Martinka Bobriková & Oscar de Carmen

Bio

Martinka Bobrikova & Oscar de Carmen have been working together as an artistic duo since 2005. Their practice, which is often community based, aims at setting up new social ecosystems. By revolving around the mechanisms and context by which power creates systems of value, they seek to intervene on the border between art and current topics of contemporary life in order to bring about the proposition of the transitory and the utopian.
They have participated in several residencies such as Arctic Art Institute in Arkhangelsk, Seoul Art Space_Geumcheon, HomeBase Saitama, KulturKontakt Austria, Nida art Colony or MeetFactory. Their works have been presented in venues and projects such as Galerie 35M2 in Prague, Oksasenkatu 11 in Helsinki and Galleri BOA in Oslo (2018), Gallery RAM in Oslo, 5th Odessa Biennale, Fotogalleriet in Oslo, Agrikultura Triennial in Malmo, Seoul Art Space Geumcheon (2017); the Saitama Triennial, Nitra Gallery, Akershus Kunstnersenter, Tranzit.sk (2016); 2nd Tbilisi Triennial, Prague Quadrennial, Babel Art Space, Entrance Gallery (2015); Centre Contemporary Art in Singapore, Høstutstillingen, Kunstnerneshus, ANX/ Atelier Nord, Skånes Konstforening, City Gallery Bratislava (2014); Karlin Studio, Rake (2013); Museum of Contemporary Art Roskilde, KURANT, (2012); Singuhr (2011); Center of Contemporary Art– Tbilisi, Röda Sten, City Museum of Gothenburg, Space Gallery (2010).
Since 2012 they run Nomad AiR, a Nomadic artist-in-residence program focuses on the notion of hospitality and the social relations between “host” and “guest” para-siting the infrastructure of other institutions and in 2017 they co-funded the project / residency program Future Utopia Community Key which is dedicated to the activities in the rural village of Uddebo and the area. The project is a collaborative agency, dedicated to new social bonding and community building.

1000 bottles of tap water

2016
(1 of 1000 bottles + series of 3 pictures)


Norway has the second best quality of tap water in the world, provided for its citizens. A few years ago, a report on Norwegian television questioned the source of water used by the luxury bottled Voss brand. Supposedly these uniquely designed bottles are filled with water from the urban network, the same one that caters the city of Iveland. 1000 bottles of tap water; Intends to generate, for a limited period of time, a social ecosystem outside of everyday consumption. The
intervention will be carried through the re-appropriation of a common consumer product; bottled water. Handcrafted tap water will be bottled, to explore the concept of Utopia and setting a value of transition from the current power in the economic sphere. The intervention provides 1000 free water bottles filled from Oslo tap water to people circulating in the surroundings of the central train station in Oslo. April 9 2016 10-16h cca.
The project was commissioned by Kunst Vardo for FEED festival 9-24 APRIL in Oslo.

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