The herbst Academy is a discursive space in the midst of steirischer herbst festival. Two workshops lasting four days and two discursive nights complement each other to create a tightly packed examination of the main question of the 50th iteration of the festival: “Where Are We Now?”

This anniversary as an occasion to pause for a moment to ask ourselves whether we might not define our place in the world and the roads that we aim to take differently. After all, the languages used so far to talk about the future appear to tie us down to present-day horizons. What could a different system of reference look like? What are its core values? What languages does it need? What kind of thinking? And in what spaces and conditions could this thinking be successful?

The herbst Academy 2017 workshops will take place from October 10–13, 2017

Workshop 1: Activist Sense—A Series of Micro-Relays
With ArchipelagoLab, Max Heinrich, Helvetia Leal
German and English language
Target group: artists, activists, cultural workers, knowledge workers, students

Against the resurgence of new grand narratives of crisis, depression and a desire for a Neue Überschaubarkeit (New Simplicity)—towards a general shift of perception to the minority, molecular or minute as part of social movements. Based on questions of temporality, dreaming alternatives and the positioning of one’s own practice, we aim to explore together what might be called Activist Sense: sense, between the sensory and sense-affording; action and activation as they relate to activisms. In the course of the three-day workshop we want to examine ways of “shaping time” by means of social practices. On the basis of artistic, philosophical input and writings we engage in the morning in a process of collective experimentation, with a different emphasis every day on micro-politics, micro-perceptions and micro-temporalities. We are specifically interested in micro-relays, that is to say, movements or gestures of commonality. Carrying these experiences with us, we will then go on to explore new places and spaces of the social, individually or in small groups. We will join up again in the late afternoon in order to interrelate the traces of what we have experienced and felt in a space-embracing diagram and thus to create our own expression of Activist Sense.

Workshop 2: Materialfragen
With Eiko Grimberg, Clemens von Wedemeyer
German language
Target group: artists, cultural workers, knowledge workers, students

How can contemporary art be created from documentary material? How can archives become manifestations of the present? Artists Clemens von Wedemeyer and Eiko Grimberg join the workshop’s participants to discuss how artworks based on filed material are shaped by the organising principles of archives and the artist’s subjective approach to the information stored. The focus is on Grimberg’s series of photos “Future History / The Pool” and on video works from von Wedemeyer’s “P.O.V. – Point of View” series, all on display in this year’s herbst exhibition. “P.O.V.” is based on 16mm footage shot by cavalry captain and amateur film-maker Arnold Freiherr von Vietinghoff-Riesch behind WWII front lines across Europe. The workshop aims to investigate ways of placing archived material in new contexts, of revealing hidden knowledge by means of experimental artistic presentations and installations: What does this tell us about the person behind the camera? What spheres of tradition impact on the (re)presentation? And what remains unseen?

Discursive Nights: Where Are We Now? A joint attempt to define our position in theory and practice
October 12–13
With Travis Alabanza, Heidi Ballett, Clémentine Deliss, Tim Etchells, Christiane Kühl, Walter Mignolo, Terence Nance, Tobias Revell, Marcus Steinweg

This year’s conference is a philosophical canteen: take a seat and be inspired by international artists and theorists—and your neighbours at the table! Between the talks and performances you’ll have lots of time to spin out what you have heard. The nine invited speakers present alternative perspectives, languages and logics of understanding, organising and imagining the world—from Oceanic thinking and alternative logics of being-in-the-world to a decolonial view of a Eurocentric “we.”

Costs
As a contribution to costs there is a charge for each workshop. Lunch is provided each workshop day. Also included is dinner on the first evening and admission to the discursive nights. Costs of travel and accommodation must be paid for by the participants. After registration, you will receive a list of steirischer herbst partner hotels.

Registration
For a detailed schedule and registration please visit www.steirischerherbst.at/academy
Deadline for registration: Thursday, August 31

Further information
Johanna Rainer
T +43 316 823 007 82 / M +43 664 24 500 82 / academy@steirischerherbst.at

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www.steirischerherbst.at