PRAKSIS R29 For real? With Harold Offeh

Developed with artist Harold Offeh, residency 29 For real? addresses ideas of authenticity and identity in art and society. 

Contemporary media are permeated by misleading content that serves motives of financial and personal gain. Within this economy, authenticity – the quality of being real, genuine or true – carries a high premium. Influencers trade on their authenticity to sell their followers a model of what and how to be. Fake news spreads uncertainty and lies, and erodes trust. Politicians seesaw on policies in pursuit of public favour. By contrast, art supposedly exists outside of the need for truth or purpose – so what is the place of authenticity in the context or art today? 
 

The practice of artist and PRAKSIS residency convenor Harold Offeh explores concepts and questions raised by the inhabiting and embodying of histories, including the notion of authenticity. In this residency, Offeh invites participants to probe the concept of authenticity. Questions include: What are the distinctions between the authentic and the fake? Where are their boundaries (if they exist)? Today, what does it mean to be authentic, in the domains of both art and society? 

More information

For this residency, Harold Offeh is seeking to convene an internationally diverse group of practitioners, individuals or collective members who will bring a range of critical and practical approaches to concepts of authenticity. The residency will offer a space to share ideas and resources, engage in both individual and shared activities and test out concepts and plans. 
 

The group will collectively plan a schedule at the residency’s outset. The schedule will include daily group meetings and joint activities such as readings, discussions, visits to relevant spaces in Oslo, networking events, communal meals and socialising, alongside unstructured time for independent reflection and research. In the first week, residents will participate in PRAKSIS’s customary “Meet the Residents” event, informally introducing themselves and their practices to the rest of the group and the Oslo arts community.

About Harold Offeh

Artist Harold Offeh works in various media, including performance, video, photography, social arts practice and pedagogy. His work explores the concepts and questions that are raised by the inhabiting or embodying of histories. Humour plays an important role in his playful yet biting performative excavations of identity within historical and contemporary cultural tropes. He has exhibited widely at venues in the UK and internationally, including Tate Britain and Tate Modern, South London Gallery, Turf Projects, London, Kettle's Yard, Cambridge, Wysing Art Centre, Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, MAC VAL, France, Kunsthal Charlottenborg, Denmark and Art Tower Mito, Japan.

Offeh studied Critical Fine Art Practice at the University of Brighton and MA Fine Art Photography at the Royal College of Art. In 2020 he completed a practice-based PhD at Leeds Beckett University, in which he explored the activation of Black Album covers through durational performance. He lives in Cambridge and is currently Senior Tutor in Fine Art MFA at the Ruskin School of Art, Oxford University and Tutor in Contemporary Art Practice at the Royal College of Art, London. In 2019, he was a recipient of the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Award for Artists, the most substantial award of its kind in the UK.

What the Residency Provides

• An active, facilitated programme connected with the residency topic. 

• A communal work space at PRAKSIS, in the centre of Oslo.

• This residency is supported by Culture Moves Europe and offers a stipend of €700 (€25 per day) plus a travel bursary for four residents based in the EU outside of Norway. The travel grant will be related to the distance involved and the method of travel chosen. Further funding is available for disability support, based on eligibility.

• 3000 NOK will be awarded to one international artist from outside of the EU.

• Comfortable shared accommodation for non-Oslo based residents. Oslo-based residents will continue to stay at their local address.

• Group dinners with invited guests. On weekdays, PRAKSIS will provide lunch at PRAKSIS HQ.

Oslo has a vibrant and adventurous arts landscape. PRAKSIS will provide residents with information and links to the city’s cultural scene, informing them about exhibitions, talks, performances and other events. PRAKSIS seeks wherever possible to connect participants with relevant organisations and individuals in Oslo, introducing the residency community to Oslo creatives in various spheres, including curators, writers, and artists.

Activities and events will be developed in dialogue with the residency group, and are mainly held at PRAKSIS’s space in central Oslo. At the start of the residency, participants are invited to make a presentation, informally introducing themselves and their practice to the rest of the group. Other activities include residency-related visits, a tour of Oslo's galleries, networking events, discussions and group critiques – some open to the public. A seminar event will address issues surrounding the residency theme.

Residents are responsible for their own travel and any further costs.

Our team is happy to support applications for external grants wherever possible.

Requirements

• English is the common language at PRAKSIS and residents must be sufficiently fluent to participate in group discussion and activity.

• Residents are expected to involve themselves fully in the work of the residency: joining discussions, participating in events and engaging with the resident community.

• Accepting a residency involves a commitment to participation for the full residency term.

Application guidelines

Submit application via Google form by 7 May at 23:59 CET. Here you will be asked to:

• Summarise your practice (max. 600 characters)


• How does your current practical work or research relate to the residency theme? (max. 1500 characters)


• What particular topics or questions would you like to explore during the residency, and how would you like to address them? (max. 1500 characters)


• How will this experience benefit you and your practice at this stage of your career? Do you have longer-term goals or project concepts that relate to the residency programme? (Please describe them.)

• What are some contributions you might want to make to this body of research in the long term? 

• How do you hope to contribute to the residency programme? (max. 1500 characters)

• Adding a CV and/or short bio

• Include contact details for two academic or professional referees. (They will only be contacted if you are invited to interview.)

• Work sample URL: This can be a link (or links) to your website, a PDF portfolio, or slideshow. If submitting a large website - please list or link to individual projects you’d like us to look at.

• Pay the application fee

Selections will be made by Harold Offeh and members of the PRAKSIS team. Online interviews will be conducted with shortlisted candidates shortly after the application deadline.

Application Fee

There is an application fee of 75 NOK (equal to €6.47 as of 08/04/24). The fee covers part of the cost of administering your application