About

What is Café Chercher?

Café Chercher is a platform to present unfinished research projects. These research projects typically exist between the realms of art and science; artists involved in research and researchers involved in the arts. Every last Tuesday of the month we organize evenings with presentations, with performances, with dance, with poetry, with poetry, with music, with videos, with soup and with drinks. Café Chercher is a place for artists and scientists to share their questions, doubts, hypothesis, try-outs, and prototypes. Participants are practitioners, students, PhD researchers, and professors from a wide variety of disciplines and institutions. We provide an informal and intimate atmosphere with room for doubt and for discussion.

Join a growing community of artistic researchers!

Soup and entrance are free, drinks 1 euro.

 

Participants 

The event consists of presentations, performances and a video clipping. Experimental and creative presentations are stimulated. Skype presentations and workshops are also possible. The format is pretty flexible, so please feel free to share your ideas/ suggestions. Some weeks before the event each participant provides information about themselves and their research project, and a single word inspired by their work. These words are collected and will form an imaginary saying which functions as the title for the upcoming event.

Theory focussed contribution: 10-15 minutes

The contribution is based on a research questions, around doubts and hypotheses. These can be small or big questions. The contribution can be in a variety of forms like: workshops, performative lectures, participatory happenings or just a power point presentation.

Practice focussed contribution: 5-15 minute

The contribution is based on an unfinished artwork, the contribution can be seen as a prototype or try-out. The contribution can be in a variety of forms like: artwork, performance, music, dance, theatre, poetry preferably not a powerpoint presentation.

In the past, Café Chercher has hosted presentations and performances of both national and international visual artists, musicians, and researchers from a variety of disciplines and studies. We aim to keep expanding the community and create a network of artistic researchers.

If you are interested in presenting or performing, please send an email to info@cafechercher.org

 

History & Organisation

Café Chercher means “A research café”.

In Modern French chercher (=search) derives from Latin circare meaning “go about, wander, traverse”. Research in the 1570s was used as the “act of searching closely,” from Old French rechercher (= to seek for). The first attestation of rechercher meaning  “scientific inquiry” is in the 1630s.

As students Artistic Research (reMA UvA) Edgar M. Caramaño and Emily Huurdeman initiated Café Chercher together with professor Sher Doruff in 2014.  They both came in contact with Sher during their study at UvA while Sher was a lecturer there, together they conceptualized and organized Café Chercher for the first two seasons. Each season, new students and alumni of the same program have joined the organization. 

Currently, Café Chercher has reached its fourth season. Artists Emily Huurdeman and Dalida Georgiou-Achmet form the core-team members and responsible for the programming, organizing, and the stimulation of inter-institutional connections. Each year new students Artistic Research join the team and contribute to the program and organization of Café Chercher. 

 

Sponsors & Supporters 

Café Chercher is sponsored by the Rietveld Research Group; Making Things Public. We are supported by ARIAS (Amsterdam Research Institute of the Arts and Sciences), the research Master Artistic Research UvA, and VOX-POP Creative Space UvA.

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