VIDEONALE.18: Fluid States. Solid Matter

Opening Day: March 3, from 11am CET on videonalefestival.org
Festival Days: March 4–6, livestream on videonalefestival.org
Streaming VIDEONALE.18 works: March 3–7 on videonalefestival.org
Exhibition: March 4–April 18 at Kunstmuseum Bonn

Since we cannot open physically yet, we transformed the opening of the 18th edition of Videonale into a digital event! All opening events and live program will take place online on our website videonalefestival.org.

About the exhibition: Fluid States. Solid Matter
With 31 works selected from around 1,900 submissions, the VIDEONALE.18 entitled Fluid States. Solid Matter opens up a space of reference for reflecting on a changing world in which social, political, economic and ecological interrelations are reassessed and orders are newly constituted in complex dynamics. 

On what basis do we live, think and act today? And how are we shaping this basis for the future? Common Western anthropocentric concepts that have been applied to large parts of the remaining world over the course of history—from human rights via the notion of private property to the founding of nation states—are based on the assumption of a sovereign individual, a fixed and autonomous body with distinct contours and clear boundaries to its environment. But how does this body, our perception of it and thus its positioning in the world, change when we conceive it as a fluid body engaged in a constant exchange with other bodies and its human, natural and more-than-human surroundings? This idea of “Bodies of Water” (Astrida Neimanis) not only liquefies our conception of a clear separation between humans and nature, it also upends many other hitherto valid hierarchies and boundaries, providing space for thinking about new, more complex reference systems in which we move about together with our bodies. If we accept this as the basis for a future form of coexistence, how does that alter our perception of the other? What new possibilities of social, political, ecological, and economic cooperation would then be conceivable?

Artists of the VIDEONALE.18
Paula Ábalos, Tekla Aslanishvili, Eliane Esther Bots, Viktor Brim, Adam Castle, Eli Cortiñas, Mouaad el Salem, Mahdi Fleifel, Ellie Ga, Beatrice Gibson, Russel Hlongwane, Heidrun Holzfeind, Che-Yu Hsu, Sohrab Hura, Ida Kammerloch, Michael Klein & Sasha Pirker, Michelle-Marie Letelier, Dana Levy, Anne Linke, Lukas Marxt & Michael Petri, Bjørn Melhus, Ana María Millán, Morgan Quaintance, Úna Quigley, Aykan Safoğlu, P. Staff, Rhea Storr, Ingel Vaikla, Ana Vaz, Emily Vey Duke & Cooper Battersby, Gernot Wieland
More about the artists

Highlights of the Festival Days

Thursday, March 4
Performance Lecture by Russel Hlongwane, V18-artist, Durban
Ifu Elimnyama (The Dark Cloud), 2019
The performance creates tension between indigenous forms of acquiring knowledge and old African technologies.

Friday, March 5
Lecture by Dr. Astrida Neimanis, University of British Columbia
We are bodies of water
Drawing on the theory of "fluid bodies," Astrida Neimanis presents a new understanding of embodiment—and challenges the anthropocentric worldview of human beings.

Award Ceremony and Party
Online awarding of the Videonale Prize endowed by the fluentum collection, followed by the VIDEONALEA.18-Party.

Saturday, March 6 (live on e-flux)
Rethinking Agency in the Anthropocene
Dr. Joanna Page, University of Cambridge
Joanna Page visualizes the limits of human agency with regard to the earth and presents alternatives to the narrative of the Anthropocene.



Funders: Stadt Bonn, Ministerium für Kultur und Wissenschaft des Landes Nordrhein-Westfalen, Kunststiftung NRW, Stiftung Kunst der Sparkasse in Bonn, Stiftung Kunstfonds im Rahmen des Sonderförderprogramms 20/21 NEUSTART KULTUR, Sparkassen-Kulturstiftung Rheinland

Project Funders: KORO - Public Art Norway; Bundesministerium Kunst, Kultur, öffentlicher Dienst und Sport Österreich

Sponsor Videonale Award: fluentum collection

Cooperation partners: Bonner Kunstverein, DAS ESSZIMMER – Raum für Kunst+, gkg - Gesellschaft für Kunst und Gestaltung, Kunstmuseum Bonn, NRW KULTURsekretariat

Media partners: Artblog Cologne, blinkvideo, EIKON, Kultur West, KUNSTFORUM International, PHOTO International, Springerin, Stadtrevue, Texte zur Kunst, Videoart at Midnight