Interrupting the Flow. Art & Activism in the City, Day 1

In the course of the last two years – while researching on the 7th Berlin Biennale “Forget Fear” and on the 24/7 marathon “Truth is concrete” at steirischer herbst 2012 – our interest was focused on artistic strategies in politics and political strategies in art. Concepts such as citizen art, useful art, performative democracy, or political choreography mark a common field of art and activism. The urban landscape and the social tissue of the city is the most obvious agonistic playgrounds for these negotiations.
This workshop concentrates on very concrete and many local examples. After a fast and subjective view on site specific art and activism from all over the world (such as Reverend Billy, Occupy Museums, Public Movement, Rimini Protokoll and several examples vom BB7) we look – while walking through the city – at several initiatives and art projects in Berlin, that play with the political and the performative.

Two nearby places shows past, present and future of urban struggles in Kreuzberg in a nutshell.
At Kottbusser Tor, the squatting moment of the 1980s started in opposition to the concrete high-rise buildings. Now “Kotti&Co” – a broad coalition of people with different ethnic, social and educational backgrounds – defends the right to live in these affordable social housing complexes. Moritzplatz in the 1980s was the studio of the so called “Neue Wilden”, a expressionist-queer group of painters. Now – with Aufbau-Haus, Planet Modulor, Beta-Haus or Prinzessinnen-Gärten – a “creative cluster” emerges right here.

17.30 Walk to Markthalle Neun, Eisenbahnstraße 42/43, 10997 Berlin

18.00 – 18.15 Introductions to Markthalle and its concept by Nikolaus Driessen, one of the initiators.

18.15 – 19.15 Presentation „Chez Icke“ with Gesine Dankwart

Chez Icke is a virtuell-real barfactory, which happens at different real places and via internet as a good old favourite pub and at the same moment as an interactive performance of a world wide web pub. It first was presented in Berlin at Markthalle Kreuzberg as a production of HAU – Hebbel am Ufer and will continue now in the four cities of Impulse Theater Biennale 2013.

19.15-20.00 Presentation „Dinner Exchange Berlin“ by Sandra Teitge

Dinner Exchange Berlin is a supper club initiated by Sarah Mewes and Sandra Teitge. The menus are composed of fruit and vegetables, which would have gone to waste at the end of a market day. A part of guests’ donations go to organisations concerned with food waste. Dinner Exchange Berlin has cooked in different frameworks, including the dOCUMENTA 13 and the KW – Institute for Contemporary Art Berlin, and occasionally invites speakers from various fields to discuss and performatively present a specific topic. Dinner Exchange Berlin prepares Table Talks for the Georgian Pavilion in 55th Venice Biennale.