08.09.2023

Experiences of Interdependence

Summer Schools, Roma

H12:30-14:30
Entrance: via Ludovisi 48

Dates
08.09.2023
Location
Roma
Category
Summer Schools
Information

H12:30-14:30
Entrance: via Ludovisi 48

The event will take place in the garden of Istituto Svizzero from H12:30 to H14:30.
Free entrance, register here.

Experiences of Interdependence

«Experiences of Interdependence» is a quote from an exchange process that has started in May 2023 and will be intensified in the framework of the Summer School Art and Activism at Istituto Svizzero in Rome. At the beginning of this process was an open question: How can art position itself in relation to current activist efforts and how can a dialogue be strengthened? – Eleven artists and art researchers associated with the Institute for Contemporary Art Research at the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) started to discuss this question in preliminary meetings that served to develop the program of the Summer School. During these conversations they questioned the discourses that feed alliances or distances between art and activism. Rather they asked about shared interests and experiences, for instance, with the entanglement of climate crisis, migration, and food, and with the forms of oppression and sovereignty that are ruling actual policies. These discussions form the grounds for encounters with artists, communities and organizations in Rome during the Summer School, opening to the forms of solidarity and alliance that are occupying spaces and counter narratives in the city.

On September 8, the Summer School group and its local dialogue partners will meet for a participatory harvest in the garden of Istituto Svizzero. The event will revolve around the practice of collective cooking and food, inviting local realities to make visible the intertwining of climate crisis, migration and extractivism. With the aim of creating a convivial and hospitable moment open to the public, the group invites everyone to taste the (culinary) results of the collective’s exchange process and to listen to the stories they embody.

After lunch, the Summer School will move to the Mediterranea Saving Humans Festival A Bordo, at the CittĂ  dell’Altra Economia, in the Testaccio district. An invitation to participate from 3pm in the festival programme, with a focus on the current scenario of migration, climate and war in Europe and beyond.

The participants of the Summer School are MFA-students of ZHdK’s Department of Fine Arts, doctoral and postdoctoral researchers associated with the IfCAR, and professors from the cooperation partner Mozarteum University Salzburg.

The event may be photographed and/or video recorded for archival, educational, and related promotional purposes. By attending this event, you are giving your consent to be photographed and/or video recorded.

Participants:
Noel Hochuli, Nic Hösli, Marc Kämpfen, Esther Kempf, Rada Leu, Gregor Neuerer, Elka Krajewska, Francisca Patrocinio, Laura von Niederhäusern, Elke Zobl, Selina Zürrer.

Artists, activists and local communities involved:
Andreco & Climate Art Project, Barikamà, Casetta Rossa, Cooperativa agricola Co.r.ag.gio, Feel Good Cooperative, Liryc Dela Cruz, Mediterranea Saving Humans, Rome Sustainable Food Project, Scomodo, Spin Time Labs, Stalker, Ultima Generazione.

Organizers:

Sara Alberani is an art historian, independent curator and activist based in Rome. She expresses her curatorial research in socially engaged art practices concerning communities and public spaces, focusing on long-term projects. Since 2019, she has been part of the refugee justice community centre Trampoline House in Copenhagen, and she has been curator for the collective’s participation in documenta fifteen, Kassel 2022. Since 2020 she is co-founder of LOCALES, a curatorial platform for the production of site-specific interventions and decolonial practices within the public space of Rome. She is part as activist of the civil society platform Mediterranea Saving Humans, in Rome. In 2023 she was selected for the MA DAI – Dutch Art Institute, she graduated with honors in Art History from La Sapienza University in Rome.

Marcel Bleuler is a researcher in the field of contemporary art and social engagement. After his PhD with a focus on media and performance studies, he left the realm of theory to work as a project manager in the field of art and civilian peace building. From this experience Marcel developed a practice-based and dialogue-oriented approach to research which brought him back to academia. In 2021, he developed the pre/doctoral program Transforming Environments at the Department of Fine Arts of the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK), where he is currently serving as head of the Institute for Contemporary Art Research (IfCAR).Â