IN NOBODY’S SERVICE

What is care, if turned away from the customers, back to the providers themselves? 

IN NOBODY’S SERVICE is an exhibition and event programme focusing on a multidisciplinary approach to history writing, labour, love, and care in contemporary arts practice. The project, curated by Sarnt Utamachote in collaboration with un.thai.tled collective as part of the POLY programme of Galerie Wedding, departs from the extremely violent cliché of images that are projected on especially Thai and Filipina women and queer bodies. Some have been asked “are you married to a German guy?” during their visa application, some have been called “women from the catalogue”, some “prostitute”, some “maids”. These racist words triggered us, the collective un.thai.tled, to dig deeper into such histories and, unfortunately, realities. The resulting exhibition features videos, installations, drawings and an archive that addresses such historical entanglement and relationship between the artists and communities surrounding them.

Migration histories from Thailand and Philippines to the West have been shaped by American influences and colonisation in the region and entangled the white colonisers’ military bases and their desires with the conditions of gendered migration after. With West Germany’s parallel interests in tourism and developing labour exchanges—of sex, care and the reproductive industry, it gave birth to the marriage agencies in Berlin linking husband and wife together, or cheap maid agencies across developing countries, the brothels and massage salons in Frankfurt am Main and Hamburg. Here, bodies have been rendered to mere “providers”—resulting in questions like the ones posed at the visa application centre.

Oppressive spaces can be subverted into places of care, comfort, and knowledge. De-stigmatizing this service sector (including sexwork) and its negative connotations on us, we take this as a chance to reclaim our rights to healing and temporal liberation. Via the intersection of class, gender, sexuality, and—if we may say—dreams, IN NOBODY’S SERVICE recognises the carved-out realities beyond the realms of  white husbands or social conditions—now available for us, now in nobody’s service.

When “that kind” and “this kind” come together, then we are unbeatable.

–un.thai.tled

IN NOBODY’S SERVICE
March 8–May 18, 2024
Opening on March 7, 5–10pm

An exhibition by collective un.thai.tled: Sarnt Utamachote & Wisanu Phu-artdun, Rosalia Namsai Engchuan, Natthapong Samakkaew, Jasmin Werner, Mon Sisu Satrawaha, Bussaraporn Thongchai, and Krisanta Caguioa-Mönnich

Curated by Sarnt Utamachote.
As part of the exhibition programme POLY 2024 at Galerie Wedding.
Interim Artistic Direction: Malte Pieper

In collaboration with Week Against Racism, Thaispora Podcast, Sinema Transtopia, Ban Ying Berlin and Gabriela Germany.

Further events on March 21, April 6, April 28, May 2–4, and May 18 include: curator’s tours in English, German, and Thai; performances; a music jam workshop; readings at Galerie Wedding; and film screenings at Sinema Transtopia.

Programme artists: Collective Gabriela Germany, Ban Ying shelter house and consultant service for migrant women, Raksa Seelapan (with Fah Passion-Asasu, Liad Hussein Kantoworicz), Analie Gepulanin Neiteler & Anika Baluran Schäfer, Sine Plambech & Sommai Molbaek, Stefanos Tai, Susanne Wycisk, Vijitra Kunawut

For more information on the programme, visit: galeriewedding.de