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CARAVANSERAIS

/ kærəˈvænsəˌraɪ /
Research


Project 1
Sonic Ecology
  1. Curatorial Statement
  2. Listening to Ecosystems from Interdisciplinary Perspectives
  3. Music and Activism
  4. The Vigil of Debris
  5. The Recycling Concerto
  6. The Unexpected Guest


Project 2
Music & Moving Image
  1. Curatorial Statement
  2. Water, The First Body
  3. Light in Infinite Darkness
  4. Kyager
  5. The Moments


Project 3
Naamyam Creative Research 
南音創意研究
  1. 策展人的話
  2. 南音的互動
  3. 戲台南音賞析
  4. 南音創意研究〈客途秋恨〉MV創意對談: 許敖山x杜泳
  5. 南音飄揚未定
  6. 香港南音之永劫回歸？
  7. 南音︰起點抑或歸處？──「南音新創作展演」的兩種實驗
  8. 傳統音樂的突破？南音未來之路——「南音研究計劃」


Project 4
Contain
  1. Genesis
  2. This is water
  3. Modul-ation
  4. Often easy, sometimes impossible
  5. Sensations of getting lost





The content of CARAVANSERAIS does not reflect the views of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region provides funding support to CARAVANSERAIS only, but does not otherwise take part in it.  Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in the materials/activities (or by members of the GRANTEE’s team) are those of the organisers of CARAVANSERAIS only and do not reflect the views of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.
Mark

Genesis

Curatorial Statement for Contain

Folkert Uhde
music manager and concert designer


This project was conceived in early 2018 in Hong Kong, when William Lane and I were on a boat on the Lamma Channel, upon gazing dozens of container ships entering one of the world’s largest trading ports.


The container shipping route between Hong Kong and Hamburg is one of the busiest in the world. 90 percent of all goods worldwide are shipped by containers. Clear origins are tagged upon them: “Made in Hamburg”, “Made in Hong Kong”, “Made in China”... At the same time, more than 1500 containers get lost every year, floating in the seas.


Source: United States Coast Guard/Twitter
https://i.cbc.ca/1.6222447.1634953561!/fileImage/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/16x9_780/lost-shipping-containers.jpg


“On ship-tracking websites, the waters are black with dots. Each dot is a ship; each ship is laden with boxes; each box is laden with goods. Infesting our waters, poisoning our air, and a prime culprit of acoustic pollution, shipping is environmentally indefensible. And then there are the pirates…”

Rose George



Source: https://www.vesselfinder.com


From this conceptual point, the Contain production was conceived in 2019 as a collaboration between the Hong Kong New Music Ensemble and Ensemble Resonanz (Hamburg). Roles were established and other team members were brought on board in 2019 as follows:


Folkert Uhde, artistic director

Elisa Erkelenz, dramaturg

Simon James Phillips, composer

Samson Young, installation artist/ composer


Matthes Alpheis, head of production (Germany), 2020-21

Sharon Chan, creative producer (Hong Kong), 2019-20

William Lane, creative producer (Hong Kong), 2021


In essence, this production travels along the questions of containing, of shipping and shifting cultural identities. The concert performance aims to open up a space of in-betweenness. With streaming sounds, videos and interview fragments, deep darkness and lights, musicians and audience float through states of disorientation. Exploring different sensations of getting lost, and new ways of coming together in the in-betweeness. This is water, a no man’s land.


The concert project is the result of a research period in Hong Kong in 2019, when interviews with musicians, philosophers and curators were conducted. An additional research period took place in September 2021 at the Hong Kong Arts Centre (with the Hong Kong New Music Ensemble) and in October 2021 in Hamburg (with Ensemble Resonanz).


Concert installations will take place in Hong Kong, Berlin and Hamburg in 2022.


This project has been made possible with the kind support of the Arts Capacity Development Funding Scheme (Home Affairs Bureau Hong Kong), Goethe Institute International Coproduction Fund (Germany) and Kulturstiftung des Bundes (Germany).




Biography

Folkert Uhde


Folkert Uhde

Music manager and concert designer Folkert Uhde, born in 1965, has lived in Berlin and Potsdam since 1987. He grew up in Wilhemshaven on the North Sea coast, surrounded by the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and Heinrich Schütz, fitting for the best of traditional Protestant church-music backgrounds. After training as a radio and TV technician, he studied communication studies and musicology at Technische Universität Berlin and, concurrently, Baroque violin at the Academy for Ancient Music in Bremen. He worked as a freelance musician until 1995, the year he went into business as a music and project manager.

Between 1997 and 2012, Folkert Uhde was co-owner of Uhde & Harckensee MusikManagement; from 1997 to 2008 he was manager and dramaturg of the internationally renowned baroque orchestra Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin.

He initiated, curated and organized several concert series and festivals, among them “zeitfenster – Biennale Alter Musik” (since 2002) in cooperation with Konzerthaus Berlin.

An international coproduction of the opera “Dido & Aeneas” by choreographer Sasha Waltz was the beginning of his cooperation with dramaturg and culture manager Jochen Sandig. In 2006, they founded the venue Radialsystem V, which today is internationally established as a “New Space for the Arts in Berlin”.

Since then, Folkert Uhde has made a name for himself by developing and realising new artistic formats and projects, particularly in the field of classical music in its broadest sense. For television channels ARTE, 3SAT and ZDF.Kultur, he developed and produced film and television productions of classical music. In 2009, he was distinguished as Culture Manager of the Year for his innovative approaches at Radialsystem V.

Since the summer of 2012, he has been on the faculty of the programme “Concerto 21”, which was initiated by the Alfred Töpfer Foundation, Hamburg. In this context, he works towards the artistic development and establishment of young ensembles and soloists. Folkert Uhde teaches concert dramaturgy and creative project development at Friedrichhafen’s Zeppelin University. Since 2012, he has been cooperating with the “Dialogues”-Festival of the Salzburg Mozarteum Foundation in the capacity of concert designer. Also in 2012, he was appointed artistic director of the long-standing festival “Internationale Orgelwoche Nürnberg – Musica Sacra” for a tenure of four years, beginning in 2013. From 2012–2014, he curated and moderated the concert series “Aufgemischt” for the Nicolaisaal in Potsdam; at the Borusan Music House in Istanbul, he has created a regular Radialsystem V series entitled “New Sounds of Berlin” since 2012.

Together with congress designer Hans-Joachim Gögl, Folkert Uhde was commissioned by the Montforthaus and the city of Feldkirch in Vorarlberg/Austria to develop and carry out a programme of high-profile, reputation-shaping events for this venue for 2015–2017. This series presents innovative formats between music and dialog, entitled “Zwischentöne”, on three weekends per year. In early 2015, Folkert Uhde acceded to the position of artistic director of Köthener Bachfesttage, taking over from Hans-Georg Schäfer, the former director of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and long-standing head of the Ansbacher Bachwochen. The next edition of the Köthener Bachtage will take place in September 2016.

Folkert Uhde introduced the concept of “Concert Design”, to define the comprehensive new design of both concert content and procedures as a reaction to the rapidly changing social conditions. This term has gained increasing acceptance within the public discourse about the future of classical music.

http://www.folkertuhde.de/