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Oana Clitan

Media, Internet, interactive, installation,Experimental, Digital technology, Digital, Design, Conceptual, collage, Audiovisual

Oana Clitan is an artist and designer exploring how language and contemporary communication are influenced by technology and media.

In her multidisciplinary practice she likes to remix and recontextualize existing materials - contemporary visuals found on the internet or old archive materials. Her works range from multi-screen installations to intricate drawings and digitally printed textiles.

Through building various narratives and dystopian scenarios, in her latest projects she addresses themes such as propaganda and rhetorics about technology, the post-truth society and the expression of online identity. One persistent point of interest is the transition between communicating with text to communicating with images in online conversations and the use of animated GIFs as rhetorical devices.

www.oanaclitan.com

Zephyr Chants
Zephyr Chants - Zephyr Chants is an interactive sound installation that explores the interplay between urban development and the natural environment through sound and sculpture. It is a collaboration between Oana Clitan and Carmen Terol Grau (flutist, sound artist). By transforming found and sustainable materials into a functional wind organ, the installation emphasizes themes of resilience, harmony, and collaboration with nature in the face of climate change. The sculpture works as a wind organ and is made primarily with PVC and paper tubes. The sound is created by the air coming from air pumps, activated by sensors. Set in a future city damaged after floods and storms, it envisions a future where people learn to live in harmony with nature. The installation is part of my future Rotterdam worldbuilding. The worldbuilding of Zephyr Chants serves a pivotal role, becoming a lens through which audiences can speculate on the evolution of our current built environment. It prompts viewers to consider how our cities might adapt, evolve, or coexist in a future dominated by unpredictable natural forces.
Birth of OPPER - Birth of OPPER consists of two large scale tapestries (above the first of two), that are part of an ongoing project set in a dystopian Rotterdam. Using references from medieval tapestries and socialist murals, the works explore how art is used by the state to convey ideology and create myths about urban environments. The tapestries depict a narrative in which people leave their home city behind and seek refuge in OPPER tower. This enforced tower is built to provide homes that offer shelter from worsening weather conditions. But in the process of admittance, civilians have to agree to be constantly monitored for their data to be harvested and sold. 390 x 180 cm, tufted with tufting gun (wool, acrylic, cotton). Photo by Mihai Gui.
Spatium Vacuum - Experiments in creating environments with 3D scans of natural and urban elements. Will become part of an installation about a society who has to relearn living in nature after climate change, using 3D scans of urban and natural details.
Visions of 010 melting - The immersive multi-screen installation showcases results of a visual research where I try to create a futuristic or sci-fi city using archive materials. Collections of images from the city archive of Rotterdam (Stadsarchief), together with my own photos and screenshots from Google Maps are fed to an AI image generator, resulting in eerie animations of a constantly changing city. The AI-generated visuals create a feeling of atemporality: it is not clear what is real and what not, if we are seeing the past, present or future and what is made by a human or by an algorithm. The sound design by Sebastian Pappalardo also includes a mix of archive sounds and contemporary field recordings from Rotterdam. The installation is part of a bigger project: creating a future dystopian Rotterdam inspired by the reconstruction politics of the city after the bombing of the Second World War, reimagined in today's context of constant urban renewal, displacement of socio-economic groups and the development of surveillance technology. The installation was first presented during the Motel Mozaïque festival at Theater Rotterdam in April 2022 under the title 'Pixels of Lost Time and Space' (curated by Nikki Giorgiou, in co-production with V2_ Lab for Unstable Media).
Pixels of Lost Time and Space - A visual research involving creative re-use of archival materials in projects with science fiction or alternative-reality scenarios, focusing on experimental video and animation. Through different techniques such as photo manipulation, AI-generated videos and 3D environments I try to create sci-fi visuals starting from archival photos of Rotterdam.
Electrons on the threshold - single screen video installation (8 min) exploring the social consequences of the rise of surveillance in public and virtual space. The project is set in a future Rotterdam, which has been rebuilt again after a mysterious disaster. It follows a fictional narrative inspired by the reconstruction politics of Rotterdam after the bombing of the Second World War, reimagined in today's context of constant urban renewal, displacement of socio-economic groups and the development of surveillance technology. Themes of nostalgia and estrangement are intertwined with issues of privacy and censorship. By exploring how catastrophes are used as clean slates for creating 'new and improved' urban and virtual spaces, the project dives into how this can also be used as an opportunity for new ways of governmental or corporate control to be inserted. The project started during a residency in Dresden, Germany in autumn 2020, where I started to research how Dresden and Rotterdam evolved after being bombed during WW2, how this disaster was presented in the media and became part of the cities' identities, as well as the social, political, ideological and economical factors that influenced their rebuilding. The research becomes the basis for a story set in a future Rotterdam. In the video we experience the perspective of Victoria, who lives in Nieuwe Erasmus Plein, the rich part of the city where the citizens' data is sold for profit. Through a series of video messages, she is trying to contact her best friend April, who chose to keep her privacy and stay in a poor neighborhood.
Future news, official screens - video installation, 5 videos/13min, mixed media, 2019; The project uses past and present news rhetorics to make a speculation about how information will be presented in the future - and by whom. It explores a future scenario where, after a certain event, electrical devices are damaged. This causes the production of new visual content to be currently not possible. The only means of visual expression are some rescued materials, which are used by the government to provide information about new developments of the crisis. The installation takes the form of a news station on the street, the news being a more exaggerated form of today's tendencies to base everything on opinions and emotions rather than facts. Themes addressed are the relationship between private news media, governments and corporations, post truth and the current attitude towards official news. Developed part of the Open Archive project initiated by Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision and Het Nieuwe Instituut. Exhibited at: Mind Over Matter (Technische Sammlungen, Dresden, DE - march 2021), The New Current (Spaanse Kubus, Rotterdam, NL, 2020), Open Archive (Het Nieuwe Instituut, Rotterdam, NL, 2019/2020), Open Archive - Dutch Design Week (Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, NL, 2019).
Future news, official screens - Trailer - Trailer for the video installation, 2019. In the installation above there are five screens, each showing the broadcast of a different character trying to explain the current situation. The trailer features all these five voices intertwined. Past and present news rhetorics are used to make a speculation about how information will be presented in the future - and by whom.
LEX4.1 - public installation, 4 screens, 2019, developed with Nicole Sciarone; LEX4.1 is an AI system which operates in a dystopian future in the current space of Gallery Lecq in Rotterdam. At its core an information android, LEX4.1 was designed to connect the areas around the Rotterdam Parkslokken with each other, give information about the neighborhood and changes in the urban planning to citizens passing by, but also to manage technical tasks connected to the lock . Its main role was to keep citizens informed, happy and safe. In this future scenario, LEX4.1 is reflecting about its role in the neighborhood and its condition, and is ultimately a personification of the gallery building.
Terms and Conditions - Drawings, 2017; A series of concept drawings as the starting point of a research about language used in Terms and Conditions texts, particularly when it comes to collecting and sharing information. An obvious starting point is Facebook, which is where the phrase below comes from. The crochet shape references welcome slogans which are mostly empty of meaning in private households, but the lace itself is also a surface of carefully connected points that form a network.
Disputation between rocks and hearts - installation, looping GIF projections on stones, 2018; The installation explores contemporary visual communication and makes a connection to its broad history - the transition from communicating through figurative images (as cave paintings) to text - and now back to communicating primarily with figurative imagery in the form of photos, GIFs and video. The projection features a series of GIFs which are assembled in order to have a conversation, referencing Sumerian disputations, short stories written on clay tablets addressing philosophical topics such as humanity's place in the world. Exhibited at Apa Kabar? What's New? (group, MAMA, Rotterdam, 2019, curated by Maria Lamslag) and '...all else is poor translation' (solo, White Cuib, Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 2019).

Design Biennale Rotterdam

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Location: W70

Narratives of Now / Digital Journeys

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Location: IAGA Gallery

Limburg Biennale

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Location: Mares

OBJECT

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Location: HAKA Gebouw

Ars Electronica festival

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Location: Ars Electronica festival
In association with: V2_ Lab for Unstable Media

T(HUIS) - Rotterdam Architecture Month

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Location: Het Nieuwe Instituut

Visions of 010 melting @ Motel Mozaïque

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Location: Theater Rotterdam
In association with: V2_

Was uns betrifft // Wat ons betreft Dresden

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Location: Galerie Raskolnikow & Gallery Ursula Walter

Was uns betrifft // Wat ons betreft Rotterdam

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Location: Het Archief

Test_Lab: Summer Sessions 2021 / Kunstavond XL

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Location: V2

Deep Truth / Future news, official screens

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Location: Rijksmuseum Twenthe
https://www.rijksmuseumtwenthe.nl/content/2995/en/deep-truth

Summer Sessions 2021

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Location: V2_ Lab for the Unstable Media
In association with: V2_ Lab for the Unstable Media

During this residency I developed the first leg of my project '...we were but electrons on the threshold'.

https://v2.nl/events/test_lab-summer-sessions-2021

Mind Over Matter / Future news, official screens

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Location: Technische Sammlungen Dresden

AiR at C. Rockefeller Center for the Contemporary Arts

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Location: C. Rockefeller Center for the Contemporary Arts

The New Current / Future news, official screens

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Location: Spaanse Kubus
https://www.thenewcurrent.org/

Open Archief / Future news, official screens

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Location: Het Nieuwe Instituut
https://collectie.hetnieuweinstituut.nl/sites/default/files/open_archief_desktop_4_0.pdf

Open Archief / Dutch Design Week 2020 / Future news, official screens

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Location: Van Abbemuseum
https://collectie.hetnieuweinstituut.nl/activiteiten/open-archief

'...all else is poor translation'

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Location: White Cuib
https://www.facebook.com/whitecuib/photos?tab=album&album_id=2511384742281616&ref=page_internal

LEX4.1

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Location: Galerie Lecq
In association with: Nicole Sciarone
http://www.galerielecq.nl/index.php/exposities/37-6-septemberi-12-oktober-2019-oano-clitan-nicole-scarione

Apa Kabar? / Disputation between rocks and heats

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Location: MAMA
https://thisismama.nl/en/events/home-en/apa-kabar-whats-new/

Hubbub le Scope Palermo

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Location: Borderline
In association with: Lavinia Xausa, Nikos Kostopoulos, Mihai Gui

Vermont Studio Center residency

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Location: Vermont Studio Center

Hubbub Le Scope

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Location: Wolfart Projectspace
In association with: Lavinia Xausa, Nikos Kostopoulos, Mihai Gui

Anthropomorphism of Media

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Location: Dynamo Arts Association
In association with: Sylvana d'Angelo, Larissa Monteiro

Goodbye expectations. Hello you.

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Location: Visual Kontakt gallery

HAUS residency

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Location: Visual Kontakt gallery
This artist has no awards yet.