‘rheinpartie - to move on to pastures new’ is a festival of projection art and media in the Unesco World Heritage Upper Middle Rhine Valley (2. bis 4. Oktober 2009).

Beside the large-scale projects of international artists which show fascinating images and dream worlds in castles, monuments and ruins with the newest technologies there is a row of local initiatives to show the life on and with the river Rhine via small scale projections on house walls and facades.

Technical fascination and the charm of the private initiative transform the Rhine Valley all around the day of the German Unification into a dream of a landscape. Projections created by Ross Ashton, ETC London Paris, Skertzò, Urbanscreen, A wall is a Screen, Philipp Geist, Gertrud Riethmüller, das modular, Hartung Trenz (Photo) and others.

rheinpartie-programm / Highlight-Flyer zum Herunterladen/Download here>

The complete rheinpartie program (August 11th,2009), changes possible. Without guarantees.

527 km Rüdesheim
Germania meets Europa
Niederwalddenkmal
Projection of Ross Ashton (E/T/C), London
Fr 20-24h / Saturday 20-24h / Su 20-23h

Christo has wrapped up monuments and whole buildings. For the occasion of the rheinpartie, the projection artist Ross Ashton (E/T/C) from London will wrap up the Germania in moving images. Ross Ashton, who staged „ The Golden Jubilee“ of the Queen and the 800 Year Jubilee of Cambridge University, will transform the Germania into a symbol of peaceful Europe.

After the Cologne Cathedral, the Germania is one of the most visited tourist sights in Germany. The monument situated high above the Niederwald is mostly popular with foreign guests from Europe and Asia. The vista over the romantic Rhine Valley stamps the image of Germany in the world. A meanwhile peaceful Germania, which will be completely veiled after rheinpartie to undergo a fundamental restoration, becomes the landmark of the UNESCO World Heritage Upper Middle Rhine Valley.

Profile:
Ross Ashton (London) sees himself as a projection artist. He is the creative head of ETC London. ETC (Paris/London) is a technology leader and‚ worldwide player in the area of projection technology. Since its foundation in 1981, ETC stands for innovative concepts for large-size image projections. From the bases in London and Paris, the company operates worldwide and realizes projects also in America and Asia (i.e. Doha Asian Games). With the participation in over 500 arrangements, conferences and live shows yearly, ETC has not only been able to optimize available technologies, but also in developing their very own methods and projectors. One of these developments being the patented PIGI (Projection d’Images Géantes Informatisées) projection system. ETC produces high-performance projectors and has also developed their own software to control and synchronize several different projectors.

www.rossashton.com
www.etclondonparis.com

527 km Rüdesheim
>> STARKSTROM
Media installations, exhibition, institute of media creation, University of applied Studies Mainz
Former Asbach area, in the Rottland– directly across from the railway station
Fr 12-24h / Saturday 12-24h / Su 12-23h
19 Fr h Opening

The term STARKSTROM (high voltage current) forms the title rich in association for a conceptual exhibition with installation- and lighting-art in the former Asbach industrial area at Rüdesheim. The title >>STARKSTROM refers not only to the highly technical efforts of this unusual art exhibition, but should also be understood as a symbol for the flowing of the current of the Rhine. The title furthermore announces the energy which will emanate from the artworks during the three exhibition days. The exhibition is curated by Tjark Ihmels.

The planned projects in detail:
Carsten Altmann: „Stille Post“ („Chinese whispers“) (Installation with 20 printers)
With the help of hidden microphones, discussions of exhibition visitors will be recorded, stored, computerized and given out by printers again. The machinery of the bureaucracy produces continuously more and more documentation of the secret observation.

Jan Brauer:„ The sound of the hall“ (Sound installation)

Bernd Güssbacher:„ Mirror, Mirror …“ (Videoinstallation)
Graphic moving images are projected onto an object made of mobile mirrors– the principle of the disco ball in gigantic magnitude.

Christoph Köhler:„ made in china / souvenirs of the industry ruins“;

Robert Meyer: „ … come in, you can look out“ (Installation)
Abstracted houses will be erected within the former industrial halls.

Sarah Pittroff/Seweryn Zelazny:„ Arrow“ (Video-/material installation)
Landscape observations will originate in combination with a human intervention– the arrow as a token of civilization…

Pascal Schneider: Project “Olatuak” (interactive videoinstallation)
Here the visitor can take leverage on the outcome of the video by movement.

Jochen Seehuber:„ The Physical Impossibility of Life in the Mind of Someone Dead“ (Installation) referring to Damien Hirst famous art work (tiger’s shark in formaldehyde) the connection of life and environment will be celebrated and questioned in a media-oriented way.

www.img.fh-mainz.de

540 km Lorch
„Glanzstück“ (Brilliant piece) Hilchen-House
Projections of Urbanscreen (Bremen)
Organizer: Town Lorch
Hilchen-House, Rheinstrasse
Fr 20-24h / Saturday 20-24h / Su 20-23h

The Hilchen-House, part of the World Heritage in Lorch, is a special example of Renaissance architecture in the Middle Rhein area. It stands shortly before the beginning of a fundamental rehabilitation. For the kick-off of this construction work, the artist’s team Urbanscreen stages a highlight which allows us to see secrets, images and dreams which slumber in these walls.„ Brilliant piece“ is a precise video-projection which will regard the content and architecture of the building. This digital garment interacts and reacts with the structure of the stone surface and melts with it to form an unmoveable entity.

„Brilliant piece“ is about conversion, beauty and light which stands in contrast to the old unsound walls. The video images combine themselves with a slide projection whose motives allow the adjoining hotel ruins to disappear under virtual plants.

Profile:
URBANSCREEN from Bremen has been working with giant image-projections in the urban space since 2004. The central starting point of URBANSCREEN is always the architecture - or more in general - the surface on which is being projected. Further core impulses are the specific spacial relations and the thematic charge of the property. These elements are brought on to the surface via a precise technique specially developed by the group‚ called ‚Lumentektur‘. By overlapping the available facade structures with a tailor-made level of light, the architecture becomes a carrier for its own playing ground and thus bearer of its own story.

www.urbanscreen.com

550 km Oberwesel
Liquid Memory / Riverine Zones
Video-installations of Philipp Geist (Berlin), monastery gardens of family Hütte,
Monastery gardens and sacristy, Oberstr. 11
Fr 20-24h / Saturday 20-24h / Su 20-23h

The artist Philipp Geist (Berlin) shows his video installation „ Liquid Memory“ in the church ruins and in the sacristy of the former Minorite cloister in Oberwesel. In his installation Philipp Geist picks out the element water as a central theme and puts this in the immediate connection to the historical place and the Rhine Valley. Water and time are the constants in the oeuvre of Philipp Geist. He works with the media videoinstallation, audio/visual performance, painting and photography. His projects integrate space, sound and moving image.

With this installation, the artist renounces the use of canvases and projects directly onto parts of the former cloister facade, the ruins and onto fog as a transpartent and volatile projection-ground. An interaction between the concrete and tangible wall and the clear evaporating projection will bring together time and space.

Geist will exhibit his long term water-project ´Riverine Zones´ in the former sacristy. This video-space installation takes the viewer on an exploratory expedition through international rivers. The artist makes a world visible which is so near and yet so distant to us. With an underwater camera he roams through all zones of the river: the ground, the deep or shallow water and the surface. Thus originate Geist´s partly minimum-puristic, partly colour-intensive, dream-like and shadowy-breakable image compositions. Geist covers– from the water perspective– also the bank area, from which, using another English term -„riverine“- the project receives its name.

Profile:
Philipp Geist, born in 1976 in Witten, grown up in Weilheim (Bavaria), lives in Berlin since 1999. He works internationally in the media video installation, audio visual performances, painting and photography. Among others he has exhibited in 2002: Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich. In 2004: Sonar Festival Barcelona, Mutek festival Montreal, Dissonanze festival, Rome. In 2005: Zurich, Winterzauber, video installation. In 2006: Salon Noir, New National Gallery Berlin. In 2007: Riverine video installation, Three Walls Gallery, Chicago; Video installation Time Lines Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome. In 2008: Kulturforum Berlin, Time Fades Australia Melbourne, Urban Screens– Riverine Movie Screening. In 2009: Geneva Palais Eynard, Parc des Bastions, Mapping festival…

www.kulturhaus-oberwesel.de
www.videogeist.de, www.p-geist.de

555 km Loreley
„Wortschatz Lebenszeichen“ (Vocabulary Sign of Life)
Projection of Hartung Trenz (Cologne / Munich)
Fr 20-24h / Saturday 20-24h / so 20-23h
Vantage point (on the left side of the Rhine river) by the panorama restaurant Loreley

Who doesnt´ know the hit-lists of the nicest words, the threatened words, the taboo words of the year etc…. German vocabulary such as Wanderlust, Denkungsart, Papperlapapp, Zeitgeist, etc. appear yearly in the media and in dinner-table discussions testifying change and development of the German language and its exceedingly rich vocabulary. Language is constantly in the flow, adapting itself, inventing itself anew, answering to time, events and social developments.

On the mythical Loreley rock, a flow of words of different sizes and meanings will originate, which will accompany the Rhine a little while downstream. All levels and codes of the German language thus pass the viewer with the speed of the river-flowing, standing fragmentarily for the today’s thinking and speech. A complicated reflection about language, word education and linguistic development inspired by a place, a rock, a scenery, a river. Language flows!

Profile:
Detlef Hartung and Georg Trenz have been working for 15 years with word projections and text projections– their big subject is the combination of light, space and language and all three factors playing together to break down other meaning levels. Often the current work receives new facets via the interaction with the viewer – thus, for example, parts of a projection are blended out for a short time by other passing viewers - thus making visible other components of the projection. The range of activities of this artist pair reaches from the creation of a flashlight as multiple up to – as can be seen at the rheinpartie– landscape-large projections.

The cooperation of both artists began in the Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Munich as master-class pupils of Prof. Gerhard Berger. Georg Trenz, born in 1962, had completed his studies as a communication designer and Detlef Hartung, born in 1958, had studied mechanical engineering.

www.hartung-trenz.de

558 km Saint Goar:
Risen from ruins – the Rheinfels castle
Projections in the ruins Rheinfels / Skertzò (Paris)
Schlossberg
Fr 20-24h / Saturday 20-24h / Su 20-23h

The Paris studio Skertzò belongs to the top-class creative addresses in France. Legendary are the projections in Lyon, in the Stade de France, La cathèdrale de Monet in Rouen or the staging of the temple mountain in Jerusalem. For rheinpartie Skertzò will transform the ruins of the castle Rheinfels into a walk-through projection space. This staging is the Germany première of Skertzò who have realized large-scale projections all around the globe for about 20 years now.

The proud castle Rheinfels was strongly damaged in 1692 by Ludwig XIV troops during the course of the Palatinate-successional wars. In 1796/97 after the peaceful taking by French revolutionary troops the fortifications were blown-up finally. The ruins of the Rheinfels remained. For the romantics of the 19th century, a yearning image for a proud German history. Ruins as sublime reminders of an era lost came into fashion. Skertzò will thematize this cult about the ruins and will resurrect a virtual castle Rheinfels. Inside of the castle-grounds the visitors will be able to move through virtual castle rooms.

The Rheinfels-project is the highlight of the rheinpartie. It is the central project smack in the middle of the UNESCO World Heritage Valley high above Saint Goar.
€ 10, - (with the acquisition of the entry-card, visitors will support the whole project‚ rheinpartie– to move on to pastures new’.)

Profile:
Jean Michel Quesne and Hélène Richard, the Skertzò founders, come from the theatre and are fascinated by the magic and the illusion technologies of the scenic arts. As masters of illusion and of Tromp L’oeil technologies they transform rooms and urban situations into theatrical performances. Always in search of new forms of theatre, they have developed new ingenious performances: unconventional mixtures of imagination, poetry and high tech. Stage plays, performances of the most different kind, starting with a pop concerts up to fashion shows, installations in towns or within exhibitions pull each visitors personally into their spell. They appeal to the intelligence of the viewers in a sensuous kind and play with the powers of imagination. Skertzò is the phonetic translation of the Italian „Scherzo“ and describes the movement in the music– Allegro Vivace - and with this everything has been said.

www.skertzo.com
www.st-goar.de

558 kms of Saint Goar, Saint Goarshausen
„fähr.bind.licht“
Audio-visual installation by Ingo Bracke (Saarbruecken)
Organizer: Rhine tourism– Valley of the Loreley with ferry Loreley
Ferry between Saint Goar and Saint Goarshausen
Fr 20-24h / Saturday 20-24h / Su 20-24h

The ferries are a part of the World Heritage scenery like the river Rhine itself. Commuting from one side to the other, visitors will experience the World Heritage Valley from varying perspectives and thus becoming a part of the light- and sound-work of Ingo Bracke, which refers to the myth of the Loreley.

www.tal loreley.de
www.faehre-loreley.de
www.ingobracke.de

568 kms Boppard
„lichtHimmel“
Sky projection over cloister Marienberg by Ingo Bracke (Saarbruecken), Marienbergstrasse, near the multi-storey car park,
organizer: Art association Mittelrhein e. V. KM570
Fr 20-24h/Saturday 20-24h/Su 20-23h

The art association Mittelrhein e. V. KM570 together with the light- and installation-artist artist Ingo Bracke will set a sign via a sky projection above cloister Marienberg. The art association Mittelrhein (KM 570) has already realized several projects with Ingo Bracke in the World Heritage Upper Middle Rhine Valley.
Nearby, on the ´Balz´(area of town), visitors of the installation will find a champagne bar. An ideal place to observe this art action.
www.km570.de
www.ingobracke.de

Profile:
Ingo Bracke, has been working for 10 years with the medium of light. Developed from numerous hand drawings, his projections make visible imaginary, symbolic, thought about and other invisible lines in our environment. In the Rhine Valley Ingo Bracke made a name for himself with his projection for the Luminale in 2008. With the art association Mittelrhein KM 570 he has realized several projects. Other installations: Hambach castle (2007, Bach-Haus Eisenach (2008), tunnel installation Sydney (2009). This year he received the advancement-award of the town of Saarbrücken. Ingo Bracke has studied interior decoration and scenery and is a master-class pupil of Prof. Christina Kubisch (Saarbruecken)

568 kms Boppard
BALZlight,
Sound- and light-installation of Gertrud Riethmüller (Saint Wendel),
Steinstrasse, organizer: Community of interests BALZ
Fr 20-24h / Saturday 20-24 / Su 20-23h

The BALZ is the part of town richest in water and shows even today two wells which are reminiscent of the former well community. Here the media artist Gertrud Riethmüller will realize a site-specific work. Mythologically, a well shaft and water often stand for a laborious way to a new period of life. The well as a metaphor and dwindling natural water resources form the subject of main focus of the video- and sound-installation.

On the BALZ some bar tables and a champagne bar are placed to facilitate communication in a relaxed atmosphere and for the enjoyment of the evening. Organizer is the community of BALZ, a union of art lovers and business people all around the area.

Profile:
Gertrud Riethmüller, born in 1961 in Niedermendig/Eifel, studied new artistic media (master-class pupil) with Prof. Ulrike Rosenbach on the Saar HBK. Since 1998 she has been active free lance. Her main work-focus lies in the area of installations in space. By means of video, sound and objects she takes up the formal circumstances and historical backgrounds of a space and translates them into installations. The resulted space situations, are readable as multi-layered and often follow a poetic theme.
Some of Riethmueller´s projects are: in 2006: “Elsewhere - Not here, not there” - international exhibition project in Saarbruecken and San Francisco, in 2006-2007: “Selfportrait - a show for Bethlehem - a show for peace”– Digitalprint: Al Kahf Art Gallery Bethlehem - Palestine, Casoria, Naples - Contemporary Art Museum - Italy, Santa Fe, MAC Museo Arte Contemporaneo - Argentinia, Szczecin, Offizyna Art Space– Poland and the conception and organization of the international media art project “Virtual-Residency”, curated together with Monika Bohr, Leslie Huppert and Claudia Brieske - Databank based Internet platform.

www.optiker-holz.de/courtship display
www.gertrud-riethmüller.de

579 km Spay
Fluvius
Old church, Spay, Zehnthofstrasse
Video– Installation of Helga Persel (Mainz)
Art association Mittelrhein e. V. KM 570 and Franz-Krautkremer-Foundation
Fr 21-23h / Saturday 21-23h / Su 21-23h

This videoinstallation shows a waterfall, flowing down the facade of the old church in Spay. Water as a moving element hits the hard surface of the building without substantially changing it, unlike it would happen if the stone would have really been exposed to such water streams.

The church lies immediately on the Rhine shore, its history is closely linked to the river. The foundations stem from a watch-tower from Roman times, the building used to be a part of frontier protections. After the breakdown of the Roman Empire a christian church was established around 1000 on the remains of the tower. In the turmoils of the Thirty Years’ War the construction is destroyed and rebuilt in the late 17-th century. Since beginning of the 20th century, the building no longer functions as a church but is being used as a concert and event hall.

A water cascade of the Rhine will be projected, which has been recorded however, in the streams way above the location of the church (i.e. the Rhine Falls of Schaffhausen). Thus the current time to be experienced is also associated besides the historical dimension. The medially preserved river water is projected at a time at which it has in reality passed by the church a long time ago.

The river as a constant next to the historical changes of the building can thus be experienced as a fleeting element. The river is always there, but always another. Thus the installation can be also read as a Vanitas code.

Profile:
Photographer Helga Persel living in Mainz studied in Mainz and Vienna pedagogic art and art history with the main focus photography and Serigrafie. In her photographic work she argues with the human perception and the mechanisms of media mediation.

www. Franz-Krautkremer-Stiftung.de
www.km570.de

580 kms Marksburg
Marksburg shadow plays
Projection from modular and atmo&sphere event production company
Fr 20-24h / Saturday 20-24h / Su 20-23h

The Marksburg wakes up to the night life with scissor-cut projections. In the shadow plays on the walls, video-animations will mix in ingenious ways with different play scenes. Inside of the castle, the visitors will be greeted by the glowing light walls of artist Martin Böttcher. Shadow projections of medieval scenes overlap with whispered stories of the Marksburg (text: Corinna Zürcher) , set to music by composer Maik Oehme (Tuebingen). The installation forms a multi-layered association scenery which accompanies the visitor on his way by the castle (and encourages him to get involved).

Profile:
Multi display shows are a speciality of ´das modular ´. Model for the staging of the Marksburg is the production of the „History night Hattersheim“. Das modular offers to its customers all finesse of the media creation - in the highest quality and with an unequivocal form. A network consisting of experts of the classical and new media guarantees an effective appearance. Beside the development of media stagings and installations das modular also offers communication design and services all around a trade fair participation.

www.dasmodular.de
www. Lichtlaub.de
www.marksburg.de

592 km Koblenz Altstadt
A Wall is a Screen
Mobil projections - Open-Air-Shortfilm-Tour /
A Wall is a Screen (Hamburg) with Koblenz-Touristik
Meeting point: Berliner Mauer-Stelen/Mosel-Promenade, Deutschen Eck
Fr 20h/Saturday 20h/Su 20h

Short films will be shown at various places in the historic district in Koblenz. Main focus are the subjects of the Koblenz after the tearing down of the Berlin-Wall, change due to the german unity, change in Koblenz and change in general. „We want to know and show, what the citizens of Koblenz and people of the region associate with the fall of the wall“ says Thomas Steinebach, manager of events at Koblenz Touristik. „The good thing about our city-tours is“, so Kerstin Budde from ´A Wall is a Screen´, „that we have the possibility to show the movies at the places where they happened, so that location and film build an entity. One suddenly notices the locations and the vicinity in a different way. For this we use the facades of the historic district of Koblenz as a screen. This way any wall can be a screen. “ With a mobile projector we will move from „screen“ to „screen“. Connecting with this tour is possilbe at any point, the duration will be about 1 ½ to 2 hrs.

Profile:
A Wall is a Screen has been established in 2003 by Antje Haubenreisser, Peter Stein and Kerstin Budde in Hamburg. First this Hamburg-based artist collective developed programms for film festivals like the Berlinale or for the independent film days at Osnabrück. In the meantime ‚A wall is a Screen’ is a popular partaker in festivals and international urban screening festivals. The open-air short-film walk has developed into a veritable event format. Projecting short-films onto walls during a guided city-tour provides new room for associations. The screening ´alienate´ the city vistas and thus change the perception of the viewers. Buildings and urban spaces load up with new meaning. ‚A Wall is a Screen’ are thus not only a group of film-makers but representants of ´relational art´. With this term, art projects are described that only develop their aesthetic meaning via the interaction of various participants. By opening up new ways of communication for the recipients, relational art works as a means against the communal alienation, opens up new spaces, new forms of social interaction and community.

www.koblenz-touristik.de
www.awallisascreen.de