Biography
Rene Beekman was born in the Netherlands. He received a BA in media arts from the AKI (Enschede, the Netherlands) and an MA in philosophy from the Sofia University. Rene has been active in Bulgaria since 1995. Since 2003 he permanently lives and works in Sofia.
As an artist, his works are distributed by LIMA (Amsterdam) and The Kitchen (New York). They have been broadcast in the Netherlands, Germany and Latvia, and shown in Austria, Canada, China, Croatia, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, Switzerland, the UK, the Ukraine and the United States, among others. His audio-work has been broadcasted on radio in the Netherlands and the U.S. and released on CD by Audio Research Editions.
In 2003 he created the interactive video environment for the performance of Mr. Ibrahim and the Flowers of the Koran, directed by Snezhina Tankovska, at the National Theater in Sofia. His writing has appeared, among others, in L&B Series of Philosophy of Art and Art Theory and in Leonardo Digital Reviews.
Rene is one of the founders of the Digital Arts MA Programme at the National Academy of Arts in Sofia, where he taught between 2008 and 2016. He was co-founder and co-curator, together with Krassimir Terziev, of the xfilm festival (2005) and xfilm lectures, and co-organiser and curator of the first two editions of the DA Festival (2009 and 2010). René Beekman curated the exhibitions Hello World (Vaska Emanouilova Gallery, Sofia, 2012), Being Post-Digital (2015, during Design Week 2015, Plovdiv) and Bodies that generate images (The Fridge, Sofia, 2018, solo exhibition of Stefan Donchev) In 2017, he established the Post-digital Laboratory at the Red House, which included workshops, commissions for new work and an exhibition. Together with Albena Baeva, Rene founded Reaktiv, a boutique studio for interactive design; they organised Dorkbot Sofia and Ignite Sofia; and curated the exhibition, Friendly Little Creatures (2016, Credo Bonum Gallery, Sofia; Contemporary Space, Varna and U10, Belgrade).
Gallery
Rene Beekman, Petya Boyukova
Friendly Little Creatures (installation view at U10 Gallery, Belgrade), 2017.
Digital Art
Details
- Photographer: Reaktiv
- Description: The exhibition Friendly Little Creatures was curated by Rene Beekman and Albena Baeva. Friendly Little Creatures is a project by Reaktiv studio for interactive installations, together with the Foundation for Entrepreneurship, Culture and Education. The exhibition was first shown in 2016 at the Credo Bonum Gallery in Sofia, and later in the same year at the gallery Contemporary space in Varna. In 2017 it was shown in the U10 gallery in Belgrade.
Artists in the exhibition: Albena Baeva, Rene Beekman, Nikoleta Boncheva, Petya Boyukova, Stefan Donchev and Ivan Shopov.
Works in the photo, from background to foreground: live video streaming from Whenever There is a Way by Rene Beekman, Helpi by Petya Boyukova and Whenever There is a Way by Rene Beekman. - Copyright: Over the photo: Reaktiv
Gry Bech-Hanssen, Justin Bennett, HC Gilje, Eva-Cecilie Richardsen, TIne Rude
Performance Synk by Kreutzerkompani during xfilm festival (2015, Akademia Gallery), 2015.
Digital Art
Details
- Photographer: Rene Beekman
- Description: The xfilm festival for experimental film, video and new media took place in April 2005 in a number of locations in Sofia. Initiators and curators for the festival were Rene Beekman and Krassimir Terziev. The festival include a film programme with close to 80 films, including films by John Whitney, Stan Vanderbeek, Larry Cuba, Mathew Slanger, and many others, most of which were shown for the first time in Bulgaria. Also included in the festival was an exhibition of Soft Cinema by Lev Manovich, lectures by Manovich, Hans Beekmans and Jeremy Welsh, and live performances by Kreutzerkompani, Radbaud Mens, Remko Schuurbiers, Frank Bretschneider, Telcosystems and Bas van Koolwijk.
See also the full festival catalog included in the documents. - Copyright: Over the photo: Rene Beekman
Rene Beekman and Albena Baeva
Aya (software code printout), 2016.
Digital Art
Details
- Photographer: Reaktiv
- Description: The exhibition Friendly Little Creatures was curated by Rene Beekman and Albena Baeva. Friendly Little Creatures is a project by Reaktiv studio for interactive installations, together with the Foundation for Entrepreneurship, Culture and Education. The exhibition was first shown in 2016 at the Credo Bonum Gallery in Sofia, and later in the same year at the gallery Contemporary space in Varna. In 2017 it was shown in the U10 gallery in Belgrade.
Artists in the exhibition: Albena Baeva, Rene Beekman, Nikoleta Boncheva, Petya Boyukova, Stefan Donchev and Ivan Shopov.
The photo shows a fragment of the software code for Aya by Rene Beekman and Albena Baeva. - Copyright: Over the photo: Reaktiv
Stefan Donchev
Iztrivane by Stefan Donchev (installation view at the Hello World exhibition), 2012.
Digital Art
Details
- Photographer: Иван Пейков
- Description: Hello World was the first public exhibition of the first graduates from the then-newly formed Digital Arts MA programme at the National Academy of Arts in Sofia. The exhibition was curated by Rene Beekman. The exhibition opened at the Vaska Emanouilova Gallery in Sofia and was later shown at Contemporary Space in Varna.
Artists in the exhibition were: Albena Baeva, Nikoleta Boncheva, Neli Borisova, Stefan Donchev, Yana Krachunova and Martin Penev. - Copyright: on the photo: Ivan Peykov
(from left to right) Addie Wagenknecht, Albena Baeva, LIA, Carl-Johan Rosén, Gilles de Brock and Frederik de Wilde
“Being post-digital” (exhibition overview), 2015.
Digital Art
Details
- Photographer: Maritsa Kolcheva
- Description: Exhibition overview of Being Post-Digital at gallery of the Union of Artists in Plovdiv. Being Post-Digital took place within the framework of One Design Week 2015 in the gallery of the Union of Artists and the City Gallery in Plovdiv. A total of 30 artists from 8 different countries took part. The exhibition was curated by Rene Beekman.
Works in the photo, from left to right are: Black Hawk Paint by Addie Wagenknecht, The Last Benjamin by Albena Baeva, Filament Sculptures by LIA, I Speak Myself Into an Object by Carl-Johan Rosén, The New Public Space by Gilles de Brock and Quantum Foam #1 by Frederik de Wilde. - Copyright: On the photo: Maritsa Kolcheva (One Design Week)