Listen for the body of the other

2008 - In Curatorial Work

”Listen for the body of the other”
- On choreography, relations and diversity


The seminar presents lectures by Goran Sergej Pristaš, Ivana Ivković and Tomislav Medak, Solveig Gade, Hannah Hurtzig and Thomas Frank. They have in common a theoretical approach to the fields they are working within; artistic, dramaturgic work, curating and writing about contemporary art, dance, theatre and performance. The title of the seminar is from an interview in the magazine Frakcija no. 20/21 with the choreographer and dancer Nikolina Pristaš from BADco. The poetic sentence contains different aspects and key words for the seminar; relation, the body, to listen and the other.


Zagreb's independent cultural scene - innovative self-organization models
Goran Sergej Pristaš, Ivana Ivković and Tomislav Medak

Friday 24th of October 2008 at 15.30
Røkeriet, USF Verftet

Zagreb's non-institutional cultural scene includes an interesting underlying communicational web of several self-organized platforms of exchange. In the lecture Pristaš, Ivković and Medak will briefly describe 5 key initiatives: an independent policy discussion platform - Policy_Forum that grew from the need to be more vocal in advocating changes in cultural policy issues in Croatia bringing together operators from the non-institutional cultural scene because of official cultural policies on municipal and state levels being either non-existent or sorely lagging behind the actual cultural production; Clubture (Klubtura) – a tactical network of independent cultural organizations from numerous Croatian cities based on programme exchange, decentralization of cultural production and intensification of cultural activity in smaller towns and cities; EkS-scena (Experimental Free Scene), a self-organized working platform of young dancers and choreographers, coordinating programmes that have almost single-handedly revitalized Croatia's contemporary dance scene education and production in the past six years; Zagreb – Cultural Kapital of Europe 3000 (ZCK3000), a collaborative platform by eight of Zagreb's more prominent and active non-institutional cultural organizations from different fields (performing arts, social and media theory, architecture and urban planning), visual arts); and Reclaim the City, an urban and public domain oriented, activism driven initiative stemming from the cultural scene, but with a real impact in the political life of the city of Zagreb.

Goran Sergej Pristaš is a dramaturge, a professor at the Academy of Drama Arts in Zagreb, a program co-ordinator in Centre for Drama Art in Zagreb. Founder and until recently editor-in-chief of the performing arts magazine Frakcija and one of initiators of the project Zagreb – Cultural Kapital of Europe 3000.

Ivana Ivković studies at the Department of Dramaturgy at the Academy of Drama Arts in Zagreb. She is a member of the editorial board of Frakcija Journal for Performing Arts and also collaborates wit the 3rd Program of Croatian Radio, several publications, the Center for Drama Art and has worked as the general coordinator of Zagreb-Cultural Kapital of Europe 3000. She collaborates as dramaturge with two Zagreb based independent companies oour and BADco. She is co-editor of the textual and pictorial reader “DemoKino- Virtual Biopolitical Agora” with Davide Grassi (Aksioma and Maska, 2006)

Tomislav Medak studied Philosophy, German and Literature at the Philosophical Faculty in Zagreb. The focus of his work is social, biopolitical and media theory, in particular socio-theoretical implications of new technologies and new media. He is currently co-ordinating a theory and research program and the publishing activities at the Multimedia Institute in Zagreb. Recently he directed his research work at social and cultural policies - investigating wider implications of and alternatives to existing IPR frameworks, protection of the public domain and regimes of management and representation of creative production. Tomislav Medak is active as performer and choreographer with the Zagreb based dance company BADco.




Kunst, sted og offentlighet
Solveig Gade

Friday 31st of October 2008 at 13.00
Bergen National Academy of the Arts, Marken 37, 3rd floor

The lecture will start with a mapping and critical discussion of several major theoretical positions in the relations between art, public space and the site-specific. With this as a background and with a special focus on inclusion and exclusion, Solveig Gade will look closer on Christoph Schlingensief and Center for Urbanitet and Dialog’s attempt in several relational orientated and site-specific projects to create temporary spaces for critic publicity. Her lecture will bring some theoretical reflections to one of the major projects at this years Oktoberdans, Dans til folket (Dance to the people) which take place at several locations in the City of Bergen.

Solveig Gade is cand. mag. in Nordic language and science of literature. In spring this year she finished her PhD. thesis about relational and intervening strategies in contemporary art. She has written articles about contemporary art and performing art in the anthology Performative Realism and for the magazines Kritik, Glänta, Peripeti and 3t. Gade was co-editor of the Danish magazine Teater 1 from 2000-2004 and since 2005 co-editor of the magazine Peripeti. She is working at the University of Copenhagen and as a dramaturge at the Royal Danish Theatre.


On Experts, Non-Knowledge and the Buzzing of the Archive
Hannah Hurtzig
Saturday 1st of November at 13.00
Hordaland Kunstsenter

Hannah Hurtzig is directing since 1999 the Mobile Academy, a temporary art institution frequently changing its location, combining interdisciplinary courses with fieldwork, theory and activism (Bochum 1999, Berlin 2002 and 2004 and Warsaw 2006). As part of Tulip House, a company dealing with the construction of public spaces experimenting with new narrative formats for the production and mediation of knowledge, she has been presenting different installation projects: “KIOSK for useful knowledge” (Kunstverein Köln, KW Berlin, MQ Vienna, ZKM Karlsruhe, Volksbühne am Rosa - Luxemburg - Platz Berlin), BLACKMARKET FOR USEFUL
KNOWLEDGE AND NON-KNOWLEDGE” (Kunstverein Hamburg 2005, Technical University Warsaw 2005, Hebbel am Ufer 2006, sterischer herbst Graz 2007, Istanbul Biennal 2007, Vienna Festwochen 2008), ”Future Perfect Advice Bureau” (Hebbel am Ufer Berlin 2008) og ”Night Lesson No.1” (Manifesta7 2008).
http://www.kiosk-berlin.de
http://www.mobileacademy-berlin.com


Changing Places
Thomas Frank

Saturday 1st of November 2008 at 13.00
Hordaland kunstsenter

For the last eight years, Thomas Frank has worked as curator, dramaturge and producer for international performing arts projects with different institutions in Frankfurt, Berlin and Vienna. In every place, he had to cope with introducing unknown artists with experimental projects and unfamiliar content. The presentation by Thomas Frank will reflect on the continuities in the development of artistic principles in contemporary theatre and the reflection of the production circumstances in the different places. About changing from one place to another with certain artistic proposals in the baggage and how the places changed the ways of collaborations with artists.

Thomas Frank has background from theatre, communication and media studies at Universität Leipzig and University of Glasgow. From 2000 to 2004 he was assistant artistic director, dramaturge and curator at Künstlerhaus MOUSONTRUM in Frankfurt a.M. where he was curator of international arts programs such as ‘plateaux – international platform for young theatre directors’ and the ‘international summer academy’. In 2004 he gave lectures for independent theatre / off theatre at the University of Music & Theatre Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Leipzig. From 2005 to 2007 he worked as dramaturge and head of the artistic program at Sophiensaele in Berlin. He has been an executive producer of national and international performing arts productions. In 2006 he was artistic advisor of the ‘breathing space’ program at Arnolfini Bristol, Green Room Manchester and Tramway Glasgow (UK). He has been a guest dramaturge at Sydney Theatre Company and the National Playwrights Conference Perth 2006 (Australia). In 2007 the founder of ‘brut Wien’, an interdisciplinary production centre for performing arts in Vienna where he works as artistic director and business management (brut-wien.at).

Publications: We Love You – on audiences, Thomas Frank & Mark Waugh (Ed.), Revolver, Frankfurt a.M. 2005. Cross the border, close the gap. Über die internationale Produktion interdisziplinärer Kunst, In ‘Spielräume produzieren’, Theater der Zeit Verlag, Berlin 2006.

Prices: 30, - for each lecture. The seminar is part of Oktoberdans.
The seminar is in collaboration with BIT Teatergarasjen and is supported by Arts Council Norway and Fritt ord.

Listen for the body of the other

2008 - In Curatorial Work

”Listen for the body of the other”
- On choreography, relations and diversity


The seminar presents lectures by Goran Sergej Pristaš, Ivana Ivković and Tomislav Medak, Solveig Gade, Hannah Hurtzig and Thomas Frank. They have in common a theoretical approach to the fields they are working within; artistic, dramaturgic work, curating and writing about contemporary art, dance, theatre and performance. The title of the seminar is from an interview in the magazine Frakcija no. 20/21 with the choreographer and dancer Nikolina Pristaš from BADco. The poetic sentence contains different aspects and key words for the seminar; relation, the body, to listen and the other.


Zagreb's independent cultural scene - innovative self-organization models
Goran Sergej Pristaš, Ivana Ivković and Tomislav Medak

Friday 24th of October 2008 at 15.30
Røkeriet, USF Verftet

Zagreb's non-institutional cultural scene includes an interesting underlying communicational web of several self-organized platforms of exchange. In the lecture Pristaš, Ivković and Medak will briefly describe 5 key initiatives: an independent policy discussion platform - Policy_Forum that grew from the need to be more vocal in advocating changes in cultural policy issues in Croatia bringing together operators from the non-institutional cultural scene because of official cultural policies on municipal and state levels being either non-existent or sorely lagging behind the actual cultural production; Clubture (Klubtura) – a tactical network of independent cultural organizations from numerous Croatian cities based on programme exchange, decentralization of cultural production and intensification of cultural activity in smaller towns and cities; EkS-scena (Experimental Free Scene), a self-organized working platform of young dancers and choreographers, coordinating programmes that have almost single-handedly revitalized Croatia's contemporary dance scene education and production in the past six years; Zagreb – Cultural Kapital of Europe 3000 (ZCK3000), a collaborative platform by eight of Zagreb's more prominent and active non-institutional cultural organizations from different fields (performing arts, social and media theory, architecture and urban planning), visual arts); and Reclaim the City, an urban and public domain oriented, activism driven initiative stemming from the cultural scene, but with a real impact in the political life of the city of Zagreb.

Goran Sergej Pristaš is a dramaturge, a professor at the Academy of Drama Arts in Zagreb, a program co-ordinator in Centre for Drama Art in Zagreb. Founder and until recently editor-in-chief of the performing arts magazine Frakcija and one of initiators of the project Zagreb – Cultural Kapital of Europe 3000.

Ivana Ivković studies at the Department of Dramaturgy at the Academy of Drama Arts in Zagreb. She is a member of the editorial board of Frakcija Journal for Performing Arts and also collaborates wit the 3rd Program of Croatian Radio, several publications, the Center for Drama Art and has worked as the general coordinator of Zagreb-Cultural Kapital of Europe 3000. She collaborates as dramaturge with two Zagreb based independent companies oour and BADco. She is co-editor of the textual and pictorial reader “DemoKino- Virtual Biopolitical Agora” with Davide Grassi (Aksioma and Maska, 2006)

Tomislav Medak studied Philosophy, German and Literature at the Philosophical Faculty in Zagreb. The focus of his work is social, biopolitical and media theory, in particular socio-theoretical implications of new technologies and new media. He is currently co-ordinating a theory and research program and the publishing activities at the Multimedia Institute in Zagreb. Recently he directed his research work at social and cultural policies - investigating wider implications of and alternatives to existing IPR frameworks, protection of the public domain and regimes of management and representation of creative production. Tomislav Medak is active as performer and choreographer with the Zagreb based dance company BADco.




Kunst, sted og offentlighet
Solveig Gade

Friday 31st of October 2008 at 13.00
Bergen National Academy of the Arts, Marken 37, 3rd floor

The lecture will start with a mapping and critical discussion of several major theoretical positions in the relations between art, public space and the site-specific. With this as a background and with a special focus on inclusion and exclusion, Solveig Gade will look closer on Christoph Schlingensief and Center for Urbanitet and Dialog’s attempt in several relational orientated and site-specific projects to create temporary spaces for critic publicity. Her lecture will bring some theoretical reflections to one of the major projects at this years Oktoberdans, Dans til folket (Dance to the people) which take place at several locations in the City of Bergen.

Solveig Gade is cand. mag. in Nordic language and science of literature. In spring this year she finished her PhD. thesis about relational and intervening strategies in contemporary art. She has written articles about contemporary art and performing art in the anthology Performative Realism and for the magazines Kritik, Glänta, Peripeti and 3t. Gade was co-editor of the Danish magazine Teater 1 from 2000-2004 and since 2005 co-editor of the magazine Peripeti. She is working at the University of Copenhagen and as a dramaturge at the Royal Danish Theatre.


On Experts, Non-Knowledge and the Buzzing of the Archive
Hannah Hurtzig
Saturday 1st of November at 13.00
Hordaland Kunstsenter

Hannah Hurtzig is directing since 1999 the Mobile Academy, a temporary art institution frequently changing its location, combining interdisciplinary courses with fieldwork, theory and activism (Bochum 1999, Berlin 2002 and 2004 and Warsaw 2006). As part of Tulip House, a company dealing with the construction of public spaces experimenting with new narrative formats for the production and mediation of knowledge, she has been presenting different installation projects: “KIOSK for useful knowledge” (Kunstverein Köln, KW Berlin, MQ Vienna, ZKM Karlsruhe, Volksbühne am Rosa - Luxemburg - Platz Berlin), BLACKMARKET FOR USEFUL
KNOWLEDGE AND NON-KNOWLEDGE” (Kunstverein Hamburg 2005, Technical University Warsaw 2005, Hebbel am Ufer 2006, sterischer herbst Graz 2007, Istanbul Biennal 2007, Vienna Festwochen 2008), ”Future Perfect Advice Bureau” (Hebbel am Ufer Berlin 2008) og ”Night Lesson No.1” (Manifesta7 2008).
http://www.kiosk-berlin.de
http://www.mobileacademy-berlin.com


Changing Places
Thomas Frank

Saturday 1st of November 2008 at 13.00
Hordaland kunstsenter

For the last eight years, Thomas Frank has worked as curator, dramaturge and producer for international performing arts projects with different institutions in Frankfurt, Berlin and Vienna. In every place, he had to cope with introducing unknown artists with experimental projects and unfamiliar content. The presentation by Thomas Frank will reflect on the continuities in the development of artistic principles in contemporary theatre and the reflection of the production circumstances in the different places. About changing from one place to another with certain artistic proposals in the baggage and how the places changed the ways of collaborations with artists.

Thomas Frank has background from theatre, communication and media studies at Universität Leipzig and University of Glasgow. From 2000 to 2004 he was assistant artistic director, dramaturge and curator at Künstlerhaus MOUSONTRUM in Frankfurt a.M. where he was curator of international arts programs such as ‘plateaux – international platform for young theatre directors’ and the ‘international summer academy’. In 2004 he gave lectures for independent theatre / off theatre at the University of Music & Theatre Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Leipzig. From 2005 to 2007 he worked as dramaturge and head of the artistic program at Sophiensaele in Berlin. He has been an executive producer of national and international performing arts productions. In 2006 he was artistic advisor of the ‘breathing space’ program at Arnolfini Bristol, Green Room Manchester and Tramway Glasgow (UK). He has been a guest dramaturge at Sydney Theatre Company and the National Playwrights Conference Perth 2006 (Australia). In 2007 the founder of ‘brut Wien’, an interdisciplinary production centre for performing arts in Vienna where he works as artistic director and business management (brut-wien.at).

Publications: We Love You – on audiences, Thomas Frank & Mark Waugh (Ed.), Revolver, Frankfurt a.M. 2005. Cross the border, close the gap. Über die internationale Produktion interdisziplinärer Kunst, In ‘Spielräume produzieren’, Theater der Zeit Verlag, Berlin 2006.

Prices: 30, - for each lecture. The seminar is part of Oktoberdans.
The seminar is in collaboration with BIT Teatergarasjen and is supported by Arts Council Norway and Fritt ord.