Art and critical writing on European exclusionism
The xeno.no project aims to engage as an online platform of contemporary cultural reflection on a phenomenon of Xenophobia: “fear and hatred of strangers or foreigners or of anything that is strange or foreign”. This phenomenon is not a static ideological pattern, but takes on different faces, agendas and forms of establishment.
"Cherry Blossoms is a backpack that uses a small microcontroller and a GPS unit. Recent news of bombings in Iraq are downloaded to the unit every night, and their relative location to the center of the city are superimposed on a map of Boston. If the wearer walks in a space in Boston that’s correlated to a site of violence in Baghdad, the backpack detonates, releasing a compressed air cloud of confetti, looking for all the world like smoke and shrapnel. Each piece of confetti has the name of a civilian who died in a war based on lies."
Domestic Terrorism
Domestic Terrorism is a project that makes public the visual evidence of private domestic work and encourages the use of private detail as a means of public resistance.
Laundry hanging on a line can suggest the gender, class and aesthetic principles of the person doing the laundry. It can disclose the population and income of a household. It reveals personal taste and bad habits; betrays acts of insurrection and indiscretion. How laundry is hung can be a statement of pride or an expression of modesty. It can be a form of communication between prisoners, a violation of housing codes in certain communities or perceived as a national threat in times of war.
I attended Simon Bayly's 'Philosophy in practice' session on Thursday 15th, which was a practical workshop based around the question: When should we intervene?
We chose to focus on a specific incident where one of us failed to intervene. We unpacked the incident, decribing every last detail, and then debated the need and efficacy of intervention.
I won't go into details about what happened (unless anyone would really like to know, in which case please contact me), but just wanted to report how useful this session was. I felt that it really got each of us to confront out own apathy and helplessness, and also feel clearer and more confident about how to approach situations which demand intervention.
What makes you think you have the right.
To tell me to go into the night.
I wish to stay and fight the fight.
For I know I have that right.
To stand here and perform.
To run, to jump, to walk, to crawl.
The right to be, to see, to cry, to fall.
And most of all, I have the right to choose it all.
You can't stop my need to be.
You can't stop my need to be free.
Free to love, free to live, free to take and free to give.
I've seen many inspiring projects and performances over the duration of this conference and would love to discover what others have seen - don't be shy! add to this website & leave a comment, message or report on events that others may have missed.
Yesterday morning at the Great hall, many people reunited for one cause. I was there too and I almost could hear the energy floating in everyone's body. It was a magical moment. The lady in the black jacket representing Amnesty International, (if I'm right?) said many important things- But what I recall straight away is something to do with our generation.
Wednesday, June 07, 2006
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Fabulous
Current mood: Â hopeful
Category: Life
I hear them playing drums, I hear their voices all over the air. I hear their screams and desire to express. I hear them over and over again. I hear myself smiling to them. I hear the rythm of my pulse inside my body. I hear my mind remembering old days in childhood when I used to dance. I hear the child in me saying, I want to dance mummy. I hear the empty space that will follow soon. This room of desire and hope that will stay here forever. Even when I'll be gone. I hear people clapping, are they so happy? They must be. And that happiness fulfills me with nostalgy because I will be gone one day. And these moments will only be alive in a memory. A memory that will cross land and sea all over this globe. A memory that will be heard one day when I'll be gone. So I hear this thought of mine, and I express it. I express it as often as I can because it is about recording our lives in memory. It is about you in space working along with time. It is about me reminding you to hear yourself and to not forget little details as when people play drums in your yard.
Saturday, June 10, 2006
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Yo nosé
Current mood: Â loved
So many thoughts captured in a moment while I sit here and think of time and space. Time and space that illuminate and captivate my illusion of perception in this worldly reality. The sound of the saxophone playing to my ears distorts the imaginary pencil of devotion. And I come to think of tomorrow, tomorrow and the day after. I wanna be sincere when I write this memory. I don't know if it's possible to be totally accurate though, but at least I can try. My room looks almost naked, all the vestuary from the walls are taken off, and lots of big rubbish bags are standing like semi dead bodies after a war of chaos. I still have books I need to return to the library, lists to do, phone calls to make and most important  finish to pack, and move out of here. This place, this room, and time that has kept so many memories. Vivid memories carved in time and space, this space that only I know. This little corner of devotion and temptation where I've painted funny paintings, danced naked, laughed and cried my eyes out. This little corner of play and fun where I've left a little mark inside. I'm truly happy even though sometimes I forget of this pleasure. My imagination doesn't wanna stop to create and invent new paths of decór. It's just funny how much you can get attached to time and space. It's funny how much I get attached to time and space particularly at this time of my life. Everything is new and fresh. And I'm so curious, I'm so alive yet so curious for living and testing the new and the old too. I breath and I feel alive, but I also feel the humanity that this body of mine produces. This body of mine captured in this wordly reality of time and space, where I wake up every day and perceive myself. I perceive myself and everything else around me, I see, hear, touch, smell, and taste the phenomenological connection between this space and this time. Right here, right now, right inside and outside myself and the link that causes it.
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New chapter
Current mood: Â content
read. The style and the colours of the words are bright and promising. The new chapter is about new everything, new hair cut, new clothes, new roof on the head, new friends, new dreams, new hopes, new candles, new meals, new places to go, new smiles to exchange, new summer time, new birthdays, new birthday cake, new faces, new odours, new everything. And as I'm writing this, and you are reading it. New ideas in your head are being drawn. And why all the excitement? Well, it's simple to answer really, and that is because at this moment I'm recording the newness of the new, the bright shining sky painted on your face, as much as painted on my face.
I'm sure the limeys are absolutely sick of youngsters such as myself producing the work of Sarah Kane, but the fact reamins that she has made a huge influence on modern theatre... and I intend to produce her works.
Outside the Octagon (the Library) & the reception area I passed and was dragged into what looks like a twisted battlefield triage, medical drips hanging, nurses & doctors questioning, interrogating people. If you are seen you are immediately taken aside & asked to prove your identity, empty your pockets and follow pointless instruction after pointless instruction.
Today - the 2nd day of 'performing rights' has been interesting
From seeing the tech & rehearsal before the shows,to the conferences. Being volunteers has allowed us to see the many aspects that this festival has to offer.
Find below, a list of all items contained in the reading room during the conference.
The Battle of Visions
Beck,Jee-sook, Kim,Hejin (eds)
Body and the East
Zdenka Badovinac
Electoral Guerilla Theatre: Radical ridicule and social movements
L.M. Bogad
The Art of Truth-Telling About Authotarian Rule
Ksenija Bilbija, Jo Ellen Fair, Cynthia E. Milton, and Leigh Payne
PSi #12: Performing Rights focuses on questions of performance and human rights and is composed of two distinct but related programmes: a Conference and a series of Manifestations, the full programme can be found on the below (all links take you to the www.psi12.qmul.ac.uk site):
First of all, walk out of Mile End tube. You are facing north.
Outside the tube
This is what you should see if you look west, to the left.
This is the current list of the library donations for June 15, 2006. The numbers corresponding are the cabinet locations for the contributions in the Library.
Anymous Art (Czech Republic)
