Remote Viewing Event

Myriam Lefkowitz & Simon Ripoll-Hurier: ?REMOTE VIEWING?
[workshop/presentation]

Dear friends and colleagues,

We are extremely happy and excited to invite you to a workshop that we are organising as part of DerBloedeDritteMittwoch #72 with the artists Myriam Lefkowitz and Simon Ripoll-Hurier from Paris.

Myriam and Simon are experimenting with “Remote Viewing”, a practice developed in the context of the CIA Stargate project during the 1970s in the US, striving to put extra-sensorial perceptions and psychic skills into the service of military intelligence. Based on their research into the strict protocols and techniques developed by the CIA, Myriam and Simon invite you to learn and experience Remote Viewing, working with the uncanny tension of a practice coming from military culture in the context of the Cold War (very far from any artistic concern) that nevertheless has a strong poetic and attentional dimension, able to trigger a flow of images free from mental construction and sensorial interference.

Workshop: 17 January 2018, 13.00-16.00, Favoritenstrasse 17/13
Participation is free of charge. Working language is English.
Places are limited, please register till 15 January 2018: bloed[at]klingt[dot]org
Presentation on the same day, as part of DerBloedeDritteMittwoch #72. See http://bloedermittwoch.klingt.org/ for full line-up.

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP AND REMOTE VIEWING

Remote viewing is a technique of description of places, events, objects or people remote in time and space. Mainly developed in the United States in the context of the CIA Stargate program, it was considered as the most promising practice for channeling extra-sensorial perceptions. Simon Ripoll-Hurier got interested in Remote Viewing in the context of his film project ?Diana?. In 2016, he contacted the director of a specialist institute for Remote Viewing (IRIS) in Paris and filmed a few sessions. Here is the trailer of his film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8xylCy8yvY

He started to experiment with this practice that he shared with Myriam Lefkowitz. Together they decided to transmit it in the context of various workshops. Little by little, the idea of making a film on the base of Remote Viewing developed as a reflection on the notion of distance. The principle of Remote Viewing is at the same time simple and complex: by developing connection techniques with a flow of deep inner images and sensations, by naming them and writing them down, the viewer would be able to describe existing targets, distant in space and/or time.

For both artists, the interest in this practice lies in the tension that underlines it: on one hand, a very strict protocol coming from military culture in the context of the Cold War (very far from any artistic concern) and on the other hand, a strong poetical and attentional dimension which is able to trigger a flow of images free from mental construction and sensorial interference.

The 3-hour workshop in Vienna will consist of a short presentation on what Remote Viewing is. Then the artists will transmit the protocol, and eventually the group of participants will spend some time practicing Remote Viewing. In the evening, the artists will share the documents produced during the afternoon workshop and present their on-going research process around the practice.

BIOS
Myriam Lefkowitz is a performance artist living and working in Paris. Since 2010 her research has been focused on questions of attention and perception, research that she is developing through different immersive devices involving direct encounter between spectators and performers. Lefkowitz? work has been presented at Situations, Bristol (2017); Public Art Agency, Stockholm (2016); imagetanz Festival / brut Wien (2015), The Lithuanian Pavilion, 55th International Art Exhibition, Venice Biennial (2013); and The Center for Contemporary Art, Vilnius (2013) a.o. http://www.ificantdance.org/Editions/EditionVII/03-MyriamLefkowitz

Simon Ripoll-Hurier is an artist who works in the intersection of visual arts, music and cinema. He has been working on ?collective images? such as Hollywood (Translations, 2008-2010), Broadway (The Broadway Melody, 2010-2013), or dreams (Dreamland, 2013). His film ?Diana? is part of a research that includes videos, performances and a radio piece. He also plays with les Agamemnonz, an instrumental surf music band, and co-founded *DUUU, an artist-based web radio. http://www.simonripollhurier.com/

The workshop and presentation is realized with the kind support of Institut Français d?Autriche.

Image: Sans sommeil, La Réunion, 2017