The School of Panamerican Unrest

June 3, 2006

The School of Panamerican Unrest (SPU) is an artist-led, not-for-profit public art project that is traveling from Anchorage, Alaska to Ushuaia, Argentina between May 9 and September 15, making 30 stops along the way.

Exhibition: 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.
Olympic Plaza – 228 - 8 Avenue SE, Calgary

Workshop: 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Olympic Plaza – 228 - 8 Avenue SE, Calgary
Register for the workshop at: panamericanismo@gmail.com

Panel Discussion: 2 p.m. to 5 p.m.
Political Art: Persuasion of Alienation
Alberta College of Art and Design - 1407 – 14 Avenue NW, Calgary
Stanford Perrott Lecture Theatre
Panellists: Don Simmons, Grant Poier, Mireille Perron, Pablo Helguera

Closing Ceremony: 7 p.m.
Olympic Plaza – 228 - 8 Avenue SE, Calgary

Presented by the Walter Phillips Gallery and the Mountain Standard Time Performative Art Festival

SPU seeks to generate connections between the different regions of the Americas through discussions, performances, screenings, and short-term and long-term collaborations between organizations and individuals. Its main component will be a nomadic forum or think-tank that will cross the hemisphere by land, from Alaska, to the most southerly point in the America’s in Argentina. This hybrid project will include a collapsible and movable architectural structure in the form of a schoolhouse, as well as a video collection component inside a van that will make the journey. The project offers alternative ways to understand the history, ideology, and lines of thought that have significantly impacted political, social and cultural events in the Americas.

Initiated by Mexican artist Pablo Helguera, the main component of the School of Panamerican Unrest is a nomadic think-tank that will travel north to south through the Americas, seeking connections between regions in the form of discussion, collaborative projects, and communication amongst English-, Spanish-, and Portuguese-speaking people. The SPU’s collapsible schoolhouse is a gathering place, as well as an exhibition space for a collection of videos and books on the social, political, and cultural issues affecting all regions of the Americas.

Supported by more than 40 organizations and more than 100 affiliated artists, curators, and cultural promoters across the western hemisphere, the SPU is inspired by the travel patterns of the people who have crossed continents in the past, including missionaries, explorers, scientists, revolutionaries, intellectuals, writers, and others.

For more information on the project visit the official website at www.panamericanismo.org or call the Walter Phillips Gallery
at 403-762-6281.