A conference in four chapters
Starting this January, join us for a series of conferences in Rotterdam, Paris, Berlin, and New York launching off the next ten years of e-flux journal.
“Exile”
Saturday, January 26, 2019
Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art, Rotterdam
In 1862, Lord Acton warned: Exile is the nursery of nationality. Nationhood and belonging are born from estrangement. A new nation is nourished by identifying lost entitlements, by cultivating a true belonging that was violated or interrupted, somehow denied or deferred. Co-organized by Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art and e-flux journal, in collaboration with Erasmus University College and the Rotterdam Arts & Sciences Lab, “Exile” asks: What have I been estranged from? What have I been denied? But also: What is encouraging me to sense these debts, to settle scores?
With lectures, responses, and workshops by Julieta Aranda, Kaye Cain-Nielsen, Binna Choi, Sofia Hernandez Chong Cuy, iLiana Fokianaki, Coco Fusco, Jeanne van Heeswijk, Charl Landvreugd, Chus Martinez, Metahaven, Christian Nyampeta, Anton Vidokle, Mary Wang, and Brian Kuan Wood.
“The Twilight Symposium: Science Fiction Inside Colonialism”
Saturday, February 2 and Sunday, February 3, 2019
La Colonie, Paris
The Canadian science fiction writer Nalo Hopkinson wrote “To be a person of colour writing science fiction is to be under suspicion of having internalized one’s colonization.” Of course, the problem isn’t the fiction, but the science—the belief that the Western scientism saturating our current technologies can create entirely new dreamworlds other than the colonial frontiers it has already created. Co-organized by La Colonie and e-flux journal, the “Twilight Symposium” asks: Isn’t the first challenge of any science fiction written with an awareness of colonial history: Can technology be detached from its role in scientifically justifying European world domination?
With lectures, films, and discussions by Julieta Aranda, Kader Attia, Robert Bird, Kaye Cain-Nielsen, Bodhisattva Chattopadhyay, Ali Cherri, Kodwo Eshun, Marie-Nour Hechaimé, Maha Maamoun, Mahan Moalemi, Chantal Pontbriand, Rasha Salti, Jihan El-Tahri, Anton Vidokle, and Brian Kuan Wood.
“Navigation Beyond Vision”
Friday, April 5 and Saturday, April 6, 2019
Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin
Navigation begins where the map ends. Navigation operates on a plane of immanence in constant motion, with its own orientation, layer, and horizon. Co-organized by the Harun Farocki Institut and e-flux journal, “Navigation Beyond Vision” asks: How shall we conceive of navigational paradigms in virtual environments and gamespace as they increasingly inform the political ontology of the image? If navigation is currently replacing montage, as the late Harun Farocki intimated, how does this shift in visual modeling affect our concepts of political action and intervention?
With lectures, films, and discussions by Ramon Amaro, Julieta Aranda, Maïté Chénière, Kodwo Eshun, Jennifer Gabrys, Tom Holert, Doreen Mende, Gloria Meynen, Hito Steyerl, Oraib Toukan, Vassilis Tsianos, Anton Vidokle, Brian Kuan Wood, and others.
“Art After Culture”
Friday, May 3 and Saturday, May 4, 2019
e-flux, New York
In recent years it has proven increasingly difficult to sustain modern and humanist ambitions for art, either because they originate in the cultural particularities of European scientific, industrial, and political revolutions, or because humanity itself is no longer triumphal amidst global economic flows and looming planetary ecological meltdown. And yet, when institutions that were not qualified to blaze pathways for all of humankind to begin with come down from their galactic ambitions, they often land on culture—not as a project or technology, but as a natural fact or preordained order. The cumulative conference at e-flux asks: After these given cultural orders present no alternative to—and possibly something far more oppressive than—the bloated agencies of humanism, what is the project that art must necessarily undertake? What is art after culture?
We will be sharing more details on these programs in the coming days, so please stay tuned—and save the dates!
