Giants of the Hoods finishes the Media Facades touring programme in Liverpool. Today the team's workshop created new characters and talked about "Liverpudlian" stereotypes at FACT. The freshly remixed characters will meet at the facade for a final dance battle event on Sat October 2.
04.09.2010
The Helsinki tour by Giants of the Hoods culminated in a dance battle at Lasipalatsi Square, with two fantastic characters at a time, dancing each other out on the Bio Rex wall, with great music from DJ Magic Sam.
Among the participants were giant dancers from other neighbourhoods, who returned to the city centre event to give their characters a final twist.
Check the wonderful dance samples on this video.
27.08.2010
Media Facades opening events during the Night of the Arts went beautifully despite the cool weather. The Helsinkian night-time audiences were breathing and touching with Hanna Haaslahti's Air Hunger and Heidi Tikka's At Hand, viewing the visionary landscapes of Ulu Braun, admiring the craftsmanship of Graffiti Analysis and creating abstract paintings with Action Flocking by OiOi collective. The club audience at mbar terrace also enjoyed the Remixed! VJ battle and urban visuals from the Random Doctors (VJ Finland). The Night culminated with the opening of Antoine Schmitt's City Sleep Light.
In Kontula, two films co-created by Alex Harrison/Tenantspin with residents of Helsinki and Liverpool were premiering, followed by Giants of the Hoods who inspired the young and the old dance the walls off. A report from Radio Kontula shows some highlights of the evening.
26.08.2010
Media Facades Helsinki starts today with pre-event in Kallio neighbourhood, 9 pm till midnight.
At the corner of Fleminginkatu and Vaasankatu, the Giants of the Hoods present an urban intervention, where participants collectively create giant characters of their neighborhoods, and dance to make the characters move. The project aims to create an easily accessible and playful platform for embodied dialogues, actions and comments about localities, identities and communities in urban living and lifestyles.
Join in and the dance the Giants with DJs Magic Sam and Dijcka! DJ Magic Samin ja DijckanDJ Magic Samin ja Dijckan
10.08.2010
The Giants of the Hoods project, produced for the Media Facades Festival is evolving rapidly. After internal workshops at the m-cult office, the Giants team has raided nearby neighbourhoods with night-time tests, done their first trial at Suvilahti and visited Kontula to co-create local giants characters. The project also launched their own website during summer - and the test videos are absolutely fun to watch!
03.05.2010
We are happy to announce the first 2 projects which will premiere in the Helsinki MFF festival, August 27-September 5.
Sini Haapalinna, Markku Nousiainen, Pia Lindy, Matti Niinimäki (FI): "Giants of the Hoods", participatory media and dance project.
Tenantspin (UK): media workshops on "Normality and citizenship" in Kontula (Helsinki) and Anfield (Liverpool).
Both projects use methods of participatory media to find out about local people's ideas of normality and locality. In Helsinki, the projects will be realized in Kontula.
The pair of projects are supported by an artist-in-residence exchange between Liverpool (FACT) and Helsinki (m-cult). The residencies are realized in co-operation with the Finnish Institute in London and HIAP, Helsinki International Artist Programme.
Read more in the attached press release (in Finnish).
