Body Hegemonies 2017: An Experimental Transfer
(2021)
author(s): Monica Clare van der Haagen-Wulff, Michael Lazar, Fabian Chyle
published in: Journal for Artistic Research
Body Hegemonies is an artistic project aimed at exploring and making transparent some of the themes of epistemic violence and hegemonic orders resulting from the legacy of colonialism and slavery, as the hidden flip-side of modernity and enlightenment. Our aim was to examine the Eurocentric logic of dehumanization and processes of exclusion from the perspective of bodies and their embeddedness within these hegemonic structures. The goal was to use artistic methods as tools to research topics commonly examined within an academic framework. The project focused on aspects of bodies that have been/are being excluded or made invisible within contemporary and historical discourses. “Body Hegemonies” worked on the trans-disciplinary interface (entanglement) of theorists, performers and everyday practitioners (experts), in an attempt to make possible other forms of knowing and knowledge production. Specifically, we tried to performatively re-inscribe the historically erased body within the production of knowledge. To engage with and explore these questions, a one-week laboratory was held in which six artists/(social)scientists gathered in a secluded location near Cologne Germany to hold video conversations with international experts over three days on the topics mentioned above. Resulting from these conversations, the Cologne participants presented individual performative responses to the group, which in turn were worked into a “performative score” presented to the public on the last day of the laboratory. This was flanked by a mini-symposium with two international scholars on the topic of body-hegemonies to expand the discursive field within which to locate and understand the artistic explorations.
Kin Tsugi Gestures
(2019)
author(s): Christina Stadlbauer
published in: Research Catalogue
This durational performance is part of Narratives of Imperfection and was taking place at the exhibition space SOLU, in Helsinki in November 2019.
Systems of Pain/Networks of Resilience (First Compilation)
(2017)
author(s): Meghan Moe Beitiks
published in: Journal for Artistic Research
'Systems of Pain/Networks of Resilience' is a creative exploration of observation and entanglement as tools for negotiating pain. Research on ecology, restoration, and psychology creates a series of videos, images, and performances. How do personal networks of resilience overcome systems of pain, both in human perspectives, and in ecologies? The project explores commonalities in the context of divisive cultural politics.
Artist Meghan Moe Beitiks begins her research with personal interviews. She discusses processes of recovery with people with both personal and professional experiences of trauma and recovery, including an ecological restoration specialist, an animal behaviourist, several survivors of abusive relationships, and many others. Clips from the interviews become the basis for visual and material explorations, generating videos, installations, and images. Stigma and prejudice emerge as barriers to healing – acceptance, observation, and listening, as common tools to accelerate it.
This compilation takes components of Beitiks’s research and arranges them within their own system of exploration. Observers’ perceptions of the work are both assisted and disrupted by audio descriptions. Originally intended to make the works accessible to non-sighted audiences, the descriptions also serve as an exploration of observation and objectivity. A seemingly unrelated pine wallpaper appears to have been unfairly categorised as “masculine,” prompting further questions about categorisation and labelling, as well as depictions of nature. Beitiks’s presence and movement in the work is described as androgynous, their body taking on the narratives described in the interview clips. Boundaries between various disciplines and narratives disappear—we instead experience the labour of connecting disparate entities, despite the limits of our own perceptions.
In and out of memory: exploring the tension when remembering a traumatic event.
(2015)
author(s): Anna Walker
published in: Journal for Artistic Research
The modernist approach to trauma points to an occurrence that demands representation and yet refuses to be represented (Roth 2012: 93); the intensity of the experience makes it difficult to remember and impossible to forget, making any form of recollection inadequate. This exposition explores the repetitive and unresolved notion of trauma using 11 September 2001 as the entry point to navigate a pathway backward into the past and all that was remembered, and uncovers what was forgotten in an effort to lay a traumatic memory to rest. The research began with a journal written on the day of and days following the disaster, which up until a couple of years ago remained closed and unread. Personal remembering is layered upon a well-established collective memory of the event and a vast array of literature, art, and theory written in response to 9/11.
The Group Who Loved To Draw A Flag
(last edited: 2024)
author(s): Riki Stollar
This exposition is in progress and its share status is: visible to all.
Thesis / Research Document of the Royal Academy of Art, The Hague, 2023.
Master Artistic Research (MAR).
Designed by Faina Faigin
Reflecting on personal experiences of being part of some groups and excluded from others makes me wonder how we connect when we are already clinging. Communities can be either chosen or forced, or both, which raises questions about how these bonds are formed and when we no longer belong.
Teleportation and Transformation: approaching the 'impossible' through storytelling and technology
(last edited: 2024)
author(s): Eirini Sourgiadaki
This exposition is in progress and its share status is: visible to all.
This research delves into the enduring human desire for immortality, omnipresence, and boundless existence, contrasting with the finite nature of human life. Employing language tools like metaphor and analogy, the project explores the metaphysical realm embedded in everyday culture, investigating the in-between moment of teleportation and transformation. This moment, often overlooked, is a threshold of change and ambiguity, prompting questions about the body's presence-absence in time and space. The research methodology remains open, evolving organically through exploration, experimentation, and engagement with hypnosis, meditation, storytelling, and somatic practices.
In a parallel exploration, the study draws inspiration from the historical origin of the term "Metaphysics," tracing its roots to Aristotle's works beyond the physical world. While acknowledging the dualisms inherent in metaphysics, the research embraces entanglement and recognizes the contemporary relevance of metaphysical inquiries in new materialism. Navigating the nostalgia for the past and the future, the study examines metaphysics as both a connection and a separation, akin to conjoined twins, contributing to ongoing philosophical conversations about existence, agency, and the interconnectedness of the material world.
Rubberneckers
(last edited: 2023)
author(s): Joana Dos Santos Almeida
This exposition is in review and its share status is: visible to all.
Thesis of the Royal Academy of Art, The Hague, 2023
BA Fine Arts
This Thesis is comprised of a series of chapters, which combine personal observations and analysis of existing theory and literature regarding the concept of trauma within the artistic context.
Throughout the text, I explore the choices and intuitive origins of the artistic practice with reference to my own experiences and connect them to my interest in the
traumatic.
Using Griselda Pollock’s writings on Trauma and art as a foundation, I explore the theoretical sides of trauma and how it operates, specifically that of psychoanalytical, scientific and philosophical texts. I aim to weave connections between the act of observation inherent to the artistic practice and the same spectacle associated with violent subject matter. This becomes the basis for the development of what I call, the ‘traumatic method’, which involves my ongoing research into this relationship.
Questions of affect and embodiment become key components of this thesis in regards to the function of using trauma as a conceptual starting point during the artistic process. Specifically the importance of re-enactment and treating the traumatic as a medium within itself rather than simply
subject matter.
El tiempo, la serpiente, el rayo y un robot.
(last edited: 2020)
author(s): FILODOXIA-PIEDRA, PAPEL Y TIJERA - MONICA VAN ASPEREN - MARTIN BOLAÑOS
This exposition is in progress and its share status is: visible to all.
Proponemos una lectura a partir de la obra de Aby Warburg en su relato sobre la magia e imaginación. Ambos, modos de existencia de un hombre que vivía a la intemperie y cuyo cuerpo es piel y agua. Cuerpo que puede herirse y al mismo tiempo inventar, en el diálogo con la naturaleza, un diseño.