From Madame Tussauds To Sequences VII

Here’s a fun fact: the artistic director of Sequences VII, Alfredo Cramerotti, spent two years working at Madame Tussauds Wax Cabinet in London!

Living in London for a year, Alfredo decided he wanted some customer service experience and got an interview at Madame Tussauds. While well prepared, he was an hour late for the interview due to his not owning a TV, radio or a smartphone (those didn’t exist at the time), which would have made him aware that Daylight Saving Time had come into effect the day before. Luckily, Alfredo managed to still attend the interview and got the job. He says his first, strangest and funniest task was to manage the visitors waiting outside to enter the museum. Since the majority of visitors to Madame Tussauds are tourists who— unlike Brits—are unfamiliar with “queuing as an ancestral mode of being,” as Alfredo puts it, he pretty much had to teach the people how to stand in line. This proved easier said than done. All in all, Alfredo describes Madame Tussauds as a great but peculiar place to work.

Today, Alfredo is a writer and curator working across TV, radio, publishing, media festivals and exhibition making. He directs MOSTYN, Wales’ leading contemporary art institute, and co-directs the roaming curatorial agencies AGM Culture and CPS Chamber of Public Secrets. Alfredo is very much enjoying the production of Sequences VII and looking forward to seeing the results soon!

On Sunday April 12 , at 17:00, Alfredo Cramerotti will introduce AGM Culture 2015: Physical and Virtual, held at Mengi (Óðinsgata 2). The evening is conducted by Steven Bode, Director of Film and Video Umbrella, who will reflect on the material and the immaterial in the context of Iceland, and how the phantom, amorphous nature of our contemporary digital image-world is reliant on an invisible infrastructure of underground ‘plumbing’. Participating artists are Graham Gussin, Anne Haaning and Ragnar Helgi Ólafsson. As well during the evening there will be a screening of artist Ed Atkins’ work Warm Warm Warm Spring Mouth, 2013.

Also don’t forget the opening of artists Anne Haaning and Helgi Þórsson at Mengi on Friday April 10 at 20:00!

Anne Haaning (b. 1977) is inspired by the production of digital media and its endless possibilities. She graduated in 2004 from the The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts’ Architecture School in Copenhagen, and in 2014 with an MFA from Goldsmiths University, London, England. During Sequences VII Haaning will show the piece KhoiSan Medicine, 2014. As a short introduction to Anne Haaning’s work, take a look at the below excerpt of How to other (2013)

How to Other (excerpt) from Anne Haaning on Vimeo.

Helgi Þórsson (b.1975) created one of his legendary mobile bars especially for Sequences VII. The new one is entitled “Sequences Baby Doll Bar”, and will be inaugurated by the artist at Mengi during the festival’s opening weekend. Helgi studied Sonology at The Royal Conservatory of The Hague, received his BFA from the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam in 2002 and an MFA from the Sandberg Institute in Amsterdam in 2004.

Detailed information on artists, openings, timings, performances and events is available here and on Sequences’ Facebook. For more info about Alfredo Cramerotti and his work, visit his website.

This article is part of a series of articles where the good folks behind Sequences inform Grapevine’s readers about some of the cool stuff they’ve got planned. Please visit Sequences’ website at sequences.is for more information about the festival venues and where the artists will be exhibiting!