Fritt Ord Foundation (The Freedom of Expression Foundation)
Uranienborgveien 2,
Oslo
Hours: 9–17hr
Free admission
Registration from August 5: [email protected]
Organized by Henie Onstad Kunstsenter in collaboration with Fritt Ord.
Coffee and lunch will be served.
In the aftermath of Anders Behring Breivik’s attacks 22 July in Norway, the Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek coined 2011 the year of dreaming dangerously. It is no longer a dream. In several countries, freedom of speech is restricted through different means of control, and right-wing extremism is on the rise once again. This seminar investigates freedom of speech as an image, as a gesture and as a term through three lectures, while five status reports given by artists, writers and curators from different regions of Europe will look at how this fundamental right is being altered, redefined, used and misused and fought for from the point of visual art.
Lectures by Boris Buden, Thomas Keenan and Marit Paasche.
Status reports: Behzad Khosravi (Sweden), Øyvind Strømmen (Norway), Burak Arikan (Turkey), Barnabás Bencsik (Hungary), Ekatarina Degot (Russia)
The seminar will conclude with Ahlam Shibli in conversation with Tone Hansen about her newest work, Death (2011–2012).
Moderated by Milena Hoegsberg.
This seminar is held in advance of the exhibition project We Are Living on a Star, opening 30 January 2014, at Henie Onstad Kunstsenter in collaboration with Fritt Ord, curated by Tone Hansen and Marit Paasche. The title comes from Hannah Ryggen’s tapestry from 1958 that was hanging in the Norwegian government building and suffered a tear in its lower part during the bombing in 2011. The project investigates the concepts of normality and freedom of speech. During and after the trial against Anders Behring Breivik, Norway was encompassed in a larger debate about his sanity and responsibility, about normality and the soundness of the mind. Normality, however, is far more than the opposite of insanity. The normative intervenes in all parts of society and regulates all our actions; it defines what is natural.
