated about a month ago, was delivered by Argentinean architect and art historian, artist Mariano Akerman at the auditorium of the German Embassy and attended by a number of students, teachers and art aficionados.
The event also included a prize awarding ceremony to those who won the collage competition and the teachers who helped in making the programme, chalked out by the speaker, a success. The number of participants who took part in the GEP was 2,500 and it was sponsored by the embassies of Switzerland and Germany.
Titled "Functionalism and International Style in Modern Times" the lecture traced the history of the Bauhaus, a school in Germany that combined crafts and the fine arts and was famous for the approach to modern design that it publicised and taught. It operated from 1919 to 1933.

Gropius & Meyer, Bauhaus, Dessau, 1925

At that time the German term Bauhaus, literally "house of construction" stood for "School of Building." The school existed in three German cities (Weimar, Dessau and Berlin), under three different architect-directors: Walter Gropius from 1919 to 1928, Hannes Meyer from 1928 to 1930, and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe from 1928 to 1933 [...]. The basic concept of the Bauhaus school was simplicity [...]. [The educational institution] was founded at a time when the German Zeitgeist (spirit of the times) had turned from emotional Expressionism to matter-of-fact New Objectivity. An entire group of working architects, including Erich Mendelsohn, [...] turned away from fanciful experimentation and moved toward rational, functional, sometimes standardized building and items of daily use designed on clean and simple lines.

Studied in detail: Paul Klee's Insula dulcamara, 1938

The institutions which took part in the Programme include Islamabad College for Girls; Postgraduate College for Women, Rawalpindi; COMSATS University; Alliance Française d'Islamabad; Lahore Grammar School; International School Islamabad and National University of Modern Languages. Twelve Students received prizes for best collage [entries] in the competition: Rabeea Ahmed; Haider Abbas; Najeha Rashid; Sundas Sana; Aisha Saeed; Saba Malik; Ikram Haider; Sawera Gull; Anum Hamid; Saira Solangi; Janita Fatima and Saadia Ashrad. The teachers who were acknowledged were Hannyia Abid; Farah Nez Sheikh; Mercedes Checa; Saba Mansur; Mamoona Kahn; Abeera Zahid; Joan Lewin-Pohl; Saba Faisal; Troya Roy; Akifa Imtiaz and Huma Koya. [A special Token of Friendship was granted to Jenny Naseem, an unconditional supporter of the Gestalt Program]. Three institutions also received prizes: Islamabad College for Girls; Postgraduate College for Women, Rawalpindi and COMSATS University.
lecture over, prizes were distributed and Mariano Akerman thanked the Swiss and German envoys and embassies for their help and cooperation before refreshments were served.
Gestalt is a German word for "form" or "shape." It is used in English to refer to a concept of "wholeness."
The series of fifteen lectures explored the themes of Gestalt theory and Bauhaus design in the 1920's and aimed at sharing experience and reconsidering the interplay between tradition and modernisation.

"Gestalt Educational Programme Concludes," International The News, Pakistan, 28.11.2011, City News, p. 14
Ref. Mariano Akerman, Lecture on Modern Art and Collage Contest Prizes
German Embassy, Islamabad, 22.11.11

References
1. Gestalt Program Announcement and Brochure Online, 30.9.11
2. Islamabad, Swiss Embassy, Mariano Akerman: Bridging Cultures (excerpts from a note by Sara Mahmood), press release, 20.10.11
3. Islamabad, German Embassy in Islamabad, Integrated Whole, Experimentation and Identity, Gestalt: Theory and Design in the New Objectivity Age, 25.10.2011, ill.
4. Islamabad, Deutsche Auslandsvertretungen in Pakistan, Integriertes Ganzes, Experimentieren und Identität, Gestalt: Thorie und Gestaltung im Zeitalter der neuen Sachlichkeit, 28.10.2011, ill.
5. Ishrat Hyatt, Gestalt Programme Launching Event, International The News, 22 October 2011, City News, p. 19 (online).
6. "The Ambassador of Switzerland ... held Reception Lecture of the Gestalt Educational Program held by Architect Mariano Akerman," Diplomatic Focus, Pakistan, Vol. II, Issue 8-9, October-November 2011, p. 70, photographs by Shabbir Hussain
7. SwissPak Association
8. Almas Haider Naqvi, "Other is the Same Side of the Picture," Dataline Islamabad, 22 October 2011, p. 4, ill.
9. Maqbool Malik, "Tradition meets Modernisation," The Nation, Pakistan, 24 October 2011
10. Gauhar Zahid Malik, Embassies of Switzerland and Germany present 'Gestalt': Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity, Fifteen Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, Architect and Art Historian, Pakistan Observer, Pakistan, 3.11.11, p. 9, ill.

The Gestalt Educational Program: Facts

2011-11-23T14:29:00.028+05:00

by Mariano Akerman

2,400 Gestalt brochures printed and given
150 press release exemplars printed and given
2,500 participants
2 embassies
7 educational Institutions
12 lectures in English, French, and Spanish
3 training sessions and workshops
1 collage exhibition, with critique
247 entries received in the Gestalt Collage Contest
50 collage entries selected
27 bags with prizes given to students, teachers, and institutions
1 virtual collage exhibition, with critique
12 collages prized
12 teachers and colleagues prized
3 educational institutions prized

12 prized students:
Rabeea Ahmed
Haider Abbas
Najeha Rashid
Sundas Sana
Aisha Saeed
Saba Malik
Ikram Haider
Sawera PGCW
Anum Hamid
Saira Solangi
Janita Fatima
Saadia Ashrad

12 prized teachers and colleagues:
Hannyia Abid
Farah Nez Sheikh
Mercedes Checa
Saba Mansur
Mamoona Kahn
Abeera Zahid
Joan Lewin-Pohl
Saba Faisal
Troya Roy
Akifa Imtiaz
Huma Koya
Jenny Naseem

3 prized institutions
Islamabad College for Girls
Post-Graduate College for Women Rawalpindi
COMSATS University

References
1. Gestalt Program Announcement and Brochure Online, 30.9.11
2. Islamabad, Swiss Embassy, Mariano Akerman: Bridging Cultures (excerpts from a note by Sara Mahmood), press release, 20.10.11
3. Islamabad, German Embassy in Islamabad, Integrated Whole, Experimentation and Identity, Gestalt: Theory and Design in the New Objectivity Age, 25.10.2011, ill.
4. Islamabad, Deutsche Auslandsvertretungen in Pakistan, Integriertes Ganzes, Experimentieren und Identität, Gestalt: Thorie und Gestaltung im Zeitalter der neuen Sachlichkeit, 28.10.2011, ill.
5. Ishrat Hyatt, Gestalt Programme Launching Event, International The News, 22 October 2011, City News, p. 19 (online).
6. "The Ambassador of Switzerland ... held Reception Lecture of the Gestalt Educational Program held by Architect Mariano Akerman," Diplomatic Focus, Pakistan, Vol. II, Issue 8-9, October-November 2011, p. 70, photographs by Shabbir Hussain
7. SwissPak Association
8. Almas Haider Naqvi, "Other is the Same Side of the Picture," Dataline Islamabad, 22 October 2011, p. 4, ill.
9. Maqbool Malik, "Tradition meets Modernisation," The Nation, Pakistan, 24 October 2011
10. Gauhar Zahid Malik, Embassies of Switzerland and Germany present 'Gestalt': Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity, Fifteen Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, Architect and Art Historian, Pakistan Observer, Pakistan, 3.11.11, p. 9, ill.

Received distinctions
Prize and certificate from the Post-Graduate College for Women Rawalpindi
Token of Friendship from COMSATS University
Prize from Alliance Française d'Islamabad

Gestalt Collage Competition Winners

2011-11-22T11:49:00.000+05:00

Nine artworks selected by Mariano Akerman. From a total of 425 entries received, the following works were chosen as the best and subsequently prized at the German Embassy Auditorium, Islamabad, November 2011

Haider Abbas, 21, COMSATS University: Gestalt

Saba Malik, 26, Alliance Française: Positivity

Janita Fatima, 16, ICG: This Fall

Saadia Arshad, 20, ICG: Mystic Maze

Rabeea Ahmed, 18, ICG: Reality vs Appearance

Saweera Gull, 19, Post-Graduate College for Women: Aesthetics

Anum Hamid, 20, COMSATS University: Explore

Najeha Rashid, 17, Lahore Grammar School: Lahore, The Evolving Culture

Ikram Haider, 24, NUML: Todo o Nada (Everything or Nothing at All)

Gestalt Educational Program

Slideshare © Mariano Akerman

Mariano Akerman, Prickly Matters II, 2009
collage, 27.5 x 19 cm. Artist's collection

Prickly Matters recalls the mood described by T.S. Eliot in his "Hollow Men" of 1925. The collage has also a source of inspiration in a question rised by William Shakespeare in 1596-8: "If you prick us, do we not bleed?" (The Merchant of Venice, act 3, sc. 1).

Gestalt: Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity. A Series of Educational Lectures, October-November 2011

Mariano Akerman, Eye, digital image, 2011

Gestalt Program Resources
The Gestalt Program ; Programa Educativo Gestalt
Islamabad, German Embassy in Islamabad, Integrated Whole, Experimentation and Identity, Gestalt: Theory and Design in the New Objectivity Age, 25.10.2011

Bridging Cultures

Islamabad, Deutsche Auslandsvertretungen in Pakistan, Integriertes Ganzes, Experimentieren und Identität, Gestalt: Theorie und Gestaltung im Zeitalter der neuen Sachlichkeit, 28.10.2011
Sara Mahmood, Mariano Akerman: Bridging Cultures, 28.9.2011
Ishrat Hyatt, Gestalt Programme Launching Event, International The News, 22 October 2011, City News, p. 19 (S).
"The Ambassador of Switzerland ... held Reception Lecture of the Gestalt Educational Program held by Architect Mariano Akerman," Diplomatic Focus, Pakistan, Vol. II, Issue 8-9, October-November 2011, p. 70, photographs by Shabbir Hussain.
SwissPak Association
Almas Haider Naqvi, "Other is the Same Side of the Picture," Dataline Islamabad, 22 October 2011, p. 4
Maqbool Malik, "Tradition meets Modernisation," The Nation, Pakistan, 24 October 2011

Pakistan Observer, 3.11.11

Gauhar Zahid Malik, Embassies of Switzerland and Germany present 'Gestalt': Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity, Fifteen Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, Architect and Art Historian, Pakistan Observer, Pakistan, 3.11.11, p. 9.
Mariano Akerman, A Visual History of Gestalt Theory, 8.11.11
_____. Gestalt Program Pics and Musings, 30.10.11

Gestalt Principles. 12 Examples. A composition by Mariano Akerman
The whole is different from the sum of its parts
Theory of Perceptual Organization

An Appreciation Letter from ISOI

2011-11-21T11:40:00.004+05:00

To Whom It May Concern:

Mr. Mariano Akerman offered a seminar and workshop to the grade three class at the International School of Islamabad as part of the GESTALT PROGRAM. Mr. Akerman’s oral presentation started off with a brief introduction as to the purpose of his being with us in the classroom. Mariano was able to present concepts and ideas that were developmentally appropriate for eight and nine year old children. All details about the collage contest were discussed so as to be understood by both students and parents who were in attendance. During the workshop, all students and parents actively participated in creating a collage of their own. The results were evidence of the effectiveness of Mariano Akerman's teaching ability to translate and connect the topic to a child's reality. Children completed their activity by writing, using their personal voice, a paragraph that described their art work. Yet another opportunity where Mariano was able to allow children to make connections from art to thought to writing their thoughts down on paper.

The program brochure met the criteria of Mariano’s lecture on part/whole; GESTALT and function. His use of graphics and writing in black and white was pleasant to the eye as well as being functional and to the point. All topics that were discussed were stated in the brochure that allowed for ‘just enough’ curiosity on the part of the reader.

The use of media and technology as was done in the PowerPoint/visual presentation showed how versatile Mariano Akerman is. I particularly appreciated the use of graphics and highlighting; both effectively used to achieve the purpose of creating focal points.

In closing, Mariano’s lectures and workshops have always surpassed any expectations on our part. He is a true professional who can adapt, adjust, and accommodate prior to and throughout his presentations so that his audience is made to feel comfortable. His thorough knowledge and understanding of the topics that he chooses create an atmosphere of pure pleasure for his audience. Mariano is accepting of all points of view; allowing for audience participation in a safe environment. He is a master of what he does.

Sincerely,
Mrs. Joan Pohl Lewin, Ed.M.

French Modern Art

2011-11-17T09:54:00.024+05:00

Its development from Eugène Delacroix to Henri Matisse
A conference by Mariano Akerman
Alliance Française d'Islamabad, 17.11.2011

Delacroix: Marianne (detail from Liberty leading the People), 1830

Art, Freedom and Modernity. Modern art owes much to France, for it was born and developed there. In the country of "Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity" many artists expressed themselves with unusual inventiveness: local and foreign artists worked together to create original, modern art.
Because of their success, modern art has become some kind of synonym with French art today.
The French expression raison d’être refers to a "reason for being" or to a "reason for existing." Yet, in art there are many of them. Along the art-education lectures, Mariano Akerman also speaks of Raisons d’être, in plural.

Claude Monet, Impression, 1872

Mariano Akerman, Painter and Art Historian. Born in Buenos Aires in 1963, Mariano Akerman studied at the School of Architecture of Universidad de Belgrano (Argentina), completing his formation with a prized graduation project on the limits and space in modern architecture (1987). Abroad from 1991 onwards, he studied modern art and researched the paintings of Francis Bacon and the architectural projects of Louis I. Kahn. He has developed the series of educational lectures In the Spirit of Linnaeus (Philippines, 2007), Discovering Belgian Art and Raisons d’être (Pakistan, 2008-10). Specializing in visual communication, Akerman is an experienced educator. He lectures on modern art at renowned institutions such as the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires and the National Museum of the Philippines in Manila. An artist himself, Akerman exhibits his paintings and collages since 1979 onwards. He has been awarded with more than twelve major international prizes.

French Modern Art

Slideshare © Mariano Akerman

Letter of Appreciation. Dear Mariano Akerman, On behalf of Alliance Française d'Islamabad, I would like to thank you for your generous contribution for the promotion of French culture.
Your lecture was not only a very fruitful contribution for our cultural activities, but also was very informative and knowledgeable about Modern French Art. Thank You. Dr. Muhammad Azam Chaudhary, President

Peinture fauviste de Matisse

Art, Liberté et Modernité. L’art moderne doit beaucoup à la France dans la mesure où c’est dans ce pays qu’il est apparu et s’est développé. Sous la devise française « Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité », beaucoup d’artistes ont pu s’exprimer avec originalité. À Paris, des artistes locaux et d’autres d’origines diverses travaillent ensemble et créent un art libre, au point où le vocable d’art moderne est presque devenu synonyme d’art français.
L’expression française raison d’être signifie autant une raison pour laquelle vivre qu’une raison pour laquelle exister. Mais dans l’art cohabitent tant de raisons. Aussi le cycle de conférences de Mariano Akerman parle-t-il des Raisons d’être, au pluriel.

Georges Lacombe, Marine bleue, Effet de vagues, 1893
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rennes

Mariano Akerman, Peintre et Historien d’Art. Né à Buenos Aires, en Argentine, en 1963, Mariano Akerman a étudié à l’École d’Architecture de l’Universidad de Belgrano et y a validé sa formation en 1987 avec un projet sur les limites et l’espace en architecture moderne. À l’étranger, depuis 1991, il a orienté ses recherches sur l’oeuvre du peintre Francis Bacon et sur celle de l’architecte Louis I. Kahn. Par ailleurs, Mariano Akerman a présenté une série de conférences éducatives l’une sur l’oeuvre du naturaliste suédois Carl Linné (Philippines, 2007) et deux autres intitulées À la découverte de l’art belge et Raisons d’être (Pakistan 2008-10). Spécialiste en communication visuelle, Akerman est un éducateur expérimenté s’intéressant particulièrement à l’art moderne au sujet duquel il a donné des conférences dans des institutions renommées telles que le Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes à Buenos Aires et le National Museum of the Philippines à Manille. Également peintre, Mariano Akerman expose ses peintures et collages depuis 1979. Il a reçu plus de douze prix et distinctions internationales.

Gestalt Program: Comsats University

2011-11-10T14:40:00.050+05:00

Photographs by Zainab Umar Rehman

Gestalt: Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity. A Series of Educational Lectures, October-November 2011

Romah Samuel

German embassy representative

Rich is always the educated individual.

Gestalt Educational Program

Slideshare © Mariano Akerman

Is society a cake and man an egg?

Collage involves Integration.

Hannyia Abid and Abeera Zahid

Creativity has to do mostly with Imagination.

Comparison: Pre-Bauhaus design vs. Bauhaus design

Hanniya Abid, GR, Mariano Akerman, Saba Masur, Abeera Zahid

Can one bridge tradition and modernization?

Hannyia Abid

Romah Samuel and friend

Swiss Deputy Head of Mission

Saba Mansur and Hannyia Abid

UNIVERSITY COMSATS: CONGRATS and EID MUBARAK

Hannyia Abid

Saba Mansur, Mariano Akerman, Swiss representative, and Hannyia Abid

Bridging Cultures

Pakistan Observer, 3.11.11

A Visual History of Gestalt Theory

2011-11-08T14:21:00.017+05:00

by Mariano Akerman

"Between the Whole and the Parts" - A Digital Prints Series

Eye

Gestalt visual theory is the systematic study of perceptual organization pioneered by German psychologists the 1920s. The founding principle of Gestalt visual theory is that individual parts have different characteristics and values depending on how they are organized in space. Gestalt visual theory has been applied and expanded upon in many fields in the social sciences and humanities, particularly visual studies, literary theory, psychology and education. However, Gestalt visual theory is not only for theorists or visual artists. Anyone can use the basic principles of Gestalt theory in daily activities, such as making page layouts or taking photos (Jen Randall).

The Gestalt Theory of the Berlin School was one of the most significant advances in the history of psychology. By rethinking the mind as a holistic, interconnected entity, psychology was able to make significant steps in furthering understanding of the mind and treatment of psychological pathologies.

Old Watermark

Gestalt Theory has a long history in German literature and philosophy. Some scholars trace the theory as far back as Immanuel Kant and Goethe. Ernst Mach's Contributions to the Analysis of the Sensations is also a seminal text to refer to in order to understand Gestalt Theory and its origins.

Manual, p. 325

Group and Individual

Encyclopedia

Projection

In keeping with the global view of the mind, Gestalt Theory calls for a change in how psychological experiments are undertaken. Instead of looking at elemental components, Gestalt studies phenomena as a whole, focusing on real situations rather than controlled laboratory experiments.

Television

Primary Colors

Puzzle

Gestalt uses key principles to understand psychology and psychological phenomena. Most of these principles hold that human perception of objects occurs by perceiving objects as a whole and not by adding up their constituent parts to deduce the image or perceptual object. Gestalt Theory turns the old proverb "You can't see the forest for the trees" inside out: humans see the forest before they identify the trees.

Transmission

New Watermark

Op Art

Interconnected

Art Now

Gestalt Educational Program

Slideshare © Mariano Akerman

¿A goblet or two profiles?

Resources: PhotoFunia ; How to Understand Gestalt Theory and How to Use the Gestalt Visual Theory, eHow.com, 8.11.11

Configurations inspired by the Gestalt Laws of Perceptual Organization

Gestalt: Theorie und Gestaltung im Zeitalter der neuen Sachlichkeit

2011-11-05T10:50:00.013+05:00

Kulturelle Beziehungen

"Integriertes Ganzes, Experimentieren und Identität"

Das Programm "GESTALT" wurde speziell für eine pakistanische Zuhörerschaft entwickelt. Es ist eine Möglichkeit, Erfahrungen zu teilen und die Beziehung zwischen Tradition und Moderne neu zu überdenken. Dabei wird der Beitrag der Kunst aus der Schweiz auf dem Gebiet der Theorie und der Gestaltung einbezogen.

Mehr als 2500 Schüler und Studenten sind eingeladen, beim Programm "GESTALT" mitzuwirken.

Die Theorie der Gestaltung und das Bauhaus-Design sind zwei wichtige Aspekte, die in dieser Serie von fünfzehn Vorlesungen und Workshops erforscht werden sollen. Figur und Hintergrund, Zufall und Absicht, Form und Funktion, das Rationale und das Irrationale, Verdrängung und Ausdruck sind einige der zahlreichen Themen, die das Programm "GESTALT" erörtert. Dabei wird die moderne Idee von Form und Funktion untersucht, die in einer einzigen Gestaltung wirkungsvoll integriert ist.

Dies betrifft Wissenszweige wie die Kunst und die visuelle Kommunikation, aber auch verschiedene Arten anderer "Sprachen". Doch beim genauen Hinsehen wird man entdecken, dass die Modernität nicht nur auf Funktionalität und gesunden Menschenverstand beruht. Es kann auch unerwartete Eigenschaften einschließen. Ist Zierde ein Verbrechen ? Traditon wird gewöhnlich mit Identität assoziiert. Aber können Abstraktion und Massenproduktion sie bieten ? Und was ist der gemeinsame, ultimative Daseinszweck hinter den Werken von deutschen und schweizerischen Schöpfern so verschiedenartig wie Gropius, Alberto Giacometti, Arp, Le Corbusier, Meret Oppenheim, Johannes Itten, Mies van der Rohe, Paul Klee und Max Ernst ?

Eine mögliche Antwort liegt genau in den Zwanzigerjahren des letzten Jahrhunders, als solche erfinderischen Künstler uns das Beste moderner Kunst bescherten. Das Programm "GESTALT" folgt mit seinem wahrhaft experimentellen Charakter ihrem Beispiel, in dessen Rahmen ein Collagen-Wettbewerb mit vielen attraktiven Preisen stattfindet. Dieses Programm möchte Sichtweisen eröffnen, wie sie in den Errungenschaften von Kulturen sichtbar sind, die geographisch und historisch weit von Pakistan entfernt sind. Damit soll die Leistungsgfähigkeit und der Erfindergeist vor Ort angeregt werden, ohne die Individualität althergebrachter Traditionen abzuweisen.

Mariano Akerman - Maler und Kunsthistoriker

In Buenos Aires 1963 geboren, studierte Mariano Akerman an der "School of Architecture of Universidad de Belgrano" (Argentinien). Für seine Abschlussarbeit zum Thema "Limits and Space in Modern Architecture" (1987) wurde Akerman ausgezeichnet. Seit 1991 lebt er im Ausland und erforschte die Gemälde von Francis Bacon und die Architekturprojekte von Louis Kahn.

Bei seinen Aufenthalten in Asien entwickelte Akerman die Konferenzreihen "In the Spirit of Linnaeus" (2007), "Discovering Belgian Art and Raisons d’être: Art, Freedom and Modernity" (2008-10) und "German Art" (2010).

Akerman hat sich auf visuelle Kommunikation spezialisiert und ist ein erfahrener Pädagoge. Er hielt Vorlesungen über moderne Kunst bei renommierten Institutionen wie dem "Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes" in Buenos Aires, dem "National Museum of the Philippines" in Manila, der "University of Modern Languages" in Islamabad und dem "National College of Arts" und "Beaconhouse University" in Lahore.

Mariano Akerman ist selbst praktizierender Maler und stellt seine Bilder, Zeichnungen und Kollagen seit 1979 aus. Er wurde mit mindestens 12 internationalen Kunstpreisen ausgezeichnet und seine Werke sind u.a. im "Musée National d’Art Moderne", "Centre Georges Pompidou", in Paris, und beim "Statenkonstråd" (National Public Art Council of Sweden) in Stockholm ausgestellt.

Andreas Dauth, Programm Gestalt, Deutsche Auslands- vertretungen in Pakistan, 2011

A Reason for Celebration

2011-11-03T18:42:00.034+05:00

Gauhar Zahid Malik, "Embassies of Switzerland and Germany present 'Gestalt': Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity, Fifteen Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, Architect and Art Historian," Pakistan Observer, Pakistan, 3 November 2011, Twin Cities, p. 9

Pakistan Observer, 3 November 2011, p. 9

ISLAMABAD - Embassies of Switzerland and Germany have jointly arranged fifteen educational lectures by Mariano Akerman, architect and art historian.
One lecture was held at the Swiss embassy while others in various educational institutions of the twin cities.
The Gestalt Program, topic of the lectures, has been conceived especially for Pakistani audiences. Focusing on the Swiss-German contribution to theory and design in the 1920s, the Program aims at sharing experience and reconsidering the interplay between tradition and modernization.
Over 2500 students have been invited to participate in the Gestalt Program.
Gestalt theory and Bauhaus design are two of the important themes to be explored in this cycle of fifteen lectures, training sessions, and workshops conceived by Mariano Akerman. Figure and ground, chance and intention, form and function, the rational and the irrational, repression and expression are discussed in the Program, which reconsiders the modern idea of form and function integrated in a single, effective whole.
Yet, significantly, close observation may reveal that modernity is not only based on functionality and common sense, as it may present surprises too. Besides, is ornament a crime? Tradition has often associated it with identity. Can abstraction and mass-produced fabrications provide it? And what is the common raison d'être supporting the work of German-Swiss creators so diverse as Walter Gropius, Arp, Alberto Giacometti, Le Corbusier, Meret Oppenheim, Mies van der Rohe, Johannes Itten, Paul Klee, and Max Ernst?
A possible answer could be experimentation. And during the 1920s those and other art researchers provided us with admirable, fully modern creations. Inspired by their experimental approach and including a full-of-prizes collage contest, the Gestalt Program aims to open a window towards the achievements of relatively distant cultures, stimulating local productivity and inventiveness, without rejecting identities or traditions.
"One of the good things about life in Islamabad these days is the sparkling presence of Mariano Akerman", one art lover said [...]. "Combining a formidable knowledge of the art canon with his exceptional skills as a teacher, the Argentinean painter and art historian Mariano Akerman has an unusual capacity to enthrall his audience. One of a rare breed, he is a scholar who delights as much as he informs. Presenting German art to a lay audience and holding them spellbound for two hours is one proof. Another is the enthusiastic response of Pakistani student audiences to the opportunity Mariano provides for them to probe their own artistic heritage and its relationship to the art of other civilizations. Building bridges between cultures — between east and west, between scholar and layman — he describes as his vocation.
Earlier this year in Islamabad, Mariano delivered a series of twenty-one lectures to a group of adult enthusiasts eager to deepen their understanding of the visual arts. Beginning at the beginning with how to appreciate a work of art, the series moved on to trace unexpected themes and linkages that brought the art canon to life in new ways. Here is the testimony of one participant to Mariano’s teaching style and breadth of perspective:

Some of the topics are quirky areas of art appreciation I had never considered, but all are stimulating. It is particularly interesting to be drawn into discussions during these lectures rather than simply taking part in a dry question and answer formula.

Communicating his ideas about art to those interested in learning is described by Mariano as fulfilling his need to balance the independent views of the scholar with the human impulse to share."

Mariano Akerman, Memory, collage, 2009
The composition has been reproduced by the Pakistan Observer today

Additional Resources
The Gestalt Program ; Programa Educativo Gestalt
Islamabad, German Embassy in Islamabad, Integrated Whole, Experimentation and Identity, Gestalt: Theory and Design in the New Objectivity Age, 25.10.2011

Bridging Cultures

Islamabad, Deutsche Auslandsvertretungen in Pakistan, Integriertes Ganzes, Experimentieren und Identität, Gestalt: Theorie und Gestaltung im Zeitalter der neuen Sachlichkeit, 28.10.2011
Sara Mahmood, Mariano Akerman: Bridging Cultures, 28.9.2011
Ishrat Hyatt, Gestalt Programme Launching Event, International The News, 22 October 2011, City News, p. 19 (S).
"The Ambassador of Switzerland ... held Reception Lecture of the Gestalt Educational Program held by Architect Mariano Akerman," Diplomatic Focus, Pakistan, Vol. II, Issue 8-9, October-November 2011, p. 70, photographs by Shabbir Hussain.
Almas Haider Naqvi, "Other is the Same Side of the Picture," Dataline Islamabad, 22 October 2011, p. 4
Maqbool Malik, "Tradition meets Modernisation," The Nation, Pakistan, 24 October 2011
SwissPak Association
Gauhar Zahid Malik, Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity, Pakistan Observer Online, 3 November 2011

The Gestalt Program Pics and Musings

2011-10-30T20:31:00.070+05:00

GESTALTUNG, Fifteen educational activities in 12 sessions
by Mariano Akerman

Mariano Akerman, "Gestalt Program as Meaningful Configuration: Its Shape and Content," lecture
The Swiss Residence, Islamabad, 20 October 2011

Theory of Perceptual Organization: Holistic Approach

Swiss Ambassador Bubb, Art Historian Mariano Akerman, and German Ambassador Michael Koch
Launching of the Gestalt Educational Program
Swiss Residence, Islamabad, 20.10.2011
Photo courtesy of Shabbir Hussain

A great success, primarily thanks to Mariano Akerman's competent, well structured presentation. The holistic approach and the humorous elements contribute to a fascinating learning experience. —Christoph Bubb, Ambassador of Switzerland to Pakistan

Gestalt: Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity. A Series of Educational Lectures, Training Sessions and Workshops

The Gestalt series of lectures by Mariano Akerman is an opportunity to bring a most significant European movement closer to the Pakistani audience. Indeed, experimentation and new objectivity are concepts which have shape European modern cultural identity. As always, Mariano Akerman's formidable knowledge of the art and his exceptional ability to captivate a wide audience will be beneficial for students and teachers alike, bringing the Gestalt closer to their own reality. The message conveyed by Klee, Le Corbusier, Arp, and other prominent artists and architects who have animated the Gestalt and Bauhaus is very much actual in today’s world. —Nicolas Plattner, Deputy Head of Mission, Embassy of Switzerland, Islamabad

"The Theory of Perceptual Organization: The Whole and the Parts"
Lecture and Students' Collage Display
Islamabad College for Girls, 25 October 2011
Guests from Islamabad Model College for Girls, F-7/4

Mariano Akerman's lectures were well delivered and produced great interest in our students of Fine Arts and were also a basis to broadening the horizons of students of History, Applied Psychology, Sociology and English Literature. These extension talks are of immense value for students and faculty alike. —Rabyia Qadir

The Parts and the Whole

"Gestalt in the Collage Children and Parents Workshop"
Islamabad, 26 October 2011

I think it was probably the best lecture I have heard. Right on form; Mariano Akerman was able to blend your knowledge of the subject with great visual presentation, humour to those of us who perhaps didn't know anything about Gestalt. His ability to combine, connect, integrate and transfer knowledge to the audience goes way beyond what many professors could do.
Mariano Akerman's potpourri of efficent, effective, instructional approaches centered around the theme of GESTALT; not a theme usually used when working with 8-9 year old students, showed once again that Mr. Akerman is able to engage all students, promote interest and variety in learning and teaching, and provide immediate and continuous informal assessment during his workshops. Mariano's ability to use humour and his keen understanding of child development help to provide workshops and seminars that promote ACTIVE INVOLVEMENT for all children. During this particular workshop, Mariano invited parents to actively participate with their child and with other children once again showing that this type of strategy is what that helps learners of all ages to learn better when they are actively engaged in learnning. —Joan Pohl

"Reality is problematic and not unquestionable."
Ortega y Gasset

The lectures were marvelous. They were informative and interesting. They captivated the students. Gestalt theory appears to them as multifarious and they understand it can be implemented on many different spheres. —Mamoona Kahn

"What we know changes what we see.
What we see changes what we know."
Jean Piaget

"Collage et intégration : la théorie de la Gestalt et les arts visuels modernes"
Alliance Française d'Islamabad, 27 October 2011

The Gestalt Programme lecture delivered by Mr. Mariano Akerman had a very positive impact on the students. The students were enthusiastic about and awed by the lecture. It captivated them and kept their attention from start till the end. Time seemed to pass very quickly. Mr. Akerman has the charm and the quality to mesmerize the audience. His lecture was not a monologue: it had beauty of involving actively everybody. —Farah Shaikh

"Si ce sont les plumes qui font le plumage, ce n'est pas la colle qui fait le collage." —Max Ernst

"Gestalt Theory and Bauhaus Design"
COMSATS University, 28 October 2011

Einfühlung | Empathy

Additional Resources
Islamabad, German Embassy in Islamabad, Integrated Whole, Experimentation and Identity, Gestalt: Theory and Design in the New Objectivity Age, 25.10.2011
Islamabad, Deutsche Auslandsvertretungen in Pakistan, Integriertes Ganzes, Experimentieren und Identität, Gestalt: Theorie und Gestaltung im Zeitalter der neuen Sachlichkeit, 28.10.2011
Sara Mahmood, Mariano Akerman: Bridging Cultures, 28.9.2011
Ishrat Hyatt, Gestalt Programme Launching Event, International The News, 22 October 2011, City News, p. 19 (S).
"The Ambassador of Switzerland ... held Reception Lecture of the Gestalt Educational Program held by Architect Mariano Akerman," Diplomatic Focus, Pakistan, Vol. II, Issue 8-9, October-November 2011, p. 70, photographs by Shabbir Hussain.
Almas Haider Naqvi, "Other is the Same Side of the Picture," Dataline Islamabad, 22 October 2011, p. 4
Maqbool Malik, "Tradition meets Modernisation," The Nation, Pakistan, 24 October 2011
SwissPak Association
Gauhar Zahid Malik, Embassies of Switzerland and Germany present 'Gestalt': Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity, Fifteen Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, Architect and Art Historian, Pakistan Observer, Pakistan, 3 November 2011, Twin Cities, p. 9.

Gestalt Programme Launching Event

2011-10-22T11:51:00.071+05:00

by Ishrat Hyatt
International The News, October 22, 2011, City News, p. 19

ISLAMABAD. The Ambassador of Switzerland and Mrs Regula Bubb hosted a function to mark the opening lecture of the Gestalt Educational Programme, which is being supported by the embassies of Switzerland and Germany.
The series of fifteen educational lectures, training sessions and workshops by Argentinean artist, Mariano Akerman architect and historian, Summa cum Laude, has been conceived especially for Pakistani audiences. Focusing on the Swiss-German contribution in the fields of theory and design, it aims at sharing experience and reconsidering the interplay between tradition and modernisation, over 2,500 students have been invited to participate from educational institutions around Islamabad and Rawalpindi.

Ambassadors Bubb and Koch, with the lecturer

After invitees representing the arts had arrived and were seated, the host welcomed them and said he and his wife were delighted to host the event which would showcase the artistic achievements of the great artists from his country as well as neighbouring Germany. He thanked the ambassador of Germany, Dr Michael Koch, for his help and collaboration and said it was so readily forthcoming that he was tempted to ask for it more often. With a few words about the Gestalt programme, he thanked the speaker for his contribution and asked him to take the floor.
Lectures by Mariano Akerman are never boring and you can listen to him for more than the usual length of time even though the subject may not be your cup of tea. His talks combine facts and figures with touches of humour and just a little spice in the form of taking a dig at people and places—in the nicest manner—thrown in for good measure, much to the delight of the audience. The students who attend his series in connection with the Gestalt programme will enjoy his style, probably compare it with that of others and generally come away with a greater understanding of the subject under discussion since he encourages his listeners' participation.
Mariano began by saying he had been in Pakistan for five years because he had a passion for art and because he has been inspired by the interest Pakistanis display in his artistic activities. "When people in Argentina ask when I am coming home, I reply home is here," he said. "Because I feel at home among my friends."

Mariano Akerman: Bridging Cultures

With a slide show to emphasise the points he made, Mariano began by speaking of European art of the 20th century, in particular the period of the Weimar Republic from 1918-1933; its ups and downs especially the economic downside between 1921-23 and the golden years from 1924-29 when there was a switch towards change of accepted norms and practises. It was interesting to hear and see the comparisons he made and how he explained what modern art was all about [...].
In a statement, Mariano says that the Gestalt theory and Bauhaus design are two of the important themes to be explored in this cycle of fifteen lectures, training sessions and workshops. Figure and ground, chance and intention, form and function, the rational and the irrational, repression and expression are discussed [in the Program], which reconsiders the modern idea of form and function integrated in a single, effective whole.
Yet, significantly, close observation may reveal that modernity is not only based on functionality and common sense, as it may present surprises too. Besides, is ornament a crime? Tradition has often associated it with identity. Can abstraction and mass-produced fabrications provide it? And what is the common raison d'être supporting the work of German-Swiss creators so diverse as Walter Gropius, Arp, Alberto Giacometti, Le Corbusier, Meret Oppenheim, Mies van der Rohe, Johannes Itten, Paul Klee, and Max Ernst?
A possible answer is that it was precisely around the 1920s that such inventive creators provided us with the best of Modern Art. Following their example and being characterised by its experimental nature and full-of-prizes collage contest, The Gestalt Programme aims to open a window towards the achievements of geographically and historically distant cultures, stimulating local productivity and inventiveness, without rejecting ancestral traditions.

Ishrat Hyatt, "Gestalt Educational Programme: Swiss Envoy hosts Opening Function," International The News, 22.10.2011, City News, p. 19

The Gestalt Program Brochure pdf

Slideshare : Mariano Akerman

GESTALT, from the German term gestellt, "put together." According to the Theory of Perceptual Organization, our mind is holistic.

Additional Resources
Islamabad, German Embassy in Islamabad, Integrated Whole, Experimentation and Identity, Gestalt: Theory and Design in the New Objectivity Age, 25.10.2011
Islamabad, Deutsche Auslandsvertretungen in Pakistan, Integriertes Ganzes, Experimentieren und Identität, Gestalt: Theorie und Gestaltung im Zeitalter der neuen Sachlichkeit, 28.10.2011
The Gestalt Program
Programa Educativo Gestalt
Sara Mahmood, Mariano Akerman: Bridging Cultures, 28.9.2011
"The Ambassador of Switzerland ... held Reception Lecture of the Gestalt Educational Program held by Architect Mariano Akerman," Diplomatic Focus, Pakistan, Vol. II, Issue 8-9, October-November 2011, p. 70, photographs by Shabbir Hussain.
Almas Haider Naqvi, "Other is the Same Side of the Picture," Dataline Islamabad, 22 October 2011, p. 4
Almas Haider Naqvi, "Other is the Same Side of the Picture," Dataline Islamabad, 22 October 2011, p. 4
Maqbool Malik, "Tradition meets Modernisation," The Nation, Pakistan, 24 October 2011: "Mariano Akerman, an Argentinean national by origin, made an exciting presentation to put across his ideas and knowledge about [the] Gestalt Programme, and [...] amused the audience with humour to make the otherwise boring stuff lighter to digest including art lovers and students."

Gauhar Zahid Malik, Embassies of Switzerland and Germany present 'Gestalt': Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity, Fifteen Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, Architect and Art Historian, Pakistan Observer, Twin Cities, 3 November 2011, p. 9

Swiss Envoy hosts Opening Function

Swiss Ambassador Michael Bubb, Art Historian Mariano Akerman, and German Ambassador Koch
Launching of the Gestalt Educational Program
Swiss Residence, Islamabad, 20.10.2011
Photograph courtesy of Shabbir Hussain

THE GESTALT PROGRAM

2011-09-30T07:40:00.292+05:00

Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity

Educational lectures, training sessions, and workshops
by Mariano Akerman

Fifteen educational activities in 12 sessions. The fifteen activities of The Gestalt Program are developed along/in 12 sessions. Thus, the following information doesn't contradict anything printed in the event brochure: the activities are all in all 15, but they take place as 12 sessions (meetings). The length of activities nos. 2-3, 7-8, and 10-11 equals a total of 9 (not 6) lectures; the duration of those activities is 2 hours per session (instead of an hour per session).

1. The Gestalt Program as Meaningful Configuration
The Swiss Residence, 90 Participants

2. The Theory of Perceptual Organization
3. The Bauhaus
Islamabad College for Girls, 1500 participants

4. Gestalt in the Collage
International School Islamabad, 25 participants

5. La idea de collage y su relación con el todo integrado
Departamento de Español, NUML, 20 participants

6. Collage et intégration : La théorie de la Gestalt et les arts visuels modernes
Alliance Française d'Islamabad, 12 participants

7. Gestalt Theory and Bauhaus Design
8. The Interplay Form and Function in the Age of New Objectivity
COMSATS University, 400 participants

9. Artistic Expressions from The Golden Twenties
Seminaire des Arts, 25 participants

10. Gestalt and Education
11. The Bauhaus and the Emergence of Functionalism
Post-Graduate College for Women, Rawalpindi, 500 participants

12. The German-Swiss Contribution to the Age of New Objectivity: On Erich Mendelsohn and Paul Klee
Embassy of Germany, 140 participants

Gestalt Principles. 12 Examples. A composition by Mariano Akerman
The whole is different from the sum of its parts
Theory of Perceptual Organization

What is Gestalt? A fuzzy term imported from German, meaning "whole" and used to denote the integrated whole; its organic unity. Although often translated as "form," Gestalt refers to the notions of configuration, pattern, and structure. In general, Gestalt has to do with the idea of a complete system (the totality rather than an aggregate of distinct parts or components). Thus, Gestalt is any physical, biological, psychological, or symbolic configuration or pattern of elements so unified as a whole that its properties cannot be derived from a simple summation of its parts. In psychology, Gestalt is a perceptual pattern or structure possessing qualities as a whole that cannot be described merely as a sum of its parts. The original Gestalt school of psychology was founded by Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka, and Wolfgang Köhler.

An impossible structure?

Gestalt also refers to the early twentieth-century school of psychology that provided the foundation for the modern study of perception (Theory of Perceptual Organization). The German term Gestalt, referring to how a thing has been "put together" (gestellt), is often translated as "pattern" or "configuration" in psychology. The Gestalt school of psychology is holistic and affirms that the integrated whole of anything is different from the sum of its parts.

Johannes Itten, Studies of Color, Bauhaus, 1919-22

Experiment Times: Tradition meets Modernization
„Gestalt” is the German word for pattern. Although often translated into English as "form," Gestalt refers above all to the idea of “wholeness.” Thus, Gestalt is any structure, configuration, or pattern of physical, biological, or psychological phenomena so integrated as to constitute a unit, with properties which are not derivable from the sum of its parts.
The Gestalt Program has been conceived for Pakistani audiences. Focusing on the Swiss-German contribution to theory and design in the 1920s, the Gestalt Program aims at sharing experience and reconsidering the interplay between tradition and modernization.
Over 2500 students have been invited to participate in the Gestalt Program.
Gestalt theory and Bauhaus design are two of the important themes to be explored in this cycle of fifteen lectures, training sessions, and workshops conceived by Mariano Akerman. Figure and ground, chance and intention, form and function, the rational and the irrational, repression and expression are discussed in the Program, which reconsiders the modern idea of form and function integrated in a single, effective whole.
Yet, significantly, close observation may reveal that modernity is not only based on functionality and common sense, as it may present surprises too. Besides, is ornament a crime? Tradition has often associated it with identity. Can abstraction and mass-produced fabrications provide it? And what is the common raison d'être supporting the work of German-Swiss creators so diverse as Walter Gropius, Arp, Alberto Giacometti, Le Corbusier, Meret Oppenheim, Mies van der Rohe, Johannes Itten, Paul Klee, and Max Ernst?
A possible answer could be experimentation. And during the 1920s those and other art researchers provided us with admirable, fully modern creations. Inspired by their experimental approach and including a full-of-prizes collage contest, the Gestalt Program aims to open a window towards the achievements of relatively distant cultures, stimulating local productivity and inventiveness, without rejecting identities or traditions.

Kurt Schwitters, Das Undbild | "The And-Picture" , collage 1919
Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris

Quotations

Form and function should be one. —The main principle in Bauhaus design

Architects, painters, and sculptors must recognize anew and learn to grasp the composite character of a building both as an entity and in its separate parts. [...] A modern, harmonic and lively architecture is the visible sign of an authentic democracy. —Walter Gropius

The house is a machine for living in. —Le Corbusier

Art does not reproduce the visible, rather, it makes visible. —Paul Klee

Si ce sont les plumes qui font le plumage, ce n'est pas la colle qui fait le collage. | Feathers may make plumage, but glue does not make collage. —Max Ernst

Like clouds, the forms of the world flow one into the other. The more immediately they unit, the closer they are to the essence of the world. When the physical vanishes, the essence radiates. | Opposites mingle, entwine, dissolve. This removal of boundaries is the road which leads to the essential.—Jean Arp

Less is more. —Ludwig Mies van der Rohe

Nobody will give you freedom. You have to take it. —Meret Oppenheim

The aim of totalitarian education has never been to instill convictions but to destroy the capacity to form any. —Hannah Arendt

The principal goal of education in the schools should be creating men and women who are capable of doing new things, not simply repeating what other generations have done. —Jean Piaget

Not everything that can be counted counts and not everything that counts can be counted. | Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution. | Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning. | Two things awe me the most: the starry heavens above and the moral universe within.* —Albert Einstein

* Einstein paraphrases Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, 1788: "Two things fill the mind with ever-increasing wonder and awe, the more often and the more intensely the mind of thought is drawn to them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me." Original words: "Zwei Dinge erfüllen das Gemüt mit immer neuer und zunehmender Bewunderung und Ehrfurcht, je öfter und anhaltender sich das Nachdenken damit beschäftigt: Der bestirnte Himmel über mir, und das moralische Gesetz in mir" (Kritik der praktischen Vernunft, Beschluß).

Terminology
Kunstgeschichte – Art History
Neue Sachlichkeit – New Objectivity
Gesamtkunstwerk – A total, all-encompassing artwork
Einfühlung – Empathy
Prägnanz – Conciseness and effectiveness

Akerman, Memory, collage, 2009

Mariano Akerman, Architect and Art Historian
Born in Buenos Aires in 1963, Mariano Akerman studied at the School of Architecture and Urbanism of Universidad de Belgrano, completing his education with a prized graduation project (1987).
From 1991 onwards, he researched the nature and significance of the grotesque in Francis Bacon's paintings, and the evocative character of Louis I. Kahn's architectural projects. In Asia, Akerman has conceived and developed various cycles of educational lectures such as Belgian Art (2005), In the Spirit of Linnaeus (2007), Raisons d’être (2008-10), German Art (2010), and Art in the Picture (2010-11).
Specializing in visual communication, Akerman is an experienced educator. He gives lectures on art and design at renowned institutions among which the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires and the National Museum of the Philippines in Manila. An artist himself, Mariano Akerman exhibits his paintings and collages since 1979. He has been awarded with twelve major international prizes. Akerman’s artwork is featured in the Musée National d’Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, in Paris, and the Statenkonstråd, the National Public Art Council of Sweden, in Stockholm.

Bridging Cultures. "One of the good things about life in Islamabad these days is the sparkling presence of Mariano Akerman. Combining a formidable knowledge of the art canon with his exceptional skills as a teacher, the Argentinean painter and art historian [...] has an unusual capacity to enthrall his audience. One of a rare breed, he is a scholar who delights as much as he informs. [...] It is the combination of his intoxicating enthusiasm with his breadth of interest as an independent scholar that enthralls Mariano’s listeners" (Sara Mahmood).

Gestalt Educational Program

Slideshare © Mariano Akerman

• Gestalt Collage Contest: "THE WHOLE AND THE PARTS"

The contest. Make your own COLLAGE, showing us what you have learnt from THE GESTALT PROGRAM and win a prize.

A collage (from the French: coller, to glue) is a work of formal art, primarily in the visual arts, made from an assemblage of different forms, but creating a new, integrated whole.

Your entry: title and theme. Avoid using the competition title (Gestalt: "The Whole and the Parts") as the title of your entry. Your work needs a title of its own. The contest theme is free. You can develop any aspect or example from the Gestalt lectures.

Who can participate? The competition is open to students and teachers. Each participant is entitled to only one individual entry.

How to submit you entry. What you need to submit is your collage and a page with the collage explanation and your personal details. Explanation and personal details must be printed on a separate page and this page needs to be pasted on the backside of your collage. Your teacher will let us have your collage.

Gerard Bertrand, Kafka at Kandinsky's or The Birth of Abstract Art, 2002-3
collage or "photographie recomposée" (album)

COLLAGE
The collage support must not be bigger than a regular A4 page.
The collage must be made of paper and/or fabric. All types of paper and fabric are welcome.
Your work can also include the use of pencil, ink, gouache, watercolor, etc. But remember that you are expected to submit a collage.
The collage can be hand made, mechanically made (photography, photomontage, computerized design), or both.
There are no color limitations. The collage may be in black and white.
The collage can be made of figures, words, or both. And these can be complete or fragmentary in nature.
The collage style can be figurative, abstract, or both at the same time.
If you use words or text, these need to be in Latin characters. They can be in German, French, Spanish, and/or English.
You may use scissors or may not, but you must to use some kind of glue or any other similar product.

EXPLANATION. Explain what you have made and why it relates to the Gestalt Program. Write it in English. No more than 12 sentences. For clarity purposes your text needs to be printed in a separate page and then pasted on the backside of your collage.

PERSONAL DETAILS. On the same page that has the explanation and which you are going to paste on the backside of your collage, you also need to add and your personal details. Please print them following this order:
1. Collage Title:
2. Full Name:
3. Age:
4. Birthplace:
5. Address:
6. Telephone(s):
7. E-mail:
8. School / University including Department / College:
9. Student / Teacher:

Entries that do not follow the contest rules will be categorically rejected.

When to submit your entry? By November 15, 2011

When will the winners be proclaimed? The winners will be proclaimed during Mariano Akerman’s closing lecture, to be held on November 22, 2011. Selected participants will receive personal invitations to attend the awarding ceremony. There will be prizes and the works of the winning participants will be published on the web.

Richard Nickel, Ornament, photomontage, 2008

Remember Piaget

Note. Entries must be personal, original and unpublished.
Nobody will be held liable for the loss of or damage to entries.
The organizer reserves the right to reject entries that do not follow the rules of the competition.
The organizer will not engage in any oral or written communication with participants regarding their entries or regarding the competition rules.
The entries shall not be returned to the participants after the competition.
Winning participants grant the organizer the right to publish their contributions with proper acknowledgement of the author.

Shouldn't one wish you GOOD LUCK?
ANSWERS TO YOUR QUESTIONS

Online Resources
The Swiss-German Project
Einfühlung | Empathy
New Objectivity
Albert Einstein
Roaring Twenties
Gestalt and Its Researchers
Jean Piaget
Bauhaus
Alberto Giacometti
Swiss and German Creators
Elza Adamowicz, Surrealist Collage in Text and Image, Cambridge University Press, 1998. Elza Adamowicz presents an analysis of surrealist collage, both as a technique of cutting and pasting ready made material, and as a subversive and creative strategy. She considers verbal collage, pictorial collage, and the hybrids they generate, and discusses the works of Max Ernst [...] and others. Focusing on the recycling of art-historical icons, the parodic reworking of narrative clichés, the concept of defamiliarisation of the banal, or the relations between part bodies and totalities, she offers close readings of individual collages, and links specific aspects of collage practice to central issues of surrealist aesthetic and political thought. Throughout this well illustrated study Adamowicz confronts the 'monstrous' nature of collage, grounded on excess and composed of irretrievable fragments and hovering signs.

Max Ernst, Collage, 1939

Marjorie Perloff, "Collage and Poetry," Encyclopedia of Aesthetics, ed. Michael Kelly, 4 vols., New York: Oxford University Press, 1998, Vol 1, 384-87.

Bonset, Collage, c. 1923. Fries Museum, Leeuwarden

De la cola y el collage

Reference
Modernity and Modernism
Art Nouveau
Ornament and Crime
Deutscher Werkbund
Expressionism
Erich Mendelsohn
New Objectivity
Functionalism
Le Corbusier
Bauhaus
Walter Gropius
Forms follows function
Paul Klee
Johannes Itten
Max Bill
Josef Albers
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
International Style
Dada and Surrealism
Jean Arp
Sophie Täuber-Arp
Kurt Schwitters
Incongruous objects
Man Ray
Meret Oppenheim
Le Déjeuner en fourrure
Elsa Schiaparelli
Arberto Giacometti
Max Ernst : Imagery
"Entartete" Kunst

Collage by Kalsoom Naiwab
Inspiration and Expression Collage and Letters Competition
Pakistan 2010

The Gestalt Program Brochure pdf

Slideshare : Mariano Akerman

Resources
The Gestalt Program Pics
Islamabad, German Embassy in Islamabad, Integrated Whole, Experimentation and Identity, Gestalt: Theory and Design in the New Objectivity Age, 25.10.2011
Islamabad, Deutsche Auslandsvertretungen in Pakistan, Integriertes Ganzes, Experimentieren und Identität, Gestalt: Theorie und Gestaltung im Zeitalter der neuen Sachlichkeit, 28.10.2011
Programa Educativo Gestalt
Sara Mahmood, Mariano Akerman: Bridging Cultures, 28.9.2011
Ishrat Hyatt, Gestalt Programme Launching Event, International The News, 22 October 2011, City News, p. 19 (S).
"The Ambassador of Switzerland ... held Reception Lecture of the Gestalt Educational Program held by Architect Mariano Akerman," Diplomatic Focus, Pakistan, Vol. II, Issue 8-9, October-November 2011, p. 70, photographs by Shabbir Hussain.
Almas Haider Naqvi, "Other is the Same Side of the Picture," Dataline Islamabad, 22 October 2011, p. 4
Maqbool Malik, "Tradition meets Modernisation," The Nation, Pakistan, 24 October 2011
SwissPak Association
Gauhar Zahid Malik, Embassies of Switzerland and Germany present 'Gestalt': Theory and Design in the Age of New Objectivity, Fifteen Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, Architect and Art Historian, Pakistan Observer, Pakistan, 3 November 2011, Twin Cities, p. 9

The Swiss-German Project

2011-08-25T18:25:00.071+05:00

GESTALT
The Swiss-German Contribution to Modern Art and Design

A Series of Educational Lectures and Training Sessions
By Mariano Akerman

GESTALT. "Essence or shape of an entity's complete form."

• Regarding a spot on the glass of the window, you may not see the forest.

• There are those who look at the tree but forget forest. And there are those who consider the forest but at the expense of denying that it's a cluster of different, individual trees.

• Full perception concerns both the telescope and the microscope.

• Reality is complex and not unquestionable.

• "He who confronts the paradoxical exposes himself to reality." —Friedrich Dürrenmatt

• Is it possible to perceive both tree and forest at the same time?

• "There are things known and there are things unknown, and in between are the doors of perception." —Aldous Huxley

Everything is dual;
everything has poles;
everything has its pair of opposites;
like and unlike are the same;
opposites are identical in nature, but different in degree;
extremes meet;
all truths are but half-truths;
all paradoxes may be reconciled. —Kybalion

The Gestalt theory understands the brain as holistic, with self-organizing tendencies. From here emerges the Gestalt dictum holding that "the whole is greater than the sum of the parts."
The central idea of holism is that any evolved whole is greater than the sum of his parts, and that no single thing can be fully understood in isolation from its extended context. Though this is obviously true, it may not to get us beyond banal observation. Moreover, holism may also be described as a soapy term which evades real complexity, conflict and change. Various phenomena such as instability and flow need to be explained through models based on fluidity.

Important aspects that may be included along the program:
1. The Whole and the Parts; Individual and Society; Tradition and Innovation
2. Representation and Inventiveness: Mimesis and "Something Else"
3. Aesthetical Categories: The Real, the Sublime and the Grotesque
4. Reason and Caprice: Order versus Chaos? ... Design vs. Arbitrariness?
5. Impulse and Precision
6. Intention and Expression: Repression vs. Sublimation?
7. Illusion, Disenchantment and Provocation
8. Education
9. Uniformity and Diversity
10. Pretension and Freedom
11. Memory and Oblivion
12. Conformism and Commitment

Time per lecture. Between 60 and 90 minutes

Technical needs
1. A dark auditorium or classroom
2. A computerized system allowing the projection of a PowerPoint Presentation
3. A projection-screen or a wall allowing the projection
4. A microphone

_____

First painting. Paul Klee, Insula dulcamara, 1938. Oil on newsprint, mounted on burlap, 88 x 176 cm. Kunstmuseum, Bern. Insula dulcamara is the largest of Klee’s finished paintings. Its original title was "Insel der Kalypso" (Isle of Calypso). Delicate colours, reminiscent of blooming plants, contrast with hard black lines; open, dynamic shapes with closed, static ones. As a base, Klee used printed newspaper mounted on burlap; he painted it with oil paints and coloured paste.
The symbols are taken from an elementary vocabulary of forms and can be read in different ways. A line running from left to right in the top half of the picture is reminiscent of a serpent, the shape to its right looks like a piece of Arabic calligraphy. In the middle, a sallow face may be seen, and to this Klee was to return to in the 1940 Tod und Feuer (Death and fire).
The initial title of the painting refers to an image from Greek mythology – Odysseus’s sojourn on the isle of the nymph Calypso. While working on it, Klee broadened the subject to make a more open statement. The title Insula dulcamara awakens exotic associations, but at the same time it points out the opposites of sweet (Lat.: dulcis) and bitter (Lat.: amarus). He possibly refers to medicinal plants: Solanum dulcamara is the Latin name for the highly poisonous solanaceous herb, known as "bittersweet," and which was then used for healing due to its anti-inflammatory and metabolism-boosting properties. It is used to treat rheumatism, and helped ease Klee’s scleroderma. The scarlet fruits and small brown leaves dispersed about the painting may be references to ripe Solanum dulcamara. Yet, and because of its double-edged title, Klee's picture relates to ambiguity. Susanna Partsch notes that Klee's "bittersweet island" suggests a conflict. See Susanna Partsch and Wikipaintings
Made by a Swiss-born painter and graphic artist whose personal, often gently humorous works are replete with allusions to dreams, music, and poetry, the art of Paul Klee (1879-1940) is difficult to classify. Primitive art, surrealism, cubism, and children's art all seem blended into his small-scale, delicate paintings, watercolors, and drawings. Klee grew up in a musical family and was himself a violinist. After much hesitation he chose to study art, not music, and he attended the Munich Academy in 1900. He often incorporated letters and numerals into his paintings. Part of Klee's complex language of symbols and signs, these are drawn from the unconscious and used to obtain a poetic amalgam of abstraction and reality. Klee wrote that "art does not reproduce the visible, it makes visible," and he pursued this goal in a wide range of media using an amazingly inventive battery of techniques. Line and color prevail in Klee's works, but he also produced series of works that explore mosaic-like effects.
After World War I, Klee taught at the BAUHAUS school, where his friend Kandinsky was also a faculty member. In "Pedagogical Sketchbook" (1925), one of his several important essays on art theory, Klee tried to define and analyze the primary visual elements and the ways in which they could be applied. In 1931 he began teaching at Dusseldorf Academy, but he was dismissed by the Nazis, who termed his work "degenerate." In 1933, Klee went to Switzerland. There he came down with the crippling collagen disease scleroderma, which forced him to develop a simpler style and eventually killed him. The late works, characterized by heavy black lines, are often reflections on death and war, but his last painting, Still Life (1940), is a serene summation of his life's concerns as a creator.

Paradox. A seemingly absurd or self-contradictory statement that may nonetheless be true.
A paradox is an invitation to creatively depart from common preconceptions of what is true, reasonable or possible. At first glance, a paradox appears bizarre or absurd because "either-or" polarized thinking can not resolve its illogical or self-contradictory nature. Thus, paradoxing involves playing with opposites to deal with "either-or" as "both-and". Paradoxing can be distinguished into three aspects: Identify the Opposite, Juxtapose the Opposites, and Synthesize the Opposites.
IDENTIFY THE OPPOSITE: What is the reverse belief, quality, value, idea, object, practice, function, situation or experience?
Clarify the context (e.g. if you could wave your magic wand, what would you want? what has bothered you recently? why is this a problem? what have you already thought of or tried? etc)
Imagine how it can be turned into its opposite(s) (e.g. head in the opposite direction from the normal; exaggerate some dimension or attribute; distort the normal pattern or sequence of relationships)
Assume that the opposite point of view is worth looking at — what is customarily done or believed is not necessarily the right thing, the best thing, or even a good thing in every circumstances
Resist the temptation to drop an idea that seems initially absurd — thinking thoughts that are absurd at first glance is an essential part of paradoxing
JUXTAPOSE THE OPPOSITES: Resolve the dilemma: How can I have my cake and eat it too?
Visualize the opposites together in your mind, holding them there together AT THE SAME TIME
Consider their relationships, similarities, pros and cons, and interplay (e.g. how do each may need the other, how each may have its place, how one may turn into the other, etc)
Explore how the opposites can work together in a complementary, mutually reinforcing way
Adopt a new meaning/perspective, or create something novel and useful, which entails the SIMULTANEOUS presence of opposites in juxtaposition (e.g. a "both-and" understanding, a household hammer with a head for hammering nails and a claw for pulling them out)
SYNTHESIZE THE OPPOSITES: How can opposites be combined in such a way that one can't tell which is which?
Visualize how to fuse, combine, mingle, integrate, or synthesize the opposites to produce a third possibility — something or idea above and beyond the opposites (e.g. prescription glasses that are both glasses and sunglasses)
Adapted from Derm Barret, The Paradox Process, New York: AMACOM, 1997 (Paradoxing: Playing with Opposites).

The Gestalt Program

Slideshare : Mariano Akerman

Links | Enlaces

Einfühlung | Empathy | Empatía

Swiss and German Creators

Istilo ng sining Belgium

2011-08-19T20:02:00.017+05:00

F.C. Garcia, Istilo ng sining Belgium, The Varsitarian, University of Santo Tomas, Philippines, Vol. LXXXIII, No. 3, 6 August 2005, p. 13

The Varsitarian on Belgian Art Styles

Istilo ng sining Belgium, tinalakay sa exhibit
Ni F. C. Garcia

PARA sa pagdiriwang ng ika-175 taon ng kalayaan ng bansang Belgium, nagbigay ng lectures sa art appreciation ang Royal Belgian Embassy ukol sa kontribusyon ng kanilang bansa sa sining biswal.
Nagsimula sa Belgian Residence ang traveling lectures na ito bago makarating sa University of the Philippines, Ateneo de Manila University, De La Salle University, at UST.
Sa masusing pagtalakay ni Mariano Akerman, isang eksperto sa sining mula sa Argentina, nabigyang pansin ang mga katangian ng makatotohanan at likhang-isip na istilong lumilitaw sa mga gawang-sining ng mga Belgian na pintor.
Para sa bahagi na ginanap sa Unibersidad, na may paksang “Masterpieces of Belgian Art from Van Eyck to Magritte,” inumpisahan ito sa mimesis o ang makatotohanang paglalarawan sa pamamagitan ng mabusising detalye, matitingkad na kulay, at mabuting komposisyon ang mga kasangkapan. Ginawang halimbawa nito ang “Girl with the Ducks” (c.1883) ni Emile Claus kung saan makikita sa painting ang isang batang babae na nagpapakain ng mga alagang bibe.
Sa pamamagitan ng tempera (mga makulay na pulbos na hinalo sa itlog), nabigyang buhay ng magkakapatid na Paul, Hermann, at Jean Limbourg ang isang tila-kalendaryong obra na “The Rich Hours.” Mapapansin ang maliliit na detalyeng matiyagang iginuhit ng mga pintor, tulad ng mga ginintuang fleur-de-lis sa mga kasuotan ng mga karakter.
Si Jan Van Eyck, isang maestro sa sining sa Belgium, ang kauna-unahang pintor na gumamit ng pamamaraan ng oil sa mimesis. Naging magandang halimbawa ng paghiram ng imahe ng tao sa isang gawang-sining ang altarpiece na ginawa niya para sa simbahan ng Ghent kung saan mapapansin ang kaibahan ng maputlang balat ni Adan sa kaniyang maitim at kulot na buhok.
Sa kabilang banda, tinalakay din ni Akerman ang phantasia, ang imahinatibong paglalarawan ng mga ideya at konsepto ng pintor sa pamamagitan ng malikhaing presentasyon ng realidad.
Kilala sa larangang ito si James Ensor, na nahilig sa pagpipinta ng mga larawang may kinalaman sa sosyo-pulitikal na aspeto ng isang pamayanan. Mapapansin sa kanyang mga ipininta ang mga kalansay na ginagampanan ang mga gawain ng nabubuhay na tao.
Isang malungkot na obra ang kanyang “Skeletons attempting to warm themselves” (c.1889) dahil ang mga kalansay na ito ay lumalapit sa isang tsimineang walang apoy. Sinasabing sumasalamin ito sa kondisyon ng mahihirap na mamayan sa Belgium.
Magkasalungat man na istilo ang mimesis at phantasia, naging matagumpay ang mga pintor na Belgian sa pag-iisa nito. Dito pumasok ang istilong surrealist. Naging matunog ang mga pangalan nina Léon Spillaert at Paul Delvaux, na parehong tubong Belgium, sa kilusang ito.
Sikat din sa istilong ito si René Magritte, isang magic realist noong panahon ng World War II. Naging simbolo ng isang magulo at nasalantang Europa ang kanyang “Taste of Tears” (c.1948) kung saan may isang halaman na may dahong kalapati na umiiyak.
Naging malaking bahagi ng sining Belgian ang simbolismo. Isang representasyon ng kasakiman ang “Saturn” (c.1635) ni maestro Peter Paul Rubens. Naging basehan nito ang mitolohiya ng diyos na si Saturn, na kumain sa kanyang mga anak upang masiguro ang kanyang kapangyarihan.
Isa ring pintor si Akerman, at nakapag-eksibit na siya sa mga bansang Argentina, Japan, at Pilipinas.
Iba’t iba man ang istilo, nanatili pa ring isang pagpapahayag ng mga ideya at damdamin ang sining—maging panlipunan, pulitikal, o personal man. Hindi hadlang ang lahi sa pagkaroon ng pagkakakilanlan, sapagka’t napatunayan ito ng sining na Belgian.

A translation:
Art styles of Belgium explored along presentation
By FC Garcia

FOR celebration of the 175th year of independence of Belgium as a country, the Royal Belgian Embassy offered a series of art appreciation lectures about the contribution of that country to the visual arts. A first one began at the Belgian residence before the lectures travelled to the University of the Philippines, Ateneo de Manila University, De La Salle University, and Universoty of Santo Tomas.
During the UST lecture, by Mariano Akerman, an art expert from Argentina, students discovered the features of realism and the imagination that characterize many of the styles developed by famous Belgian artists.
Akerman's lecture, entitled "Masterpieces of Belgian Art from Van Eyck to Magritte," began with the exploration of the idea of mimesis and its artistic expression involving realistic descriptions of great detail, intense colors and remarkable compositional layouts. A significant examples of this was the "Girl with the Ducks" (c.1883) by Emile Claus, showing a young woman feeding her pet ducks.
With tempera (colorful powder mixed with egg), the brothers Paul, Hermann and Jean Limbourg created a calendar masterpiece known as "The Rich Hours," an illuminated manuscript full of little details the artists patiently illustrated, e.g., golden fleurs-de-lis in the garments of the characters.
Jan Van Eyck, a master of art in Belgium, was the first artist that fully developed the technique of oil painting. He also devoted his work to mimesis. With "Adam" he depicts the image of the first man and includes him in his altarpiece for the church of Ghent, stressing the difference between pale skin and dark curly hair.
Akerman also discussed the notion of phantasia and the art of the imaginary. Known in the field as James Ensor, who was inclined to painting images relating to the socio-political aspects of the Belgian society. Noted are his painted skeletons performing as if they were living persons.
A sad masterpiece is "Skeletons attempting to warm themselves" (c.1889), as these figures can be seen close to a stove with no fire. The image is a reflection on the condition of the poorest Belgian citizens.
A dialogue takes place between mimesis and phantasia, particularly with the surrealist style. Been distinctive of this movement are Léon Spillaert and Paul Delvaux, both native Belgium. And this style also made famous René Magritte, a magic realist painter who working during World War II painted a symbol of the confused and displaced Europe today known as "The Taste of Tears" (c.1948). The image shows a dove-plant.
Important to Belgian art is symbolism. Selfishness finds expression in "Saturn" (c.1635) by master Peter Paul Rubens. According to classical mythology, the god Saturn ate his children to ensure himself eternal power.
Akerman is a lecturer and also a painter. He exhibits his art in Argentina, Japan, and the Philippines. Differences in style can express diversity of ideas and emotions. They make art to be a social, political, or personal matter. Style is identity. It also validates Belgian art.

Limbourg Brothers
"January"
Les Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry, c. 1413-16
Musée Condé, Chantilly

Jan van Eyck, "Adam", Mystique Lamb Altarpiece, 1432
Cathedral Saint-Bavon, Ghent

Peter Paul Rubens, Saturn devouring one of his sons, 1636
Museo del Prado, Madrid

Émile Claus, The Girl with the Ducks, c. 1883

James Ensor, Squeletons willing to warm themselves up, 1889

René Magritte, The Taste of Tears, 1948. Oil, 60 x 50 cm.

Jean-Michel Folon, Yes to Thought, watercolor

Educational Activities, 2011

2011-06-20T14:34:00.030+05:00

Lectures and cultural events developed by Mariano Akerman

Art in the Picture
Seminaire des Arts
Art-Appreciation Lectures
The Visual Arts Institute

Pakistan Day Art Workshop
Drawing and Watercolor Techniques
International School Islamabad

Power in the Picture
Visual Image as Significant Structure and Communication Resource
Training Sessions on Visual Communication
COMSATS Institute of Information Technology

Tradition and Innovation I
The Nature and Evolution of Art and Architecture as Structures of Consciousness
A Lecture on the History of Design in Art and Architecture
COMSATS Institute of Information Technology

Tradition and Innovation II
The Nature and Evolution of Art and Architecture as Structures of Consciousness
A Seminar on the History of Design in Architecture
COMSATS Institute of Information Technology

Mariano Akerman
Portfolio
Profile
Curriculum Vitae PDF 2010

Previous activities

Art lectures and educational events developed by Akerman's initiative, 2005-10

THE GERMAN LECTURES, 2010
German Art
brochure
review
German Embassy Info: Deutsche Kunst | German Art
Shape and Meaning
brochure outside ; brochure inside
technical information
German Embassy Info: Form und Bedeutung | Shape and Meaning

Online information provided by the German Missions in Pakistan:
1. German Art
2. Deutsche Kunst
3. PDF brochure
4. Shape and Meaning
5. Form und Bedeutung

In the Spirit of Linnaeus

2011-06-19T09:13:00.043+05:00

The Tercentenary Lectures on Science and Art
by Mariano Akerman
Manila and Taytay, Philippines, 2007

27.12.06 - Embassy of Sweden, Manila, In the Spirit of Linnaeus: The Tercentenary Lectures on Science and Art, by Mariano Akerman, brochure (PDF)

Abstract. The year 2007 marks the tercentenary of the birth of the renowned Swedish biologist Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778). In Manila special events take place, to enhance his unique contribution in terms of systematic research. Indeed, Linnaeus was an enthusiastic man, a researcher who believed that curiosity was the only firm basis for scientific thought. Interested in mapping, studying, cataloguing and classifying the living species, Linnaeus wanted to understand the organizational principles underlying God's Creation. The Linnaean approach involves a systematic giving of names to the natural spacies or binary nomenclature, which is an attempt to clarify and simplify the scientific dialog, raising it to a universal level. Exploration, medicine, geology, anthropology, ecology and philosophy were among the many interests of Linnaeus. Considering the scientific and artistic developments of the Age of Reason, Linnaeus’ deductive approach and his systematic classification of life can be put in context. Searching for species to be discovered, collected, examined, described, named and classified, Linnaeus traveled across Scandinavia. He also played a key role in leading seventeen of his students to important scientific journeys all around the world. Conceived as an interdisciplinary forum, the Manila Series of Lectures on Linnaeus gather together the Sciences and the Arts, to focus on Linnaeus’ extraordinary contribution which was to lead us to a better understanding of the world that surrounds us.

Mr. Mariano Akerman, Researcher and Lecturer. Mariano Akerman was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1963. He obtained a masteral degree in architecture and urbanism from the Universidad de Belgrano in Buenos Aires with a prized graduation project on the limits and space in modern architecture. […] Specializing in visual communication, Mr. Akerman is an experienced educator. He has worked at renowned institutions such as the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Universidad de Belgrano and Universidad del Salvador in Buenos Aires […]. Today, Mr. Akerman resides in the Philippines, working as a professional lecturer at the National Museum of the Filipino People, De La Salle University, University of Santo Tomas, Ateneo de Manila University and the Embassy of Belgium in Manila. A painter himself, Mariano Akerman has exhibited solo or in group […]. He has been awarded with twelve major international prizes.

Lecture Schedule
1. In the Spirit of Carl Linnaeus: The Tercentenary Lectures on Science and Art, Swedish Residence, Manila, 10 January 2007 - 6:30 – 7:30 pm.
2. Carl Linnaeus: Exploration, Creativity and System, British School Manila, 11 January 2007, 2:30 – 5 pm. Music Room, 36th Street University Park, Bonifacio Global City, Taguig, Manila
3. The Art of Linnaeus: From Curiosity to Apotheosis, University of Santo Tomas, 15 January 2007, 2 – 4 pm. Beato Angelico Audiovisual Room, College of Fine Arts & Design, España Avenue, Manil
4. Carl Linnaeus: A Creative Person in the Age of Reason, European International School, 17 January 2007, 1:40 - 3:20 pm. Auditorium, 75 Swaziland Street, Better Living, Subdivision Parañaque
5. Linnaeus: Nature Exploration and Knowledge Systematization, International School Manila, 22 January 2007, 9 – 11 am. Fine Arts Theatre, University Park, Fort Bonifacio, Taguig, Manila
6. Linnaeus and the Rara avis Phenomenon, Ateneo de Manila University, 24 January 2007, 4:30 – 6:30 pm. Ateneo Art Gallery, Katipunan Avenue, Loyola Heights, Quezon City
7. The Art of Classification: Linnaeus’ Passion and System, Lyceum of the Philippines University, 26 January 2007, 1:30 – 3:30 pm. JPL Hall of Freedom, Muralla Street, Intramuros, Manila
8. Classification: A Fundamental Tool involving Surprises, Advantages and Risks?, Mahatma Gandhi International School. 30 January 2007, 12:30 – 2:30 pm. Auditorium, 3270 Armstrong Avenue, Merville Access Road, Pasay City
9. Nature and Art: Species Exploration in the Spirit of Linnaeus, School of Sciences, De La Salle University, 31 January 2007, 12:30 – 2:30 pm. Waldo Perfecto Seminar Hall, SPS Building, 2401 Taft Avenue, Manila
10 Linnaeus and Order: Nature and Its Architectural Projections, School of Architecture, Far East Aero-Technological University, 2 February 2007, 2 – 4 pm. Audiovisual Room, Administration Bldg., Helios Street, Santa Cruz, Manila
11 Linnaeus’ Systematic Approach to Nature and Its Implications, Hoppets Stjärna (Star of Hope School), 7 February 2007, 10:30 –12 apm. Auditorium, Taytay
12 A Tribute to Carl Linnaeus as Homo universalis, Swedish Residence, Manila, 22 February 2007, 4 – 7:30 pm.

01.12.06 - "In the Spirit of Linnaeus," EU NEWS, Vol. 4, Issue 4, December 2006, p. 13
Educative Program Linnaeus for the Philippines: Abstract and Schedule.

01.01.07 - LINNÉ 2007, Sweden
"Linné ska göra filippinska studenter mer kreativa - Linnéjubiléet 2007 - Ambassador Annika Markovic of Sweden I Manila inleds Linnés jubiléumsår med en sexveckorsperiod föreläsningar på universitet och högskolor som man hoppas ska väcka nyfikenhet och ge inspiration till filippinska studenter. Linnéfirandet i Manila, Filippinerna, lanserades nyligen med en presskonferens/sponsorkväll i ambassadresidenset. Under en sex veckor lång period kommer universitet och högskolor i Metro Manila-området att engageras genom föreläsningar för studenterna om Linné och hans insatser.Vi vill inspirera filippinska studenter att följa i Linnés fotspår - att blir mer kreativa, innovativa och nyfikna. Föreläsningsserien arrangeras tillsammans med konstvetaren Mariano Akerman och det filippinska utbildningsdepartementet.Studenterna inbjuds också att delta i en uppsatstävling där den första vinsten är en resa till Sverige i samband med Linnés födelsedag den 23 maj. Avslutningsveckan gästas Manila-universiteten också av en svensk föreläsare och Linné-expert Dr. Lars Jonsson från Uppsala Universitet. En filippinsk konstnär Manuel Baldemor har också inspirerats av Linné vid besök i Uppsala att måla en serie akvareller om filippinsk fauna. Dessa kommer att ställas ut i residenset. Linnéfirandet i Manila är en del i ambassadens Sverige-arrangemang för att under hela 2007 uppmärksamma 60 år av diplomatiska relationer mellan Sverige och Filippinerna."

linnaeus.se

01.01.07 - Annika Markovic - EMBASSY OF SWEDEN, MANILA
Events: Linnaeus 2007
2007 heralds the 60 Years of Diplomatic Relations between Philippines and Sweden and the 300th anniversary of the birth of Carl Linnaeus.
To highlight these two momentous events, the Embassy of Sweden in Manila together with Mr. Mariano Akerman, Researcher and Lecturer, will organize a series of lectures with different universities and educational institutions entitled In the Spirit of Linnaeus, a [series of] Tercentenary Lectures on Science and Art from 11 January to 22 February 2007 that will enhance Linnaeus' consistent contribution in the field of systematic research. The primary goal of the lecture series is to promote interdisciplinary involvement and exchange of ideas in the Linnaeus Forum which we hope will increase the interest of young people in science and research (swedenabroad.com, retrieved 08.01.07).

11.01.07 - Rapeepat Jumnongjit, In the Spirit of Linnaeus, SCANDASIA, News for Scandinavia: Scandinavian News Portal for Southeast Asia
Sweden and Philippines celebrate their 60 years of Diplomatic relations and the 300th anniversary of the birth of Carl Linnaeus. The Embassy of Sweden in Manila together with Mr. Mariano Akerman, Researcher and Lecturer will organize a series of lectures with different universities and educational institutions entitled “In the Spirit of Linnaeus”, a tercentenary Lectures on Science and Art from 11 January to 22 February 2007.

11.01.07 - Inger Ultvedt, 60 Years of Diplomatic Relations between Philippines and Sweden the 300th anniversary of the birth of Carl Linnaeus, SCANDASIA THAILAND, News for Scandinavia: Scandinavian News Portal for Southeast Asia
60 Years of Diplomatic Relations between Philippines and Sweden the 300th anniversary of the birth of Carl Linnaeus
2007 heralds the 60 Years of Diplomatic Relations between Philippines and Sweden and the 300th anniversary of the birth of Carl Linnaeus. To highlight these two momentous events, the Embassy of Sweden in Manila together with Mr. Mariano Akerman, Researcher and Lecturer, will organize a series of lectures with different universities and educational institutions entitled In the Spirit of Linnaeus, a Tercentenary Lectures on Science and Art from 11 January to 22 February 2007 that will enhance Linnaeus' consistent contribution in the field of systematic research.

21.01.07 - C. Jude Defensor, In the Light of Linnaeus, WHAT'S ON & EXPAT, Philippines, 21.01.07; (retrieved 03.02.08)
The year 2007 marks the 60th Anniversary of Diplomatic Relations between Philippines and Sweden and the 300th anniversary of the birth of Carl Linnaeus. To highlight these two momentous events, the Embassy of Sweden in Manila together with multi-awarded Researcher and Lecturer Mr. Mariano Akerman have organized a series of lectures with different universities and educational institutions entitled In the Spirit of Linnaeus, a Tercentenary Lectures on Science and Art, from 11 Jan. to 22 Feb. 2007. Conceived as an interdisciplinary forum, the Manila Series of Lectures on Linnaeus is meant to highlight Linnaeus significant contribution in the field of systematic research, and is hoped to lead to a better understanding of the world that surrounds us as a result of Linnaeus' curiosity and inventiveness. Venues for the lectures include the British School Manila, University of Sto. Tomas, European International School, International School Manila, Ateneo de Manila University, Lyceum of the Philippines University, Mahatma Gandhi International School, De La Salle University, and Feati University. Carl Linnaeus is Sweden's most famous and outstanding scientist in history. Linnaeus lived at a time of enormous discovery when science was seeking to explain the world around us. He is looked upon not just as a traveler and explorer of his own country, but more notably as the father of the modern classification system of flora and fauna, being the first to enunciate the principles of defining genera and species and to adhere to a uniform use of two names (one each for for genus and for species). Linnaeus received a degree in medicine at the university town of Uppsala, the former capital of Sweden. In 1761 he was granted a patent of nobility. His later years were taken up by teaching at the Uppsala University where he inspired many of his students to go on voyages of scientific discovery all over the world. For much of Linnaeus’ life, he was financially insecure and his health suffered due to overwork. His untiring and resolute endeavors in the description of the living world laid the groundwork for the eventual emergence of many significant scientific ideas such as heredity, evolution, and genetics. He died at his beloved Uppsala on Jan. 10, 1778. Linnaeus published many books on flora and fauna, the Linnaean manuscripts, his herbarium and collections of insects and shells are now carefully preserved by the Linnean Society at Burlington House, London. The celebrations were launched at the residence of H.E. Ambassador Annika Markovic of Sweden and were attended by members of the diplomatic corps, the media, and representatives of Swedish companies such as Ericsson, Sony Ericsson, Sandvik, AstraZeneca, and SCA.

ateneo.edu

01.02.07 - Xavier Banès, Linnaeus 2007, EIS LETTER: The European International School Newsletter, Parañaque, January 2007, p. 4 (retrieved 01.02.07)
2007 marks the tercentenary of the birth of the renowned Swedish biologist Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778), an enthusiastic researcher and a man who believed that curiosity was the only firm basis for scientific thought. Ecole Française de Manille had welcomed Mr Mariano Akerman, Researcher and Organizer of the Linnaeus Tercentenary Program in Philippines, who gave a very instructive lecture to EFM students. Through Ms Marilou Pascual, the Swedish embassy donated informative documents that were received by Xavier Banès for the use of the EIS library. Other schools selected for this program included the British School, the International School, Ateneo de Manila, De La Salle and the University of Santo Tomas.

18.02.07 - Beth Day Romulo, Win a Trip o Sweden, THE MANILA BULLETIN: PHILIPPINE PANORAMA, pp. 16-17
On the 300th anniversary of the birth of the great natural scientist (biologist and botanist) Carl Linnaeus, ... Ambassador Annika Marcovic ... held a reception ... that previewed a series of lectures which will be held in universities and schools, in Manila from January 11th to February 22nd, to refresh young Filipinos' knowledge of the astonishing work of Sweden's most famous citizen. The lectures will be conducted by the Argentinean educator and curator, Mariano Akerman, at the British and European and International Schools, Santo Tomas, Ateneo, De La Salle, FEATI, the Lyceum, and the Gandhi International School.

23.02.07 - Twink Macaraig, Take One News: Interview with Friedrik Agerhem and Mariano Akerman, ABS-CBN NEWS, TV channel 27, Philippines, 4:45-4:57 pm (Drasko Markovic).

06.03.07 - Maria Presson, "Linné i Taytay," HOPPETS STJÄRNA, Sweden (retrieved 08.02.08)
7 februari var en speciell dag på "High school" i Taytay, Filippinerna. Det var dagen då Carl von Linné kom på besök. Inte i egen hög person men i form av ett mycket inspirerande och lärorikt föredrag om vår världsberömde svenske botaniker. I år är det 300 år sedan han föddes, något som kommer att uppmärksammas både i Sverige och utomlands. Det var ett erbjudande från Sveriges ambassadör Annika Marcovics som föranledde besöket. Föredragshållaren Mariano Akerman höll, på uppdrag av svenska ambassaden, föreläsningar på skolor och universitet i Manila. Att även få berätta om Linnés arbete för elever på en skola i slummen, uppskattade både han och eleverna väldigt mycket. Precis innan han skulle börja sin föreläsning försvann strömmen och varken lampor, mikrofoner eller den specialgjorda datorpresentationen fungerade. Å andra sidan hade ju inte heller Linne tillgång till sådana finesser och föredraget fungerade utmärkt ändå. Linné katalogiserade och beskrev växter och djur och gav dem latinska namn, ett arbete som än idag ligger till grund för botanikers arbete världen över. Under de sista åren som Linné levde, var han professor i Uppsala. Han valde då ut 17 av sina duktigaste studenter, vilka han skickade ut över hela välden. Deras uppgift var att samla och skicka hem plantor och djur till Linné. Eleverna på Taytay blev glatt överraskade när de fick höra att Linnés studenter även genomförde resor ända bort till Filippinerna.

Online resources
linnaeus-manila 2007
program highligths
linnaean chronology
father of systematic biology
what a century!
something in common
rara avis
kingdom and ecology
the same order
manila acclaims linnaeus
maxims
riddle
contest
contest best entries
repercussion
en el espíritu de linneo
el mismo orden

The Soul in a Collage

2011-06-16T13:10:00.054+05:00

Mariano Akerman
Jardín indokushi | Hindu Kushi Garden | Jardin Hindou Kouchi
2011
collage, 45 x 25.5 cm
Hosai Rahimi Collection, Islamabad
© MAC. Todos los derechos reservados | All Rights Reserved | Tous droits réservés. Right-click on the image may enlarge it

According to La Font de Saint-Yenne, the historian-painter is the only one who paints the soul; the other painters only paint for the eyes (Réflexions, 1752).

Yes, I paint a personal history, yet mine has to do with the ones of other people as well. The Hindu Kush is a region in Central Asia, one marked by an intense reality. This finds a visual echo in the colors and textures of a 2011 collage, the Hindu Kushi Garden. Central to it is a mango tree, with delicious fruit. In the collage, the root of the mango tree remains visible to the viewer. And there are also four green-and-black plants around the mango tree.
Unmistakably oriental is the conceptual nature of Hindu Kushi Garden, a flat composition of overlapping planes which evoke the structure of a number of Mughal miniatures.
As in oriental art, also here there are some areas where the figure can be easily associated with other compositional elements in the background and vice-versa. In fact, all the leaves of the mango tree and other seven prop-like rectangles (which sustain the whole composition) share the very same textures and colors. Such rich areas are common ground to both tree and garden.
Motifs of trees, plants and flowers are often present in my work since (at least) 1981. It seems that I have been depicting them for some three decades. And such motifs establish sort of a dialog with other elements present in my works (e.g., Friendship, collage, Philippines, 2005). I am aware of the traditional symbolism of the tree and of what some poets describe as its generous nature. Doesn't man and tree present quite a number of common traits? And isn't man the tree of the field? As Zach puts it in a 1999 poem, both of them have much in common,

Because the man is the tree of the field;
Like the tree, man grows up.
Like the man, the tree also gets uprooted,
...
Because the man is the tree of the field;
Like the tree, he aspires upwards.
Like the man, he gets burnt in fire.
...
Because the man is the tree of the field;
Like the tree, he is thirsty to water.
Like the man, thirsty he remains.
...
Because man is the tree of the field.

And, above all, both of them are living beings. In a celebratory manner, the Hindu Kushi Garden presents a lilac background, being this color (at least for me) typical of this area. Such color harmonizes with a purple butterfly visible not far from the mango tree. And you may ask, "why a purple butterfly?" Well, just because la vita è bella. —Mariano Akerman

Resources
The Giving Tree
¿No es acaso el árbol un hombre?

Of Roots and Fruits • De raíces y frutos

2011-06-05T10:46:00.065+05:00

Mariano Akerman's lectures are certainly the most intellectually lively events I have ever been to in Islamabad.

His breadth of knowledge, not only on Art, but also on Literature and History, allows him to place his views in a global perspective and context. I thought I had a good background in Art History, but I have learned a great deal at every lecture.

What is more, he doesn't take a linear, progressive, approach to his course and topics, so every lecture can stand on its own.

Some of the topics are quirky areas of Art appreciation I had never considered, but all are stimulating, and it is particularly interesting to be drawn into discussion during these lectures, rather than simply taking part in a dry question and answer formula.

This week we are even using Art to consider the meaning of Life!

Mariano is clearly an experienced lecturer, confident in his approach and has a wealth of slides to illustrate his points. We have also studied Architecture in these sessions, since he was also an architect, but the sessions on Architecture were integrated smoothly into his overall view of Art and History.

These sessions keep me pondering all week, and so I highly recommend them to anyone who wants to think outside their own environment, in Islamabad.

Jenny Naseem

Photograph by Mariano Akerman

Las conferencias de Mariano Akerman son sin duda los eventos intelectualmente más animados de los que yo he participado en Islamabad.

Su amplitud de conocimientos, no sólo en arte, sino también en literatura e historia, le permiten colocar su punto de vista en una perspectiva global y en su contexto apropiado.

Yo pensaba tener una buena formación en Historia del Arte, pero he aprendido muchas cosas nuevas en cada conferencia.

Es más, no le hace falta a Mariano Akerman un enfoque lineal progresivo ya que cada uno de los diferentes temas que aborda en su curso tiene valor de por sí.

Algunos de los temas son peculiares zonas para la apreciación del arte a las que nunca antes había considerado, pero todas son estimulantes, y particularmente interesante resulta el debate elaborado en estas conferencias y que aquí reemplaza tanto a la pregunta seca como a la respuesta-fórmula.

Esta semana estamos incluso empleando el Arte para considerar... el Significado de la Vida.

Mariano Akerman es claramente un profesor con experiencia, confianza en su enfoque y posee una gran cantidad de diapositivas para ilustrar los puntos que trata. También hemos estudiado Arquitectura en estas sesiones, ya que él también es arquitecto, pero la sesiones en la Arquitectura se integraron sin problemas en su visión global del Arte y la Historia.

Estas sesiones me mantienen pensando toda la semana, y por eso se las recomiendo a cualquier persona que quiera pensar fuera de su entorno cotidiano.

Dra. Jenny Naseem

Mariano Akerman's "Art from Belgium" lecture at the Belgian Residence (Islamabad, 29.6.2010); his paintings from the exhibition "Les raisons d'être" can be seen in the background.

Response

Let us plant yet another tree.

La Vita è Bella

Art as Tree

"Por sus frutos los conoceréis"
You will know them by their fruits - Matthew 7:16

The Giving Tree

Art in the Picture
Art-Appreciation Lectures, by Mariano Akerman
The Visual Arts Institute
Islamabad, 2011

Other resources that may interest you:
• Educational events developed by Akerman's initiative, 2005-10
• Mariano Akerman: Curriculum Vitae
• PDF 2010

Tradition and Innovation at COMSATS

2011-05-28T08:51:00.048+05:00

The Nature and Evolution of Art and Architecture as Structures of Consciousness

A Series of Educational Lectures on the History of Design
by Mariano Akerman

COMSATS Institute of Information Technology (CIIT)
Johar Campus, H-8/1, Chak Shahzad, Islamabad, Pakistan
March-May 2011

TRADITION AND INNOVATION
The Nature and Evolution of Art and Architecture as Structures of Consciousness

Throughout the ages, design has involved an ordered realm, one consistent with man’s aspirations and circumstances.
In Antiquity, Vitruvius celebrated the concept of re-presentation (mimesis) in art and established as three the main features of architecture. Lao Tsu on the other hand understood the essential as a harmony of opposites.
From Ancient Egypt to 18th-century France, academic canons and norms were developed in order to organize and regulate art and design. The French Revolution celebrated the notion of Freedom and the Industrial Revolution emphasized that of Progress. New technologies offered new solutions, although they not always entirely satisfactory. There was also a temptation to go back, repeating past models: this approach was not totally satisfactory either. A third one led to hybrid fabrications.
Only Modernity brought real innovation. Functionalism was mostly inspired by the machine aesthetic and provided important solutions. However, it eventually became a dogma that supressed the historical past and the very notion of identity in architecture.
After WWII, the Age of Pluralism began, being Post-Modern Architecture built upon the principles of integration and identity. As Louis Kahn once pointed out, "a stripped-painted horse is not a zebra" and "a good question is greater than the most brilliant answer." Thanks to him, today we can speak of Structures of Consciousness.

Along the lectures on "Tradition and Innovation," Mariano Akerman analyzes and interprets the nature, historical context and development of the arts, architecture and design.

LECTURES' SCHEDULE

1. Tradition and Innovation
Main Library. Friday, March 4th, 2011

We shape clay into a jar, but it is the emptiness inside
that holds whatever we want. —Lao Tsu

2. Classicism
Friday, April 8th, 2011

Utilitas, Firmitas, Venustas. —Vitruvius

The column is the principal ornament of the architecture. —Leone B. Alberti

3. The Illustration
Friday, April 29th, 2011

I belong to those who from darkness to light aspire. —Wolfgang von Goethe

4. Functionalism
Friday, May 20th, 2011

Form follows function. —Louis Sullivan

Ornament is a crime. —Adolf Loos

Every architect is—necessarily—a great poet. Hew must be a great original interpreter of his time, his day, his age. —Frank Lloyd Wright

The house is a machine for living in. —Le Corbusier

Less is more. —Mies van der Rohe

5. Pluralism
Wednesday, May 25th, 2011

Less is a bore.
I prefer ‘both-and’ to ‘either-or,’ black and white, and sometimes gray, to black or white. A valid architecture evokes many levels of meaning and combinations of focus; its space and its elements become readable and workable in several levels at once.
—Robert Venturi

I thought of the beauty of ruins...
Of things which nothing lives behind...
And so I thought of wrapping ruins around buildings.
What does this building wants to be?
Monumentality in architecture may be defined as a spiritual quality inherent in a structure which conveys the feeling of its eternity, that it cannot be added to or changed.
The same order created the dwarf and Adonis.
Order is intangible.
Order supports integration.
—Louis Kahn

Order Is

Mariano Akerman, Architect and Historian
Born in Buenos Aires, Mariano Akerman studied at the School of Architecture and Urbanism of Universidad de Belgrano (Argentina), completing his education with a prized graduation project on The Boundaries and Space in Architecture (1987).
Abroad from 1991 onwards, he has researched the paintings of Francis Bacon and the architectural projects of Louis I. Kahn.
In Asia, Mariano Akerman has been developing the series of conferences The Belgian Contribution to the Visual Arts (2005), In the Spirit of Linnaeus (2007), Discovering Belgian Art (2008-9), Raisons d’être, German Art, and Shape & Meaning (2010).
Specializing in visual communication, Akerman is an experienced educator. He gives lectures on modern art and architecture at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires, the National Museum in Manila, the National College of Arts in Lahore and the National University of Modern Languages and COMSATS IIT in Islamabad.
An artist himself, Mariano Akerman exhibits his paintings since 1979. He has been awarded with twelve major international prizes. His work is featured in collections such as the Musée National d’Art Moderne, (Centre Georges Pompidou), in Paris, and the Statenkonstråd (National Public Art Council of Sweden), in Stockholm.

References and credits for the illustrations
Opening image: Richard Nickel, Ornament, photo-collage, 2008
1. Jugendstil Vase, by Max Läuger (1898). Victoria & Albert Museum, London
2. Classical Temple in Agrigento, Sicily; Colosseum, Rome
3. Thomas Cole, The Architect's Dream, 1840. Toledo Museum, Ohio, USA
4. Frank Lloyd Wright, Fallingwater House, Bear Run, Pennsylvania, 1936 ; Le Corbusier, Ville Savoie, Poissy, France, 1928-31 ; Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Farnsworth House, Plano, Illinois, USA, 1950
5. Charles Moore, Piazza d'Italia, New Orleans, USA, 1975-79 ; Louis I. Kahn, Hurva Synagogue Project, 1967-74, computer graphics by Kent Larson

Online Resources
Visual Communication at COMSATS
Historia de la Arquitectura
Western Architecture Timeline
Great Buildings Collection
Kahn and Hurva
From the Ruins

"So therefore I thought of the beauty of ruins... of things which nothing lives behind... and so I thought of wrapping ruins around buildings; you might say encasing a building in a ruin so that you look through the wall which has its apertures as if by accident... I felt this would be an answer to the glare problem." -Kahn, interview, Perspecta 7, 1961, 9-18.

Mariano Akerman at COMSATS
Visual Communication at COMSATS
Power in the Picture

Inspiration

2011-05-20T12:04:00.000+05:00

Patience is a tree of bitter roots and sweet fruits.

Solitary trees, if they grow at all, grow strong.
Winston Churchill

Power in the Picture

2011-03-13T10:52:00.073+05:00

Visual Image as Significant Structure and Communication Resource

A Seminar on Visual Communication
by Mariano Akerman

COMSATS Institute of Information Technology (CIIT)
Johar Campus, H-8/1, Chak Shahzad, Islamabad
March 2011

Power in the Picture: Visual Image as Significant Structure and Communication Resource

Session 1
The Visual Image
1. Nature
- Medium
- Type
- Structure
- Context
- Function
- Meaning
2. Representation, Visualization, Creation

Session 2
Visual Communication
1. Communication Theory
- Sender, Message, Receiver
- Means
- Style
- Intention
- Effect
2. Principles of effectiveness
- Design
- Substance
- Decorum
- Originality
- Clarity
- Brevity
- Empathy

Graphic visualization. Visualization is a multidisciplinary field concerned with the generation of images, diagrams, or animations aiming to communicate a message. Visualization through visual imagery has been an effective way to communicate both concrete and abstract ideas since the dawn of man. Examples from history include cave paintings, Egyptian hieroglyphs, Greek geometry, and Leonardo da Vinci's revolutionary methods of technical drawing for engineering and scientific purposes. The development of animation and computer graphics also helped to advance visualization.
Today visualization has ever-expanding applications in medicine and science, education, art, product visualization and interactive multimedia.

A picture is worth a thousand words. This short and memorable saying expresses a truth and has gained credibility through its long use. The adage refers to the idea that a complex idea can be conveyed with just a single still image. It also aptly characterizes one of the main goals of visualization, which aims to make possible the absortion of large amounts of data quickly.

It is believed that the modern use of the phrase stems from an article by Fred R. Barnyard, which carries an ad entitled "One Look is Worth A Thousand Words" (Printers' Ink, 1921; The History of A Picture's Worth).
Despite the twentieth-century origin of the popular phrase, the sentiment has been expressed by earlier writers, such as the Russian writer Ivan Turgenev who wrote that "A picture shows me at a glance what it takes dozens of pages of a book to expound" (Fathers and Sons, 1862). The idea is sometimes also attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte, who said "Un bon croquis vaut mieux qu'un long discours" (A good sketch is better than a long speech). Significantly, his words are often translated "A picture is worth a thousand words" and such translation may not predate the phrase's common use in English.

Pakistan Art Workshop and Exhibition

2011-03-10T19:33:00.064+05:00

To celebrate Pakistani culture, a workshop and exhibit organized by painter Mariano Akerman take place at the ISOI today.

Devoted to explore local motifs and pattern-making, the workshop attracts some three dozens of participants.

Akerman's paintings, which include several of his "Inner Constellations," are shown outdoors, together with the images created by everyone who attends today's workshop.

Jornada Internacional de Arte con Exposición en Pakistán

Con ánimos de celebrar la cultura pakistaní, un taller de dibujo y acuarela conjuntamente con la exposición de trabajos son organizados hoy por Mariano Akerman en ISOI Campus, Islamabad.

Dedicado a explorar los motivos locales y la creación de tramas y diseños a partir de los mismos, el taller atrae unas tres docenas de participantes de todas las edades.

El taller es desarrollado por Rashida Samar y Mariano Akerman. Forma parte de un evento anual que es organizado por Joan Lewin-Pohl.

Las pinturas de Akerman, que incluyen varias de sus "Constelaciones interiores," son exhibidas al aire libre y a ellas se le suman otras producidas por quienes participan en las jornadas de arte del día de hoy.

Pakistan Art Workshop on the Behance Network
by Mariano Akerman and Rashida Samar

The Indokushi Elephant, by Shankar (eight-years old).

Mariano Akerman: Educational Activities, 2005-10

Visual Communication at COMSATS

2011-03-04T20:17:00.076+05:00

"Tradition and Innovation" is the title of Mariano Akerman's lecture on Architecture and Design which was given at the main library of the COMSATS Institute of Information Technology (CIIT), Johar Campus, H-8/1, Chak Shahzad, Islamabad today.

The event was attended by 60 participants who showed a sustained interest in the multi-faceted topic of the day and formulated questions concerning the nature of art and architecture today and their possible projections in the near future.

TRADITION and INNOVATION
by Mariano Akerman

Pt. 1. Design as Ordered Realm
1a. Vitruvius' architectural principles: utilitas (function), firmitas (structure), venustas (aesthetics).
1b. Interplay between architectural space and its limits (Lao Tsu: useful is not the shape of a vessel, but its inner space).
1c. History as a resource of memory and identity.
1d. The designer's responsability concerning History or "Shouldn't one learn from the past?"

Pt. 2. Design as Historical Development
2a. Prehistory as a ground for speculation.
2b. Tradition from Ancient Egypt to 18th-Century France. Mimesis. Fine-Arts Academies.
2c. 19th-Century Dilemmas. The quest for freedom in times of the Industrial Revolution. The new materials (Paxton and Eiffel), Historicism (Jones: Grammar of Ornament) and crisis of style (Eclecticism). Vincent van Gogh's approach toward mimesis.
2d. 20th-Century Innovation. Pictorial avant-garde (Matisse, Soutine, Kandinsky, Malevitch). Ornament as a Crime (Loos). Functionalism (Bauhaus, Mies van der Rohe: "form follows function"). Criticism (Oppenheim).

SOURCES OF INSPIRATION

1. Learnings from The Silk Road

We join spokes together in a wheel,
but it is the center hole
that makes the wagon move.

We shape clay into a jar,
but it is the emptiness inside
that holds whatever we want.

We hammer wood for a house,
but it is the inner space
that makes it livable.

Thus benefit comes from what is there;
Usefulness from what is not there.

Lao Tsu (551-479 BCE), Tao Te Ching (Daodejing, 道德經), chapter 11

2. The Main Issue

From cradle to grave this problem of running
order through chaos, direction through space,
discipline through freedom, unity through
multiplicity, has always been, and must
always be, the task of education.

The Education of Henry Adams: An Autobiography, Boston: Houghton Mitflin, 1961, p. 9

Addendum. À propos "form follows function"

Caloi, Caloidoscopio, image #33

Eric Lafforgue, Untitled, photograph, Mount Hagen Singsing, Papua, 2008

Johann Georg Hertel (after Jeremias Wachsmuth), Winter, Rococo Music, Fancy Dress Ball, etching, 1750-60

Méret Oppenheim, Breakfast in Fur (Le Déjeuner en Fourrure), 1936. Fur-covered cup, saucer, and spoon. Museum of Modern Art, New York

Humor by Mordillo

"Drop excess baggage," add by the beauty care company VLCC Sliming, Skin and Hair Services, 2007

Johann Esaias Nilson (1721-1788), Neues Caffehaus (New Coffee House), colored engraving, Augsburg, Germany, 1756

Javier Inga, The Lie Covered, Argentina, 2008

Grass-Sofa, France, 24.4.2010

Reality-TV

Jake Crees, Oops, mahogany, 2001.

Tradition and Innovation
The Nature and Evolution of Art and Architecture as Structures of Consciousness, by Mariano Akerman

Power in the Picture
Visual Image as Significant Structure and Communication Resource: A Seminar on Visual Communication, by Mariano Akerman

Educational Activities Slideshow and CV 2010

2011-02-18T21:45:00.023+05:00

Mariano Akerman, Educational Lectures and Activities, 2005-10

Pensamientos encapsulados

2011-01-30T11:28:00.033+05:00

La paciencia es un árbol de amargas raíces y frutos dulces.
Anónimo

Akerman, Memoria, collage 2009

Akerman, Partida, gouache 2003

EL VIAJE
Sólo quiero tu casa de ternura,
vivir en su calor.
Eres el mar y la orilla segura
porque el único viaje es el amor.
Reconocer tu alma, qué aventura
de mágico sabor.
Allí tendré profundidad y altura
porque el único viaje es el amor.
Besos desconocidos como puertos
esperan bajo un cielo de mirada.
-Lo demás es dolor.
Hoy vuelvo de países que están muertos,
después de un mar que no me dijo nada,
porque el único viaje es el amor.
María Elena Walsh

Mariano Akerman, Las cosas que te digo, collage, 2010

Los árboles solitarios, de crecer, crecen fuertes.
Winston Churchill

Branka Parlic, "Las Horas" (Philip Glass), Novi Sad Synagogue, Serbia, 5 de julio de 2005

Un pensamiento de gratitud dirigido al cielo es la expresión más perfecta.
Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

Albert Einstein

Nunca consideres el estudio como una obligación, sino como una oportunidad para penetrar en el bello y maravilloso mundo del saber.

Todos somos muy ignorantes. Lo que ocurre es que no todos ignoramos las mismas cosas.

La definición de la locura es continuar haciendo lo mismo y esperar resultados diferentes.

Mi ideal político es el democrático. Todo el mundo debe ser respetado como persona y nadie debe ser divinizado.

Triste época la nuestra. Es más fácil desintegrar un átomo que un prejuicio.

La vida es muy peligrosa. No por las personas que hacen el mal, sino por las que se sientan a ver lo que pasa.

No existe el frio, sino la ausencia de calor. No existe la oscuridad, sino la falta de luz. No existe el mal, sino la ausencia del bien.

La realidad es simplemente una ilusión, aunque muy persistente.

Hay dos formas de ver la vida: una es creer que no existen milagros, la otra es creer que todo es un milagro.

El sentido común no es más que un depósito de prejuicios establecidos en la mente antes de cumplir dieciocho años.

No entiendes realmente algo a menos que seas capaz de explicarselo a tu abuela.

La creatividad nace de la angustia como el día nace de la noche. Es en la crisis donde nace la inventiva, los descubrimientos… Sin crisis no hay desafíos, sin desafíos la vida es una rutina, una lenta agonía. Sin crisis no hay méritos. Es en la crisis donde aflora lo mejor de cada uno, porque sin crisis todo viento es caricia.

La imaginación es más importante que el conocimiento. El conocimiento es limitado. La imaginación abraza el mundo.

La mente intuitiva es un regalo sagrado y la mente racional una sirviente fiel. Hemos creado una sociedad que honra a los sirvientes y que ha olvidado los regalos.

Cuando me examino a mí mismo y mis formas de pensar llego a la conclusión de que el regalo de la fantasía ha significado más para mí que mi talento para absorber el conocimiento positivo.

La experiencia más maravillosa que podemos tener es el misterio; es la emoción fundamental que permanece en la base del arte y la ciencia verdaderos.

Dos cosas me inspiran sobrecogimiento: los cielos estrellados allí arriba y el universo moral interior.

No todo lo que cuenta puede ser contado y no todo lo que puede ser contado cuenta. (Inscripción a la vista de todos en el despacho de Einstein en Princeton).

Video-Clip as Suggestive Stimulus

2011-01-05T09:31:00.011+05:00

Argentinean Art - ArgentinArte - Arte Argentino. Three Centuries of Argentinean Art. Tres siglos de Arte Argentino. Maestro de Calamarca, Prilidiano Pueyrredón, Ernesto de la Cárcova, Justo Lynch, Héctor Borla, Emilio Petorutti, Xul Solar, Antonio Berni, Antonio Segui, Carlos Alonso, Mariano Akerman

Mariano Akerman, Paintings 1986-90. Motifs from Mariano Akerman's paintings, made in Buenos Aires, Argentina, 1986-1990. One-man shows at RG en el Arte Fine Art, University of Belgrano, and Bank of Boston Cultural Foundation

Fiddler on the Roof. Play performed by the students of the M.G.I.S., Manila, Philippines, December 2006. - El violinista sobre el tejado. Obra representada por los alumnos de M.G.I.S., Manila, Filipinas, 15 de diciembre de 2006.

Belgian Art - Art Belge - Belgische Kunst - Arte Belga. Among the achievements of the Belgian artists are the invention of the oil painting technique, the fostering of remarkable pictorial styles and a whole questioning of the notion of "reality" as such. Art Historian Mariano Akerman reveals the singularity and originality of a select group of Belgian masterpieces. He examines their style and meanings, historical context, aesthetic qualities and raison d'etre, appreciating them from unexpected, innovative perspectives.

DOUBLE-EDGED 1. Having two edges that can be used; having two cutting edges. 2 Having a dual purpose; having two meanings; effective or capable of being interpreted in two ways. Double-edged sword - literally, a sword which cuts on either side; metaphorically, an argument which makes both for and against the person employing it, or which has a double meaning. Featured: French Medieval hybrid; Giuseppe Arcimboldo; Italian Renaissance grotteschi (sogni dei pittori); Francis Bacon; Quentin Metsys; Keller; Quino; Roman Domus Aurea; Paul-Andreas Weber. DE DOBLE FILO 1. Arma blanca que tiene filo por ambos bordes de la hoja. 2. Cosa o acción que puede obrar en contra de lo que pretende. Incluidos: Híbrido medieval francés; Archimboldo; Grutesco renacentista italiano; Francis Bacon; Quentin Metsys; Keller; Quino; Domus Aurea; Paul-Andreas Weber.

Ref. Mariano Akerman, video-clips, information, education, record.

Mariano Akerman an der Deutschen Botschaft

2011-01-04T12:58:00.029+05:00

Deutsche Kunst - Form und Bedeutung. Eine Vorlesungsreihe von Mariano Akerman, Botschaft der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Islamabad, 3.1.2011, Kulturelle Beziehungen

Deutsche Kunst, Botschaft der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Islamabad, 12.5.2010

International The News, Pakistan, 14.5.2010

Deutsche Kunst ihre Wandlungen und ihre Besonderheiten. Eine Vorlesungsreihe von Mariano Akerman, Botschaft der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Islamabad, 28.5.2010, Kulturelle Beziehungen: Lesungen zur Deutschen Kunst

Auf Englisch

German Art: Its Peculiarities and Transformations - A Series of Lectures by Mariano Akerman

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Visual Arts - Five Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman

German Art Gallery

2010-12-26T10:35:00.056+05:00

The German Contribution to the Visual Arts: Select Artwork
by Mariano Akerman

Medieval sculpture. Last Judgement Tympanum: The Damned, Bamberg cathedral, 13th century

Gothic sculpture. Master Heinrich of Constance, The Visitation, c. 1310-20. Polychrome walnut, with gilding and rock crystal cabechons. German sculpture, from Katharienenthal Abbey, Switzerland. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Stephen Lochner, The Madonna in the Rose Bower (Maria am Rosenhag), 1448. Wallraf-Richartz Museum, Cologne

Medieval print. Hartmann Schedel, The Monstrous Races: "Blemmyae," from Liber chronicarum (Die Schedelsche Weltchronik, Das Buch der Croniken und Geschichten von Hartmann Schedel), woodcut, 1493

Renaissance painting. Albrecht Dürer, Self-Portrait, 1498

Renaissance print. Moses leads the Children of Israel through the Red Sea, from The Luther Bible, Germany, c. 1530

Christoph Jamnitzer, Neuw Grotteßken Buch (New Book of Grotesques), Nuremberg 1610

Friedrich Unteutsch, Gristly Motif (Knorpelwerk), engraving, 1650

Johann Heinrich Keller, Cartilaginous Grotesque (Knorpelgrotesk), engraving, 1680

Rococo engraving. Johann Georg Hertel (after Jeremias Wachsmuth), Winter, Rococo Music, Fancy Dress Ball, etching, 1750-60

Romanticism. Runge, Self-Portrait, oil, 1810

Caspar David Friedrich, The Wreck of Hope, oil, 1823-4. Hamburger Kunsthalle

Realism. Karl Edouard Biermann, Borsig Engineering Work in Berlin (Borsig's Maschinenbau-Anstalt zu Berlin), oil, 1847. Stadtmuseum Berlin

Impressionism. Max Liebermann, Country Tavern at Brannenburg, oil, 1893. Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Jugendstil (Art Nouveau). Ephraim Lilien, "The Covenant of Abraham," Die Bucher der Bible, 1908

Expressionism 1. Die Brücke (The Bridge). Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, Girl from Kowno (Madchen aus Kowno), woodcut, 1918. Brücke Museum, Berlin

Expressionism 2. Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider). Franz Mark, The White Bull (detail from Cattle), oil, 1913

Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity). George Grosz, Café Megalomania, pen and ink, 1915. Galerie St. Etienne, New York

Dada. John Heartfield, Dada Photomontage, 1917

Social Realism. Käthe Kollwitz, The Mothers, woodcut, 1921

Surreal sculpture. Meret Oppenheim, Object (Breakfast in Fur), 1936. Museum of Modern Art, New York

Surreal collage. Max Ernst, She looked slightly like a horse, 1937

Bauhaus. Mies van der Rohe, Model for a Glass Skycreaper (Maquette Glazen Wolkenkrabber), 1922

Totalitarian propaganda. Modern art presented as DEGENERATE "ART" (Entartete "Kunst"). Catalog of Munich 1937 exhibition features on its cover a sculpture by German expressionist artist Otto Freundlich, The New Man (Der neue Mensch), 1912

Karl Schwesig, "Anyone could participate in the beatings," from the Drumstick Cellar (Schlegelkeller−Zyklus), 1935-37. A pen and ink drawing from his (now mostly lost) 48-images series. Düsseldorf Stadtmuseum

John Heartfield, And Yet It Moves, photomontage, 1943

Andreas Paul Weber, March into the Grave, lithograph, 1932

Informalism. Abstract painting by Hans Hartung

Ernst Kahl, The Fighting Dog (Der Kampfhund), on the cover of In the refrigerator light still burns (Im Kühlschrank brennt noch Licht), record, 1996

Anselm Kiefer, Margarete (Dein goldenes Haar, Margarethe), mixed media, 1981

Above-featured artworks were explored by Mariano Akerman along the series of educational lectures and workshops Shape and Meaning, Islamabad and Rawalpindi, November-December 2010

1. Looking at Pictures and Learning from Art
Islamabad College for Girls, 23 November 2010
2. The Grotesque in German Art. Its Nature, Transformations and Importance in Aesthetics
Islamabad College for Girls, 8 December 2010
3. Modern Art
Post-Graduate College for Women, Rawalpindi, 9 December 2010
4. The Bible and the Visual Arts
Khatoon-e-Fatima School, Islamabad, 10 December 2010
5. Bible-inspired Symbolism in German Art
Khatoon-e-Fatima School, Islamabad, 14 December 2010

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Visual Arts - Five Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, German Embassy Islamabad, 3.1.2011, Education & Culture

More on famous German artists:
Albrecht Dürer
Anton Raphael Mengs
Caspar David Friedrich
Max Liebermann
Franz Marc
Max Ernst
Paul Klee
Kathe Kollwitz
Hans Hartung
Anselm Kiefer

German Art Lectures

2010-12-25T23:39:00.010+05:00

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Visual Arts
Educational lectures and workshop program
Islamabad and Rawalpindi, November-December 2010

1. Looking at Pictures and Learning from Art
Islamabad College for Girls, 23 November 2010
400 students
Artworks by Albrech Dürer, Balthasar Küchler, Christoph Jamnitzer, Johann Esaias Nilson, Max Liebermann, Lesser Ury, Ludwig Meidner, Karl Schmidt-Rothluff, Franz Marc, and Max Ernst.

2. The Grotesque in German Art. Its Nature, Transformations and Importance
Islamabad College for Girls, 8 December 2010
380 students
Artworks by Conrad von Megenberg, Hartman Schedel, Albrech Dürer, Christoph Jamnitzer, Simon Cammermeir, Johann Heinrich Keller, Jeremias Waschmuth, Carl Strathmann, Max Ernst, Meret Oppenheim, Thomas Grunfeld, and Ernst Kahl.

3. Modern Art
Post-Graduate College for Women, Rawalpindi, 9 December 2010
180 students
Artworks by Philipp Otto Runge, Caspar David Friedrich, Karl Eduard Biermann, Max Liebermann, Lesser Ury, Max Laueger, Ephraim Lilien, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Ludwig Meidner, Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, Max Beckmann, Franz Marc, Otto Dix, George Grosz, Kurt Schwitters, Meret Oppenheim, Max Ernst, Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Karl Schwesig, John Heartfield [Helmut Herzfeld], Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Hartung, and Anselm Kiefer.

4. The Bible and the Visual Arts
Khatoon-e-Fatima School, Islamabad, 10 December 2010
152 students
Students were introduced to a meaningful relation between archaeological evidence and Gerrman imagery inspired by the Bible. All biblical themes were explored via German artworks, among which The Creation, Adam and Eve, The Tower of Babel, Noah's Ark, Abraham contemplating the Stars, Moses and the Children of Israel crossing the Red Sea, The God Prophet, The Annuciation to Mary, The Visitation, The Virgin Mary and Baby Emmanuel, The Three Kings, Mother and Child, The Rose Garden, Young Jesus teaching in the Temple, and Jerusalem as City of Light.

5. Bible-inspired Symbolism in German Art
Khatoon-e-Fatima School, Islamabad, 14 December 2010
160 students
Students were introduced to a meaningful relation between archaeological evidence and Gerrman imagery inspired by the Bible. All biblical themes were explored via German artworks, among which The Creation, The Tower of Babel, Noah's Ark, Abraham contemplating the Stars, Moses and the Children of Israel crossing the Red Sea, The God Prophet, The Annuciation to Mary, The Visitation, The Virgin Mary and Baby Emmanuel, The Three Kings, Mother and Child, The Rose Garden, Young Jesus teaching in the Temple, and Jerusalem as City of Light.

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Visual Arts - Five Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, German Embassy Islamabad, 3.1.2011, Education & Culture

Mariano Akerman • Art, 1987-2005

2010-12-23T15:42:00.016+05:00

1 • Suite Argentina • Argentinean Suite
Watercolors, Buenos Aires, 1987-1990

Exh. Universidad de Belgrano, Buenos Aires, 1988; Bank of Boston Cultural Foundation, Buenos Aires, 1989; Centro Cultural San Martín, Buenos Aires, 1990; Negev Artists' Pavilion, Beersheba, 1991; Rubin Cultural Center, Arad, 1991; Galería Saint Margaret, Buenos Aires, 1992-95; Alliance Total Gallery (Alliance Française de Manille), Manila, November 2005; Royal Residence of Belgium, Islamabad, 2010

Mariano Akerman was born a painter. In a world of constant exploration, his spiritual curiosity produces true symbols of life. —Bernardo Graiver

If we search a formal structure, this is evident. There's also a strong subject matter; his work carries an interesting, vital message. Here, the simple does not exclude the profound. The theoretic basis of this artist can be found in his education as an architect, the rest are personal recollections that will permeate his artwork. —Monique Sasegur

Powerful will in the creation of form, his dream-inspired enigmas demand an active participation of the spectator. And this is worthwhile—it is beauty itself, unfolding in an exuberant flowering. —Renato Olivieri

He projects his inspiration in select images, giving to his work the mysterious charm of those things seldom seen by the human eye. —Zulema Vaini

The mobile layout of his painting recalls Miró, [... yet] the nature of the work is from the Americas, a fact confirmed by [the depiction of] dreamlike figures and settings. —Teresita Pociello

He is interested in the problem of the limit. In his works, he explores the relation continent-content. —Alicia Oliberos

In his work, there is a precise and delicate line; the fresh way in which he handles watercolor produces colorful results. / As he depicts forms and details, his enormous inner richness is expressed in terms of joy. In this way, his personages […] dream and grow up under skies specially created to convey the better world he desires. In a patient and silent distillation, he adopts a heroic attitude, innovating in the contemporary visual arts. —Bettina Sandrini

His works can be defined as a mixture of abstract and figurative techniques, complex and with a rich symbolism. —JN, The Buenos Aires Herald

2 • Here, There, Everywhere, small format works, 1991-2002

Small format works made in Buenos Aires, Jerusalem, London, Brussels, and Manila. Exh. The Rubin Cultural Center, Arad, 1991; The National Museum of the Philippines, Manila, 2005; Alliance Total Gallery (Alliance Française de Manille), Manila, 2005; Royal Residence of Belgium, Islamabad, 2010

He possesses excellent intellectual virtues and a remarkable aesthetic sensitivity. […] His self-critical sense leads him to a constant effort to achieve his goals. —Oscar Maisonave

With secure hand and controlled drawing, a prolific imagination finds expression in his work. His knowledge is intermingled with a profound introspection and an almost obsessive desire to transcend the formal in order to convey profound meanings. —Jorgelina Orfila

His pictorial work might be described; it could never be defined. The style is intricate, precise, richly symbolic and wholly personal. […] His strikingly colored and textured paintings suggest the fantastic, but on closer inspection their bizarre shapes and colors reveal a concern with real-world events and experiences. […]. His own development as a painter has been a matter of intensification, of refinement of technique rather than of dramatic stylistic change. —Susan Mahler

I am impressed with his sensitivity to historical artistic and cultural material. This reflects his intellectual training and knowledge of art history. This sensitivity is beyond the norm for members of the design professions, and reflects a more theoretical approach to art. [Another …] impressive trait […] is his ability to empathize with diverse cultural traditions and societies. —Chanan Mazal

3 • Les Constellations Intérieures • Inner Constellations
Watercolors and mixed media, Manila, 2004-2005

Exh. The National Museum of the Philippines, Manila, 2005; Alliance Total Gallery (Alliance Française de Manille), Manila, 2005, with Introductory text by Jean-Paul Girault; Residence of Belgium, Islamabad, 2010

A notable researcher. —Libertad Vigo

I really like the inner constellations. They are like paths, aren’t they? —Andrea Gobbi

Akerman’s work speaks for inner vision; it is almost an exploration to the painter’s soul. Some of his works recall the type of the textures one can perceive with the help of a microscope. —Martin Yaya

Only a person so creative and with so much depth and inner beauty can show his interior with so much clarity and purity. I am delighted to lose myself in the inner constellations, thinking I am a tiny atom in that wonderful universe called Akermariano. —Adriana Morabito

• Mariano Akerman at WOOLOO, 2005-11

• Akermania Digitalis

Mariano Akerman: The German Art Lectures

2010-12-21T09:07:00.032+05:00

The German Contribution to the Visual Arts
Five educational lectures by Mariano Akerman

Dr. Thomas Ditt, German Embassy, Pakistan. Shape and Meaning is the title of a series of lectures given by the well-known art historian Mariano Akerman to 1,500 students in Islamabad and Rawalpindi.

The German contribution to the visual arts is the theme explored in this educational cycle where each lecture is different from the previous one. One of the conferences is devoted to the evolution of German art throughout the ages, others present German imagery inspired by the Bible. There are also lectures on modern art and even those which introduce the audience to the persistence of the Grotesque in German art.

The lectures have the support of the German Embassy in Islamabad. They are free of charge and are given in English, being simultaneuously translated into the Urdu language.

German Art - Its Peculiarities and Transformations. A series of lectures by Mariano Akerman
The contribution of German artists and their colleagues working in Germany encompasses the development of the print as an artistic means in its own right (Albrecht Dürer), outstanding formulations concerning the Grotesque (aesthetical category), the subjective approach of Romanticism, fusing the visible with the spiritual (Caspar David Friedrich), incursions in Impressionism (Max Liebermann) and Jugendstil (Max Laeuger and Ephraim Moses Lilien), the conjunction of Primitivism and the Soul (Ernst Ludwig Kirchner and Karl Schmidt-Rotluff), the simplification of the image leading to abstraction in 20th century art (Franz Marc and Wassily Kandinsky), sharp criticism of the bourgeoisie and the aftermath of WWI (Otto Dix and Georg Grosz), the exploration of the absurd and the apparently irrational nature of dreams (Kurt Schwitters, Max Ernst, Meret Oppenheim), and a logical amalgamation of the arts and crafts to supply normative archetypes to the industry as developed in the Bauhaus (Walter Gropius and Mies van der Rohe).
Problematic is the effect of totalitarianism on German Art, while luminous are the contributions of a number of German independent artists during WWII (Kollwitz, Heartfield, Weber) and other post-war painters such as and Anselm Kiefer.

Along the conferences, Mariano Akerman explores these and several other aspects of modern art while considering the historical context of a select group of German masterpieces. As a whole, Akerman’s collection of images underlines how diverse and meaningful German Art is.

Mariano Akerman - Artist and Historian

Born in Buenos Aires, Akerman studied at the School of Architecture of Universidad de Belgrano (Argentina), completing his education with a prized graduation project on the limits and space in modern architecture (1987).
Abroad from 1991, he received a full British Council Grant and researched the visual imagery of Francis Bacon (1995) and the architectural projects of Louis I. Kahn (1997). A professional art historian (Suma cum Laude, 1999), he contributes regularly to Knol and the Encyclopédie Larousse since 2009.
In Asia, Akerman developed the educational series of lectures From Van Eyck to Magritte (2005), Arte Argentino (2006), In the Spirit of Linnaeus (2007), Raisons d’être—Art, Freedom and Modernity (2008-10), and German Art (2010; review by Ishrat Hyatt).
Specializing in visual communication, architect and art historian Mariano Akerman is an experienced educator. He gives lectures at renowned institutions such as Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Argentina, the National Museum of the Philippines and the National College of Arts in Lahore. Only in Pakistan, he has given more than twenty lectures ad honorem (Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Lahore and Karachi, 2008-10).
An artist himself, Akerman exhibits his paintings and collages since 1979 onwards. His pictures are featured in important collections, including the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris and the Swedish Statenkonstråd. Mariano Akerman has received more than twelve major international prizes.

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Arts, brochure, Pakistan, November-December 2010

1. Looking at Pictures and Learning from Art

2. The Grotesque in German Art: Its Nature, Transformations and Importance in Aesthetics

3. Modern Art from Germany

4. Bible-inspired Images from Germany

5. Bible-inspired Symbolism in German Art

Andreas Dauth, German Art: Its Peculiarties and Transformations - A Series of Lectures by Mariano Akerman, Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany, Islamabad, 2010.

German art: four extraordinary images

Johann Georg Hertel (after Jeremias Wachsmuth), Winter, Rococo Music, Fancy Dress Ball, etching, 1750-60

Moses crossing the Red Sea, from the Luther Bible, c. 1530

Hartmann Schedel, Blemmyae from Liber chronicarum, woodcut, 1493

Last Judgement Tympanum: The Damned, Bamberg cathedral, relief, 13th century.

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Visual Arts - Five Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, German Embassy Islamabad, 3.1.2011, Education & Culture

Akerman y Ciclo Educativo sobre el Arte Alemán

2010-12-20T10:49:00.042+05:00

Dr. Thomas Ditt, Embajada de Alemana, Pakistán. Shape and Meaning (Forma y Significado) es el título de un ciclo de conferencias educativas llevadas a cabo por el ya célebre historiador del arte Mariano Akerman para un total de 1.500 alumnos y estudiantes de Islamabad y Rawalpindi.

La contribución alemana a las artes visuales es el tema de esta serie donde cada conferencia tiene su propia personalidad. Una de ellas trata el desarrollo del arte alemán en el curso de la historia, mientras que otras muestran cómo buena parte del arte en Alemania fue inspirado por los textos bíblicos. La serie también incluye conferencias sobre arte contemporáneo moderno y la persistencia de lo Grotesco en el arte alemán.

El ciclo educativo cuenta con los auspicios de la Embajada de Alemania en Islamabad. Las conferencias son con entrada libre y gratuita, presentadas en inglés y con traducción simultánea al urdu.

Arte alemán - sus peculiaridades y transformaciones. Una serie de conferencias a cargo de Mariano Akerman
La contribución de los artistas alemanes y sus colegas trabajando en Alemania comprende la impresión como medio de expresión artística (Alberto Durero), incursiones en el campo de lo Grotesco (categoría estética), el enfoque subjetivo del Romanticismo (que implica un diálogo entre lo palpable y lo espiritual, Caspar David Friedrich), el desarrollo del Impresionismo (Max Liebermann) y el Jugendstil (Modernismo, representado por Lauger y Lilien), el interés por el Primitivismo (Ernst Ludwig Kirchner y Karl Schmidt-Rotluff), la simplificación de la forma (que conduce a la abstracción, Franz Marc y Wassily Kandinsky), la crítica de la burguesía como secuela de la Primera Guerra Mundial (George Grosz y Otto Dix), la exploración del absurdo y la aparente irracionalidad de los sueños (Kurt Schwitters, Max Ernst, Meret Oppenheim), y una fusión consistente del arte y la artesanía con el fin de producir modelos normativos a ser aplicados por industria (Bauhaus, Walter Gropius y Mies van der Rohe).
Polémico resulta el impacto del totalitarismo en el arte alemán; no obstante, hay brillantes aportes de artistas alemanes que se oponen al régimen dictatorial a lo largo de toda la Segunda Guerra Mundial (Kathe Kollwitz, Heartfield, Andreas Paul Weber). Significativo es el papel de pintores de posguerra tales como Hans Hartung) y Anselm Kiefer.

En sus conferencias, Mariano Akerman investiga estos y otros aspectos del arte alemán, considerando el contexto histórico de selectas obras plásticas. En su conjunto, su colección de obras subraya la gran diversidad y contenido del arte alemán.

Mariano Akerman - Artista e Historiador

Nacido en Buenos Aires en 1963, Mariano Akerman lleva a cabo sus estudios en la Facultad de Arquitectura y Urbanismo de la Universidad de Belgrano (Argentina), y los completa con un proyecto de graduacion premiado sobre la Naturaleza de los limites y el espacio en la arquitectura moderna (1987). Desde 1991 en el exterior investiga la obra pictórica de Francis Bacon y los proyectos arquitectónicos de Louis I. Kahn.
En Asia concibe y desarrolla las series de conferencias educativas In the Spirit of Linnaeus (Al modo de Lineo, 2007), Discovering Belgian Art y Raisons d’être: Art, Freedom and Modernity (Descubriendo el Arte Belga y Razones de Ser: Arte, Libertad y Modernidad, 2008-10), German Art y Shape and Content (Arte Aleman y Forma y Significado, 2010).
Especializado en comunicacion visual, Akerman es un educador con experiencia. Da conferencias sobre arte moderno en el Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes en Buenos Aires, el National Museum of the Philippines (Museo Nacional de Filipinas) en Manila, la University of Modern Languages (Universidad de Lenguas Modernas) en Islamabad y el National College of Arts (Escuela Nacional Superior de Bellas Artes) en Lahore.
Artista plástico por derecho propio, Mariano Akerman exhibe sus pinturas, dibujos y collages desde 1979. Ha recibido doce premios internacionales y sus obras figuran en importantes colecciones, incluyendo el Musée National d’Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, en Paris y el Statenkonstråd en Estocolmo (Consejo Nacional de Arte Sueco).

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Arts, (Forma y significado: la contribución alemana a las artes visuales), programa, Pakistán, Noviembre-Diciembre 2010

1. Mirando cuadros y aprendiendo del arte alemán

2. Lo Grotesco en el arte alemán

3. Arte moderno de Alemania

4. Imagenería alemana inspirada por la Biblia

5. Symbolismo inspirado por la Biblia en el arte alemán

Andreas Dauth, Mariano Akerman: Lesungen zur Deutschen Kunst, Deutschen Botschaft Islamabad, 2010.

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Visual Arts - Five Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, (Forma y Significado: La contribución alemana a las artes visuales - Cinco conferencias educativas por Mariano Akerman), Embajada de Alemania en Islamabad, 3.1.2011

Form und Bedeutung

2010-12-17T18:47:00.026+05:00

Shape and Meaning (Form und Bedeutung) ist der Titel einer Vortragsreihe, die der bekannte Kunsthistoriker Mariano Akerman in Islamabad und Rawalpindi für insgesamt 1.500 pakistanische Schüler und Studenten durchgeführt hat.

Der deutsche Beitrag zu den Bildenden Künsten ist das Thema dieser Reihe, wobei jeder Vorlesung ihren eigenen Charakter hat: Bei einer Veranstaltung wurde die Entwicklung der deutschen Kunst im Laufe der Geschichte dargestellt, andere Vorlesungen zeigten dem Publikum, wie sehr die Kunst in Deutschland von der Heiligen Schrift beeinflusst wurde. Außerdem gab es Vorlesungen zu Moderner Kunst und eine befasste sich mit grotesken Elementen der deutschen Kunst.

Die Reihe wird unterstützt von der Deutschen Botschaft in Islamabad. Eintrittsgelder werden nicht erhoben. Die Vorlesungen werden in englischer Sprache gehalten und teilweise auf Urdu simultan übersetzt.

Deutsche Kunst - ihre Wandlungen und ihre Besonderheiten. Eine Vorlesungsreihe von Mariano Akerman
Der Beitrag deutscher Künstler und ihrer Kollegen, die in Deutschland gearbeitet haben, umspannt den Druck als künstlerisches Ausdrucksmittel (Albrecht Dürer), herausragende Abfassungen über das Groteske (als ästhetische Kategorie), der subjektive Ansatz der Romantik, der das Sichtbare und das Spirituelle miteinbezieht (Caspar David Friedrich), Einfälle des Impressionismus (Max Liebermann) und der "Art Nouveau" (Läuger und Ephraim Lilien), die Verknüpfung des Primitivismus mit der Seele (Ernst Ludwig Kirchner und Karl Schmidt-Rotluff), die Simplifizierung des Bildes, die zur Abstraktion der Kunst des 20-ten Jahrhunderts führte (Franz Marc und Wassily Kandinsky), scharfe Kritik an der Bourgeoisie und an den Nachwirkungen des 1. Weltkrieges (Georg Grosz und Otto Dix), die Erkundung des Absurden und dem offensichtlich irrationalen Wesen der Träume (Kurt Schwitters, Max Ernst, Meret Oppenheim) und eine konsequente Verschmelzung der Kunst und des Kunsthandwerkes, um der Industrie normative Modelle zu liefern, wie sie im Bauhaus-Stil entwickelt wurden (Walter Gropius und Mies van der Rohe).
Umstritten ist der Einfluss des Totalitarismus auf die deutsche Kunst. Trotzdem gibt es brilliante Beiträge deutscher Künstler während des 2. Weltkrieges und der Nachkriegszeit, wie etwa Hans Hartung und Anselm Kiefer.
Mariano Akerman geht diesen Aspekten in seinen Vorlesungen nach, indem er den historischen Kontekt ausgewählter Meisterwerke darstellt. Insgesamt ist es das Ziel Akermans aufzuzeigen, wie vielseitig und bedeutsam deutsche Kunst ist.

Mariano Akerman - Maler und Kunsthistoriker

In Buenos Aires 1963 geboren, studierte Mariano Akerman an der "School of Architecture of Universidad de Belgrano" (Argentinien). Für seine Abschlussarbeit zum Thema "Limits and Space in Modern Architecture" (1987) wurde Akerman ausgezeichnet. Seit 1991 lebt er im Ausland und erforschte die Gemälde von Francis Bacon und die Architekturprojekte von Louis Kahn.
Bei seinen Aufenthalten in Asien entwickelte Akerman die Konferenzreihen "In the Spirit of Linnaeus" (2007), "Discovering Belgian Art and Raisons d’être: Art, Freedom and Modernity" (2008-10), "German Art" und "Shape and Content" (2010).
Akerman hat sich auf visuelle Kommunikation spezialisiert und ist ein erfahrener Pädagoge. Er hielt Vorlesungen über moderne Kunst bei renommierten Institutionen wie dem "Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes" in Buenos Aires, dem "National Museum of the Philippines" in Manila, der "University of Modern Languages" in Islamabad und dem "National College of Arts and Beaconhouse University" in Lahore.
Mariano Akerman ist selbst praktizierender Maler und stellt seine Bilder, Zeichnungen und Kollagen seit 1979 aus. Er wurde mit mindestens 12 internationalen Kunstpreisen ausgezeichnet und seine Werke sind u.a. im "Musée National d’Art Moderne", "Centre Georges Pompidou", in Paris, und beim "Statenkonstråd" (National Public Art Council of Sweden) in Stockholm ausgestellt.

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Arts, Pakistan 2010

1. Looking at Pictures and Learning from Art
Islamabad College for Girls

2. The Grotesque in German Art. Its Nature, Transformations and Importance
Islamabad College for Girls

3. Modern Art
Post-Graduate College for Women, Rawalpindi

4. The Bible and the Visual Arts
Khatoon-e-Fatima School, Islamabad

5. Bible-inspired Symbolism in German Art
Khatoon-e-Fatima School, Islamabad

Deutsche Kunst - Form und Bedeutung. Eine Vorlesungsreihe von Mariano Akerman, Botschaft der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Islamabad, 3.1.2011, Kulturelle Beziehungen (Andreas Dauth).

Bible-inspired Symbolism in German Art

2010-12-14T14:44:00.051+05:00

The fifth art-appreciation lecture from the educational Shape and Meaning, devoted to the German contribution to the visual arts, was given today at the Khatoon-e-Fatima School in Islamabad.

Albrecht Dürer, Study for St Jerome, 1521

The meeting was attended by 148 students and 12 teachers, being the lecture given in English with a simultaneous translation into the Urdu language.

Sister Rukhsana opened the event with prays for everyone in Pakistan. Afterwards Mariano Akerman referred to some German masterpieces and pointed out their biblical sources of inspiraton. He also explained the context in which they were executed and the symbolism they entail.

Mr. Akerman also drew a chronological line on which he included important dates concerning the Holy Scriptures and theis main protagonists.

Ephraim Lilien, "The Covenant of Abraham," Die Bucher der Bible, 1908

Moses leads the Children of Israel through the Red Sea, from The Luther Bible, Germany, c. 1530

Master Heinrich of Constance, The Visitation, c. 1310-20. Polychrome walnut, with gilding and rock crystal cabechons. German sculpture, from Katharienenthal Abbey, Switzerland. Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY

Stephen Lochner, The Madonna in the Rose Bower (Maria am Rosenhag), 1448. Wallraf-Richartz Museum, Cologne

Significantly, the students also learnt about the Biblical Manuscripts from Qumran (1st century C.E.) and the ivory Pomegranate from King Solomon's Temple (8th century B.C.E. or perhaps conceived even earlier), found at archaeological excavations that once took place in Jerusalem.

Biblical themes were explored via German artworks featuring The Creation, Adam and Eve, The Tower of Babel, Noah's Ark, Abraham contemplating the Stars, Moses and the Children of Israel crossing the Red Sea, The God Prophet, The Annuciation to Mary, The Visitation, The Virgin Mary and Baby Emmanuel, The Three Kings, Mother and Child, The Rose Garden, Young Jesus teaching in the Temple, and Jerusalem as City of Light.

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Arts, Pakistan 2010

Event brochure

Sister Rukhsana Lucas and Sister Stella Maria Younas: "We are very grateful to Mr. Mariano Akerman for being with us in our school and having a session on Bible stories that have been incorporated in the visual arts of Germany. He is a very competent lecturer and his way to talking to the students is very friendly. God bless him."

Mariano Akerman (Argentinean), City of the Lord and Peace, c. 1992-5. For Biblical Images, see Tali Education and ABC Gallery

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Visual Arts - Five Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, German Embassy Islamabad, 3.1.2011, Education & Culture

Deutsche Kunst - Form und Bedeutung. Eine Vorlesungsreihe von Mariano Akerman, Botschaft der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Islamabad, 3.1.2011, Kulturelle Beziehungen (Andreas Dauth).

• Selected masterpieces at the German Art Gallery

Arts Seminar: Artwork and Source of Inspiration

2010-12-11T19:23:00.008+05:00

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Today the students from the Seminaire des Arts had a meeting during which they explored German art and its sources of inspiration.

Mariano Akerman explored with them German imagery from Renaissance to Modern Times. Special attention was devoted to the work of Albrecht Dürer, Ephraim Lilien and Anselm Kiefer.

The discussion included literary sources of inspiration including passages from the Holy Scripture and German literature.

Bible-inspired Images from Germany

2010-12-10T15:01:00.060+05:00

The fourth art-appreciation lecture from the educational Shape and Meaning, devoted to the German contribution to the visual arts, took place today at the Khatoon-e-Fatima School in Islamabad.

Albrecht Dürer, Study for St Jerome, 1521

The meeting was attended by 143 students and 9 teachers, being the lecture given in English and simultaneously translated into the Urdu language.

Sister Stella opened the event with a pray for everyone in Pakistan. Afterwards Thomas Ditt from the German embassy said some words to the students.

The lecture included a good number of images, most of which were German artworks inspired by the Holy Scriptures. All of them were described and explained in detail by Mariano Akerman.

Significantly, the students also learnt about the Biblical Manuscripts from Qumran (1st century C.E.) and the ivory Pomegranate from King Solomon's Temple (8th century B.C.E.) or perhaps conceived even earlier, yet found at archaeological excavations that once took place in Jerusalem.

Biblical themes were explored via German artworks featuring The Creation, Adam and Eve, The Tower of Babel, Noah's Ark, Abraham contemplating the Stars, Moses and the Children of Israel crossing the Red Sea, The God Prophet, The Annuciation to Mary, The Visitation, The Virgin Mary and Baby Emmanuel, The Three Kings, Mother and Child, The Rose Garden, Young Jesus teaching in the Temple, Jerusalem as City of Light.

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Arts, Pakistan 2010

Event brochure

Sister Rukhsana Lucas and Sister Stella Maria Younas: "We are very grateful to Mr. Mariano Akerman for being with us in our school and having a session on Bible stories that have been incorporated in the visual arts of Germany. He is a very competent lecturer and his way to talking to the students is very friendly. God bless him."

Mariano Akerman (Argentinean), City of the Lord and Peace, c. 1992-5. For Biblical Images, see Tali Education and ABC Gallery

Modern Art from Germany

2010-12-09T15:36:00.039+05:00

A third lecture from the educational cycle Shape and Meaning, The German Contribution to the Visual Arts was delivered at the Post-Graduate Government College of Women in Rawalpindi today.
The lecture took place after a warm welcoming that included several bunches of flowers. Prof. Mamoona from the Fine Arts Department and Dr. Ditt from the German embassy opened the event with important remarks about the nature and importance of the present series of conferences that aims to refresh the local area by broadening the public's awareness of art as a means of education.

Event brochure

Architect and historian Mariano Akerman introduced the audience to German Modern Art. He talked about similiarities and differences between traditional art and modern art. Talking to a group of 180 students and teachers he dealt with the visual imagery of Renaissance artist Albrecht Dürer to explore afterwards the idea of freedom in the work of more than twenty German Modern Artists such as Philipp Otto Runge, Caspar David Friedrich, Karl Eduard Biermann, Max Liebermann, Lesser Ury, Max Laueger, Ephraim Moses Lilien, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Ludwig Meidner, Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, Max Beckmann, Franz Marc, Otto Dix, George Grosz, Kurt Schwitters, Meret Oppenheim, Max Ernst, Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Karl Schwesig, John Heartfield [Helmut Herzfeld], Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Hartung, and Anselm Kiefer.

Karl Edouard Biermann, Borsig Engineering Work in Berlin (Borsig's Maschinenbau-Anstalt zu Berlin), oil, 1847. Stadtmuseum Berlin

The subject matter of the lecture is not particularly easy to communicate but most of the participants seem to have enjoyed the lecture. Some unexpected lack of electricity did not prevent Akerman to keep on talking about the difficulties of being an artist in Germany before, during and after the two world wars.

John Heartfield, And Yet It Moves, photomontage, 1943

Käthe Kollwitz, Seed corn must not be ground, 1942

Andreas Paul Weber, March into the Grave, 1932

As a matter of fact the sudden lack of electricity became then a wonderful opportunity to explore four quotations of words writen respectively by Goethe, Oppenheim, Fenton, and Paul Celan, and which are included in the brochures received by all participants:

I belong to those who from darkness to light aspire. Goethe.[1]

Nobody will give you freedom. You have to take it. Meret Oppenheim.[2]

It is not what they built. It is what they knocked down.
It is not the houses. It is the space between the houses.
It is not the streets that exist. It is the streets that no longer exist. [...] It is not what you have forgotten, what you must forget.
What you must go on forgetting all your life.
[...] The workers are dismantling the houses of the dead. [...]
It is not what he wants to know.
It is what he wants not to know.
It is not what they say.
It is what they do not say.
James Fenton, A German Requiem, 1981.[3]

Black milk of dawn we drink it at sunset we drink it at noon and in the morning we drink it at night / we drink and we drink it [...] / Your golden hair Margarete / Your ashen hair Shulamith.
Paul Celan, Todesfuge (Death Fugue), 1947-48.[4]

Captions to images: 1. Philipp Otto Runge, Self-Portrait, 1810; 2. Franz Marc, Deer in Flower Garden, oil, 1913; 3. Abstract painting by Hans Hartung; 4. Anselm Kiefer, Margarete (Dein goldenes Haar, Margarethe), mixed media, 1981.

Mariano Akerman, Black Milk, watercolor, 2001-3

Remarks by Prof. Aalia Sohail Khan: "I congratulate you for delivering a lecture on a very serious theme in a very lively and interesting manner. The same topic could have been approached in many other ways, but the way you synthesised the subject matter with earnestness and message made all the difference. History is not just a record of events, and your lecture brought out the determining, shaping power of events on painting which is not just dabbing in colour. You speak with conviction and earnestness; this is the vital element in your personality as a speaker, because the energy is transferred and holds the attention of the listeners. To cover so much in so little time is another remarkable feat. The use of slides illustrated the theme and made ideas more clear."

Akerman, Gold and Ashes, ink and watercolor, 2001

The words of Naima Muzaffar: "The lecture was highly educative. It revealed artistic sensitivity from part of the lecturer, who helped us to understand how German art evolved into what it is today. The presentation made me feel empathy towards the pain of the German nation as it suffered in the hands of a tyrant. Concepts were explained clearly. As he delivered the lecture, Mr. Akerman's style was above all moving."

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Visual Arts - Five Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, German Embassy Islamabad, 3.1.2011, Education & Culture

Deutsche Kunst - Form und Bedeutung. Eine Vorlesungsreihe von Mariano Akerman, Botschaft der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Islamabad, 3.1.2011, Kulturelle Beziehungen (Andreas Dauth).

Selected masterpieces at the German Art Gallery

The Grotesque in German Art: Its Nature, Transformations and Importance in Aesthetics

2010-12-08T19:09:00.039+05:00

An educational lecture, "The Grotesque in German Art" is part of Shape and Meaning, a program of educational lectures on the German contribution to the visual arts. Aiming to bridge cultures and people, this extraordinary program counts with the kind support of the German Embassy in Islamabad.

Today a new lecture was given at the Islamabad College for Girls, where lecturer Mariano Akerman met 380 Pakistani students.

Conceived and organized by Art Historian Mariano Akerman in collaboration with the cultural attache of the German embassy, Thomas Ditt, the event was verbally described by a student as "awesome."

Prof. Rabya Qadir once again gathered a great number of students and teachers from her College. They followed attentively the lecture to later ask no less than seven questions which not only were pertinent to the topic discussed but also brilliant in their nature, this being so mostly due to their engagement along the lecture and remarkable curiosity at the time of confronting the Grotesque face to face.

Mariano Akerman explored and analized two dozens of Grotesque artworks, including those important German masters such as Conrad von Megenberg, Hartman Schedel, Albrech Dürer, Christoph Jamnitzer, Simon Cammermeir, Johann Heinrich Keller, Jeremias Waschmuth, Carl Strathmann, Max Ernst, Meret Oppenheim, Thomas Grunfeld, and Ernst Kahl.

Students and teachers were interested in the interplay reality and grotesqueness. They wanted to know the function and raison d'être of the grotesque in art and whether it can be considered visionary art. They asked whether the grotesque can be seen as some sort of irony.

The event was no doubt much appreciated and even prized by the public. Bunches of flowers and numerous writen comments were handled to Ditt and the lecturer. It was a fine day in Islamabad and shining wasn't just the sun here, for today we actually had several. The day was wonderful. Simply put, unforgettable.

Event brochure

The Grotesque in German Art - Highlights

Bamberg cathedral, Princes' Portal, tympanum: portion of the Last Judgement showing the Damed (being taken to hell by a devil), 1235

Green-Man Keystone at Bamberg cathedral

Hartmann Schedel, The Monstrous Races: "Blemmyae," from Liber chronicarum (Die Schedelsche Weltchronik, Das Buch der Croniken und Geschichten von Hartmann Schedel), woodcut, 1493. The Blemmyae were believed to live somewhere between Africa and India (Pliny, Natural History, 57-58).

Michael Wolgemut, "Dance of Death" (Totentanz), from Hartman Schedel's Liber chronicarum, woodcut, 1493

Hans Holbein the Younger, The Rich Man, woodcut, detail, 1523-26

Christoph Jamnitzer, Neuw Grotteßken Buch (New Book of Grotesques), Nuremberg 1610

Friedrich Unteutsch, Gristly Motif (Knorpelwerk), engraving, 1650

Johann Heinrich Keller, Cartilaginous Grotesque (Knorpelgrotesk), engraving, 1680

Johann Georg Hertel (after Jeremias Wachsmuth), Winter, Rococo Music, Fancy Dress Ball, etching, 1750-60

Death and Soap Bubbles, stucco relief, 18th century. Michelsberg Cloister, Bamberg

Heinrich Hoffmann, Slovenly Peter (Der Struwwelpeter), Baden, 1858.

Meret Oppenheim, Object (Breakfast in Fur), 1936

Max Ernst, She looked a little bit like a horse, collage, 1937

And silence is made, ad from a beer company, c. 1996

Ernst Kahl, The Fighting Dog (Der Kampfhund), on the cover of In the refrigerator light still burns (Im Kühlschrank brennt noch Licht), record, 1996. Kahl, a musician, is also the author of Bestiarium Perversum (1985). About him artist, see Matthias Wagner, "Komik ist Notwehr" (Comedy is Self-defense), Kulturnews, May 1997.

• Remarks by Prof. Sabah Faisal: "Attending Mr. Akerman's lectures was very interesting not only for their content but also for the passion he puts in them to explain the subject matter to the audience--serious facts interspersed with some personal opinion and a touch of humour, making an appealing mix that keeps the audience's attention riveted.
His first lecture gave us a view of how to look at a picture and learn from it, while the second one was enlightening. Introducing the students to grotesque of art helps in broadening their vision and making them understand different facets of life. Today's lecture on Grotesqueness at ICG F-6/2 gave us an in depth perception of German art. It was a mind opening experience, captivating and mesmerized us from start till end. It gave us food for thought about the harsh realities of life in contrast to fairy tales. We really are mesmerized by the swiftness and flow of the German lectures given by Mariano Akerman and are looking forward to more in the series. As the lecturer himself made it clear today, the grotesque invites a search for meaning, pushing us to consider alternative possibilities. Grotesque art is thought-enlarging art; it has an immense capacity to open the valves of feeling."

Double-Edged, clip on grotesqueness in the visual arts, 2008. Featured: French Medieval hybrid; Giuseppe Arcimboldo; Italian Renaissance grotteschi (sogni dei pittori); Francis Bacon; Quentin Metsys; Keller; Quino; Roman Domus Aurea; Paul-Andreas Weber.

DOUBLE-EDGED 1. Having two edges that can be used; having two cutting edges. 2 Having a dual purpose; having two meanings; effective or capable of being interpreted in two ways. Double-edged sword - literally, a sword which cuts on either side; metaphorically, an argument which makes both for and against the person employing it, or which has a double meaning.

Shape and Meaning: The German Contribution to the Visual Arts - Five Educational Lectures by Mariano Akerman, German Embassy Islamabad, 3.1.2011, Education & Culture

Deutsche Kunst - Form und Bedeutung. Eine Vorlesungsreihe von Mariano Akerman, Botschaft der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Islamabad, 3.1.2011, Kulturelle Beziehungen (Andreas Dauth).

Selected masterpieces at the German Art Gallery

Looking at Pictures and Learning from Art

2010-11-23T20:45:00.037+05:00

Dürer, Self-Portrait, oil, 1498

The much expected lecture "Looking at Pictures and Learning from Art" was given today at the Islamabad College for Girls, where lecturer Mariano Akerman met the unprecedented number of 400 Pakistani students.

The event took place at the Islamabad College for Girls and was kindly organized by Prof. Rabya Qadir, who gathered an incredible number of students and teachers from her Institution and from four other neighbor educational centers among which the Imperial International School F10/3, the Federal Government School for Girls G6/1-3; the Federal Government Junior Girls Model School G6/3; and the Federal Goverment Boys Secondary School No.8 F6/2.

"Looking at Pictures and Learning from Art" is part of Shape and Meaning, a program of educational lectures on the German contribution to the visual arts. Aiming to bridge cultures and people, the program counts with the generous support of the German Embassy in Islamabad.

Mariano Akerman explored and discussed artworks and masterpieces by forerunners of German imagery, including Albrech Dürer, Balthasar Küchler, Christoph Jamnitzer, Johann Esaias Nilson, Max Liebermann, Lesser Ury, Ludwig Meidner, Karl Schmidt-Rothluff, Franz Marc, and Max Ernst.

Dürer, The Large Turf, watercolor, 1503

Johann Georg Hertel (after Jeremias Wachsmuth), Winter, Rococo Music, Fancy Dress Ball, etching, 1750-60

Max Liebermann, Country Tavern at Brannenburg, oil, 1893

Franz Marc, Deer in Flower Garden, oil, 1913

Students were interested in topics such as the development of the artist as an individual in the 16th century, the various trends dealing with the imagination in the 17th century, the 18th-century notion of artificiality, and the main differences between Impressionism and Expressionism in German Art.

In a memorable gesture, tokens of friendship were given to the representative of the German Embassy and to the lecturer. The meeting was closed with a cup of local tea and a general desire of meeting once again soon.

Dürer, A Young Hare, 1502

Event brochure, November 2010

Pensamientos encapsulados

2010-11-21T10:30:00.006+05:00

1. No hay belleza excelente que no posea cierta rareza en su proporción (Sir Francis Bacon).

2. Cortarán todas las flores, pero no podrán detener la primavera.

3. Realidad no es solo aquello que percibimos con los cinco sentidos: nuestro mundo interior también es parte de ella (Chagall).

4. Si no tienes un sueño... ¿cómo podría volverse realidad?

5. La imagen ficticia posee su propia verdad (Giordano Bruno).

6. Sólo con imaginación es posible sacar de la nada un mundo.

7. Los que sueñan sólo de noche son seres limitadísimos: desde el vamos ya se perdieron todo lo que es posible soñar durante el día.

8. Extraordinario no significa necesariamente útil.

9. La vida es sólo un sueño, pero, por favor, no me despiertes.

PARADOXICAL TIMES

2010-11-16T12:44:00.107+05:00

An anthology of paraphrased texts and memorable images.

Ours are no doubt paradoxical times.

Today we have bigger houses and smaller families; more conveniences, but less time.

We have more degrees, but less common sense; more knowledge, but less judgment.

We have more experts, but also more problems.

We say more, but understand less; plan more, but accomplish less.

We’ve learned to rush, but not to wait; we have higher incomes, but lower morals.

We build more computers to hold more information, to produce more copies, but have less communication. We are long on quantity, but short on quality.

We have taller buildings, but shorter tempers; wider freeways, but narrower viewpoints.

We’ve split the atom, but not our prejudice.

We have multiplied our possessions, but reduced our values. We talk too much, but love too litte.

We spend more, but have less; we buy more, but enjoy it less.

These are the times of fast foods and slow digestion; tall men and short character; steep profits and shallow relationships.

More leisure and less fun; more kinds of food, but less nutrition; fancier houses, but broken ones.

We spend too recklessly, laugh too little, drive too fast, get to angry too quickly, stay up too late, get up too tired, and smile too seldom.

We’ve been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to make a new friend.

We've learned how to make a living, but not a life.

We’ve added years to life, not life to years.

We’ve conquered outer space, but not inner space.

Life can be about enjoyment, not only about survival.

Every day, every hour, every minute... is special. Yet, you don’t know if the coming one will be your last.

The way we perceive things has an effect on our understanding. Nevertheless, visual perception cannot always be trusted.

Definition of Paradox. A paradox is a statement that contradicts itself. For example, the statement "I never tell the truth" is a paradox because if the statement is true, it must be false, and if it is false, it must be true. In everyday language, a paradox is a concept that seems absurd or contradictory, yet is true.

Proverbial paradox. The Book of Ecclesiastes is an example of proverbial literature and its statements should thus not be taken as absolutes. The nature of Ecclesiastes is paradoxical. It may be a dialogue of a man debating with himself, "torn between what he cannot help seeing and what he still cannot help believing" (Kidner, Wisdom of Proverbs, Job and Ecclesiastes, 91), or a challenge to the man of the world to reconsider his own position, encouraging him to seeking something less futile. At any rate, the book of Ecclesiastes relates to other Ancient Near East texts with similar content and methodology (eg., A Dialogue About Human Misery and Pessimistic Dialogue Between Master and Servant; The Man Who Was Tired of Life; the book of Job). In such texts, problems are discussed and resolved via dialogue. The formulations of Ecclesiastes are meant to provoke thought:

Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity. What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun? One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever. The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose.

This rethorical verse affirms the ephemeral character of humankind, against the background of the ever-standing earth. Or, likewise, the permanence of the earth is merely the foil against which the restless coming and going of human beings is outlined. The theme is monotonous repetition, and thus analogue to aimless and futile human existence.

Paradoxically, parts of the text seem to suggest that there is no value in life, yet parts of it very strongly suggest the opposite.

The resolution for Ecclesiastes' paradox is found in the very last verses and the answer to whether happiness is better than sorrow is, proverbially, that each is better than the other at various times and by various situations, because life is complex, not simple.

There is nothing more whole than a broken heart. —Mendel of Kotzk

Platypus, Vanitas vanitatum, The Eye's Mind, Crazy Optical Illusions