Jan Åman is a curator, writer, columnist and urban activist specializing in the meeting between contemporary art, urban development and social phenomena. He is based in Stockholm, Sweden.
Jan Åman
curator of the Internet pavilion at the 53rd Venice Biennial (www.padiglioneinternet.com and www.biennale.net) started by artist Miltos Manetas;
creative director of the Stockholm Exhibition 20010-2013 (www.stockholmexhibition.com) initiator (together with Mia Hägg/habiter Autrement, Maris Mesilus and Ola Andersson/A1) of New Urban Strategies, a tool for developing and exchanging solutions for urban development
creative consultant for new low cost housing and infrastructure solutions and the new TV-tower in Accra, Ghana. Jan Åman’s activities has since the late 1980’s been within three fields
curating innovative contemporary art projects curating projects leading to new urban strategies founding platforms such as magazines, art venues, forums and digital tools Contemporary art
Jan Åman has curated some pivotal contemporary art exhibitions working closely with the artist themselves to find new paths for the artists, contemporary art and the idea of an exhibition.
Some of these are:
“Interpol” (curated with Viktor Misiano), in 1996, where a group of artists from the West collaborated with artists from the former Soviet Union. The project created an intense friction between artists from the East and the West, which started a debate that would last several years to come.
“HIM” by Maurizio Cattelan, in 2001, where Cattelan for the first time presented the now legendary “HIM”, a kneeling boy with the face of Adolf Hitler (later permanently installed for the Pinault collection in Palazzi Grassi, Venice as well as the Castello di Rivoli, Turin).
“ONE DAY ONE DAY” by Carsten Höller, 2003, a “double” exhibition, where two installations were installed in one room, but only one of them displayed on day. Frieze art fair dedicated a seminar in 2008 to how the exhibition changed international curatorial practice.
“Teleport Diner” (an idea by Jan Åman curated with Anne Pasternak, Andreas Angelidakis and Miltos Manetas), in 2000, bringing a Diner in Williamsburg and 25 people to a virtual diner that was built for real in Stockholm, ending in a 48 hour gathering with 4.000 people.
“Playing the Building” by David Byrne (Stockholm 2005, New York 2008), turning an old factory building into a musical instrument only using the architectural elements of the building.
“Gravity of Light” by Doug & Mike Starn, 2004, where the artists for the first time presented the “Carbon Arch Lamp”, taking them from representing light and darkness through photography to actually produce real ligt, an intense, white light, by sending electricity between two carbon rods.
“Kira Carpelan” by Miriam Bäckström, 2007, where Bäckström invited the younger artist Kira Carpelan to take over Bäckström’s entire exhibition, but with Bäckström filming the process, creating blurred identities and an intense psychological drama.
“EAT MY FEAR”, 2004, exhibition with American film director David Lynch on the trivialization and privatization on public space.
“Pause” by photographer Jean-Pierre Khazem and architect Andreas Angelidakis, 2002, presenting architecture, live models and photography that blurred the relation between the real and the virtual.
“TELEPORT KINSHASA”, 2004, a project by Carsten Höller with a live transmission between Stockholm and Kinshasa transmitting a concert by Werra son and the Wenge Music Maison Mere, in Stockholm (curated with Daniel Daboczy).
“Bodywork”, 2005, by Liz Cohen where the exhibition space was transformed into a car workshop where a German Trabant was rebuilt into a Chevrolet El Camino in a low rider version, along with a gym and a seminar room hosting 25 seminars on gender.
“Moment Ginza”, 1997, by Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster (curated with Yves Aupetitallot), an exhibition space as the boulevard Ginza of Tokyo, at 3 PM a Sunday afternoon.
“Kontakt” by Ernst Billgren, in 1998, exhibition the shooting of several short movies and seven TV-programs.
“Walker”, 2001, an installation with a new series of paintings by Jan Håfström, which would mark a whole new direction by Sweden’s perhaps most influential artists since the mid 1960’s.
“Goatrans” (1997), “Alice Fine” (2006), “Taptim” (2008) by Fredrik Wretman, three large scale water installations by one of Sweden’s most influential installation artists.
“STEGA” by Henrik Samuelsson, presting 11 new paintings but avoiding the white cube, that was the starting point for an exciting international career.
“Future Homes”, between 1998 and 2001 Jan Åman developed on commission from the city of Malmö the project “Future Homes” where artists Maurizio Cattelan, Vanessa Beecroft, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Pablo Vargas Lugo, Bigert & Bergström and architects Farshid Moussavi, Andreas Angelidakis and François Roche visited NASA to make an experimental exhibition based in a dialogue with NASA’s scientists and astronauts who were working on putting man on the planet Mars. An exhibition that would have been a test hub for the future on Earth, if executed.
Urban/design
Jan Åman has since the mid 1990’s introduced new strategies for urban development, on how to achieve new long-term concepts for a city’s development, and also.
Through workshops turned into exhibitions, concept studies, lectures and writing he has invented new tools the normal players – politicians, property owners, real estate developers and general public – needed. Jan Åman has brought in the integrity of the activist tradition into a real dialogue and transformation in the city.
The urban projects started by Jan Åman have played a significant role during the 2000’s for the city of Stockholm. The key aspect of his practice has been to break the modernist Some of these projects are:
“Form Follows [Antything]”, 1996, (with Catharina Gabrielsson), exhibition and seminar “where urban theorists such as Beatrice Colomina, Mark Wigley and Martha Rosler, architects such as Farshid Moussavi, François Roche and Adam Carurso introduced new urban theories for a Swedish audience.
“Stockholm at Large”, 2001, a project that transformed the mental image of Stockholm’s urban needs, stating that the city needed to connect the segregated suburban area of the modernistic model. In a three-day workshop architects such as Farshid Moussavi, Andreas Angelidakis, Franois Roche and Niels Mjaaland came up with concepts and visions on change, infrastructure, mix and remix of Stockholm in a 30 year perspective.
“Urban Turntable”, 2004, taking the ideas of Stockholm at Large into a larger regional discussion, introducing Richard Florida, Dan H Pink, Noreena Hertz and others to form a discussion on a new Swedish model and Stockholm’s growth in an global perspetive
“THE GREAT SWEDISH SOCIAL MAKEOVER”, 2002-2005, a long-term project on re-inventing a new Swedish welfare model.
“Kymlinge”, 2002, a commission from Skanska where Jan Åman put together a group with Andreas Angelidakis, Michael Daun and Angelo Plessas that produced a new concept for building cities outside of city centers that was based on simulating a gentrification process.
“Järva – the city around the green river”, a concept for developing the most segregated suburban area with low income and non-swedish population, based on add on, plug in and develop from the existing instead of building entirely new.
“Malmö 2050”, 2007, commission from the city of Malmö, Jan Åman wrote a 20 page study presenting a concept for the future development of city of Malmö, to make it grow from the inside of the existing infrastructure.
“Lövholmen – the new Swedish model”, 2007, a concept study on commission from the county of Stockholm, presenting a concept for developing an old industrial area based on a mix between old and new, high and low income.
“Meat packing area”, 2007, a commission from the city of Stockholm, where Jan Åman wrote the text for a concept study of developing the meat packing district of Stockholm.
“Järva”, 2008, a concept study for the future of a segregated area in Stockholm.
Platforms
Jan Åman was the founder and editor of Hype Magazine (1987-1990), the first magazine in Sweden to, on the highest level, mix art, fashion, philosophy, politics, media and architecture, provoking a strong debate in Sweden at this time, because of the blend between advanced art and philosophy with fashion and glamour. In 1992 Jan Åman was the co-founder of the project group “Interiors executed” (collaboration with artists Dan Wolgers, Ernst Billgren, Fredrik Wretman, designer Lena Bergström and architerct Per Glembrandt), suggesting a building in the centre of Uppsala that started an intense debate what would be possible to add as architecture in a historical city area. The project was later selected as the most important art project in Uppsala during the 1990’s. In 1995 Jan Äman was introduced to a former paint factory in Stockholm. He suggested to turn it into a center for contemporary art and architecture, Färgfabriken. With Jan Åman as Director between 1995 and 2008, the venue was turned into one of the leading contemporary art venues in the world. Three times Artforum in NYC nominated project from there as one of the ten best in the world. Jan Åman’s idea of a new art institution was independence and integrity through broad collaboration instead of the traditional situation with a public commission or a single sponsor. Jan Åman turned an art venue into an active voice in society by collaboration on a broad level with official and private partners as well as university structures. The cutting edge profile was guaranteed by a personal collaboration with some of the leading artists and architects in the world. In 2008 Jan Åman got an idea from the Estonian architect Veronika Valk and developed it into a conference and a potential internet tool, www.thenewworldbank.com. With key speakers such as Malcolm McLaren, Noreena Hertz, Lars Reuterswärd, Bill Liao and Kohei Nishiyama the aim was to find a tool for urban solutions in a world of rapid urban growth. The project was cancelled but will reappear in coming platforms.
Other
In 1992 Jan Åman took the initiative to use the Swedish telephone books (35 books for the different cities of Sweden) as an art piece where one artist got the control over a telephone book’s cover. The projects created an great attention and started a discussion on art on a broad level in the Swedish society. One book, that of Dan Wolgers, is in the permanent collection of MOMA, NYC. In 1992, for the Expo92, Jan Åman curated the art in the Swedish pavilion, presenting the exhibition “El Tiempo Revela La verdad”. Through the history of Swedish drawing the exhibition presented a journey of Western pictorial tradition from the renaissance tradition of the “I” in relation to non-figurative tradition of the moric.
Awards
Jan Åman won the “architecture critic” prize 2008, given by the Swedish Association of Architects.
He was selected as the first ever award winner for “estethic entrepreneurship”, in 2005, an award founded by the artists Christo & Jeanne-Claude and the Lilja Art Fund Foundation.
He was given the honorary prize for great achievements for the city of Stockholm in 2004, given by the S:t Erik Foundation.
He is a member of the advisory board of the city of Stockholm, Stockholm Business Region as well as of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce’s jury for city development achievements.
Since 2004 Jan Åman write a column every other week for Dagens Industri, Sweden’s largest financial daily. www.janaman.com
jan@janaman.com