Encounter: Exploring Artistic Resistance in the Myanmar Spring Revolution. Convened by Zoncy Heavenly
Tea Oval Session
Date: Wednesday, May 15th
Time: 19:00
Tea Oval Session is a monthly forum from May to November 2024 for new and emerging perspectives on artistic resistance against political dictatorships worldwide. Experiential knowledge shared by a global audience of contributors will contribute to a situational analysis of artistic conduct in the Myanmar Spring Revolution. The invited contributors and participants will analyse the most successful artistic tactics used in political reimagination. By the end of the sessions, the contributions and collective findings will be co-authored as a manual for Myanmar artists to exercise political imagination.
Zoncy Heavenly, an interdisciplinary artist from Myanmar, is leading this study inspired by the TIER methods of knowledge building. The first Tea Oval, which will be introduced on 15 May 2024 at 19:00, is just the first public encounter of her independent study journey. Members of the Myanmar artist community in Berlin will present their visual, literary, and musical protest art from the Myanmar Spring Revolution, setting the stage for future discussions on the collective understanding of artistic resistance. Green Tea from Southern Shan State and rice salad from the mainland will be served.
Suggested Reading Material before the session: https://thediplomat.com/2022/
No RSVP required
Event held onsite: Donaustr. 84, 12043 Berlin
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TIER is delighted to welcome Zoncy Heavenly, an interdisciplinary artist from Myanmar, as artist-in-residence at TIER. This program is supported by Berlin Senatsverwaltung für Kultur und Gesellschaftlichen Zusammenhalt through the Weltoffenes Berlin Fellowship program.
BIO
Zoncy Heavenly started her career as a performance artist in 2009 by participating in Japan’s Nippon International Performance Art Festival. Inspired by knowledge from different fields, she later worked with sound, photography, installation, and poetry to explore the intangible aspects of body-based art and the concrete impact of collective trauma with a phenomenological approach.
Born in 1987 in southern Myanmar, Zoncy has lived, worked, and studied in Yangon. She graduated from the University of Computer Studies in 2008 and joined the postmodern and Performance art classes at New Zero Art Space in Yangon. Since 2011, she has been involved in the anti-civil war movement and gained more awareness about gendered violence in the Myanmar civil war. She co-founded the Diverze Youth Art Platform to promote minority rights and culture through the arts. The platform is a network of artistic self-empowerment in a country that ranks between Afghanistan and North Korea, according to the Democracy Index. One of her most significant contributions is the feminist performance series, Unknown Women.
She was the design fellow of Akademie Schloss Solitude in 2019 and the visual art fellow of the DAAD Artist in Berlin Program in 2022. In 2024, she will conduct an independent study on artists’ methods in political (re)imagination with the support of TIER in Berlin as a Weltoffenes Berlin Program fellow.
Encounter: Mapping Queer Feminist Journeys with Saltanat Shoshanova
Dates: Saturday, March 23rd, 2024
Time: 15:30
RSVP essential / Limited numbers
Register now at Beketovamash@gmail.com until 22d of March
This workshop invites you to create your very own Map of a Queer Feminist Journey/Futures. You can visualize your journey (so far) and draw the map that tells your story. You can imagine your future journey and manifest it in the universe! We will draw and craft using different colors and materials. This workshop is a successful tool to connect artistic practice with your own story in order to raise important questions on political, historical, and private levels. In the end, you will go home with the map of your life (or an imagined future) and some important reflections on it.
The creative process will take 1-1,5 hours leaving us with 30 min for a sharing circle. You will have an opportunity to open up and share your stories with others using the map. At the same time, the logic and structure of the workshop allow participants not to share and keep their maps private. We will get creative, vulnerable, triggered and curious. We will get healed and inspired by each other’s stories!
This workshop is only open to all queer and feminist people.
BIO:
Saltanat Shoshanova is a researcher from Kazakhstan, based in Berlin. She studies decolonial queer feminist cultures and art in Central Asia and beyond. Her writing and artistic practice deals with family history, trauma, food and queer joy.
https://www.instagram.com/quotidian_pleasures/
Event held onsite: Donaustr. 84, 12043 Berlin
Thursday, 29.February. Workshop: Sound Stories Silent Site with Anton Kats
Dates: Thursday, February 29th
Time: 16:00-19:00
RSVP essential
Register now at archiveofbelonging@gmail.com until February 26th.
Sound Stories Silent Site is a performative laboratory for improvised music and
storytelling; a sonic playground where everyone is invited to step in and set aside a formal
understanding of sound, composition, performance and writing.
Sound Stories Silent Site wonders how a collective ethics of a place sounds, especially when
inspired by difference and contradiction. Embracing transmigration to dream and enact new
semi-fictional identities, the laboratory collectively envisions narratives of the self, other and the
world.
The structure of the laboratory revolves around a sequence of collaborative and interactive
modules. The improvised ensemble takes turns listening, tuning, field working, playing,
conducting and weaving sounds and narratives. You are invited to become part of a musical
ensemble that experiments with sound modules, synthesizers, storytelling and Orchestration.
NOTES ON THE WORKSHOP:
The workshop is free of charge and open to max. 15 participants. No prior knowledge or skills
are needed. There is no age limit, but we wouldn’t recommend this workshop to kids under 10
years of age. We primarily welcome refugees, asylum seekers and disadvantaged migrants. All
necessary equipment will be provided by the artist and the organizers.
RSVP essential
Register now at archiveofbelonging@gmail.com until February 26th.
BIO:
Anton Kats (Kherson, Ukraine) works as an artist and musician. His practice draws from the
everyday, inspired by the complex narratives of Satelite Island, a south-Ukrainian neighborhood
in the port city of Kherson. Kats develops responsive and site-specific projects exploring the
interdependencies of learning, migration and the non-normative. His works have been
presented at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt, steirischer herbst, SAVVY Contemporary,
Serpentine Galleries and Tate Modern, among others. Kats took part in documenta14 and
performed at the Roskilde Festival, Fusion Festival and Sonic Acts. He was awarded a
practice-based PhD at Goldsmiths University of London and currently lectures at MA Spatial
Strategies at Kunsthochschule Weißensee. He is also a fellow of the Berlin Artistic Research
Programme 2024–25.
Homepage: www.antonkats.net
IG: @katsmonaut
About Archive of Belonging
Archive of Belonging (AOB) is a directory and archive for refugees, asylum seekers and
migrants. It brings together practical, cultural, and emotional resources to respond to the
question – after relocation, how can we begin to find a sense of belonging?
Read more at https://archiveofbelonging.
Image caption: Sound Stories Silent Site at House of World Cultures. Photo courtesy of the
artist
Wednesday 28. February. Arkhiv Plastik: an experimental art history of the plastic bag with Kandis Friesen
Date: Wednesday, February 28th
Time: 19:00-21:00
This encounter is a visit to the portable archive of plastic bags that artist Kandis Friesen has been collecting over the last twenty years. Amidst an accessible archival display, the artist will speak about three distinct plastic bags: her recent artist multiple DAUT DINTJ DAUT HELT, grafted onto the ubiquitous knock-off Ukrainian BMW plastic bag; a sequence from Ukrainian director Kira Muratova’s 1989 film The Asthenic Syndrome; and the plastic practice of Kazakh artist Saule Suleimenova, who will join us by video from Almaty.
In Friesen’s archive and practice, the plastic bag is approached as container, landscape, figure, textile, and text, both producing and archiving these forms in the neoliberal present. Like the particalization and flexibility of neoliberal structures, plastic shapeshifts its materiality (into wood, metal, clay, textile, glass) and is now ubiquitously resident within our bodies, waters, soil, and air. Friesen approaches diasporic formations in relation to plastic materialities, through portability, translation, and transposition; her experimental art history of the plastic bag is a history of the present.
Friesen will bring a portion of her archive to TIER for public perusal, and drinks and snacks including kozinak, halva, and pickles will be served.
BIO
Kandis Friesen works with diasporic language and disintegrating archival forms. Her recent work in video, sculpture, writing, and sound is anchored in the dispersed monumental, composing between the solidity of official memory and the dispersal of intimate, unofficial forms. She often draws on modes of grafting and re-publication (making something public, again), amplifying specific histories and the structures which hold and transmit them.
Her work has been exhibited and screened at the CAFKA Biennial of Contemporary Art in Public Space (Six Nations Haldimand Tract territory / Waterloo, CA), Galerie im Turm (Berlin, DE), Chicago Architecture Biennial (Zhigaagong / Chicago, US), Plug In ICA (Winnipeg, Treaty 1 territory, CA), Le Festival International du Film sur l’Art (Tiohtià:ke / Montreal, CA), MIX NYC (NYC, Lenapehoking territory, US), and Jihlava International Film Festival (Jihlava, CZ), among others.
No RSVP required
Event held onsite: Donaustr. 84, 12043 Berlin
Wednesday 20.December:Encounter and screening with Edson Ramirez
Dates: Wednesday December 20th
Time: 19:00-21:00
Join us for an evening at the Institute for Endotics Research, where we will be showing the film “Vatreni”, which narrates the Croatian War of Independence through the lens of the national football team that finished third in the 1998 FIFA World Cup. Witness the triumph and resilience of a nation through the eyes of the soccer players who brought joy to a war-torn population. “Vatreni” explores the Croatian War of Independence and the euphoria surrounding the team’s remarkable achievement in France. This cinematic experience reflects the highest point of post-Yugoslavian soccer history. Following the screening, engage in a thought-provoking discussion with the talented director, Edson Ramirez. Gain insights into the making of the film and explore the intersection of sports, history, and national identity.
Bio
Born in Mexico City in 1982. He graduated with a degree in Film Direction from the Centro de Capacitación Cinematográfica CCC and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Social Communication from the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana – Xochimilco. As a director, he has developed and participated in various projects, including noteworthy works such as Vatreni, a Mexico-Croatia co-production produced by Geiser Media, América vs América, a documentary series produced by Netflix and Filmadora MX, and multiple short fiction and documentary films.
As an editor, he has worked on feature films, documentary films, and VOD fiction and documentary series. Some notable projects include Cenizas de la Gloria on VIX in 2023, América vs América on Netflix in 2022, Lecciones para Canallas 2022, Historia de un Crimen – Colosio on Netflix in 2019, and many more. In 2023, Edson made the decision to relocate to Berlin, seeking to broaden his professional experience while concurrently developing his upcoming projects. These projects aim to delve into the analysis of resentment that has manifested in certain aspects of Mexican identity.
No RSVP required
Event held on-site: Donaustr. 84, 12043 Berlin
Thursday 14. December. (dis)appear – Performance Workshop led by Patricia Woltmann
Dates: Thursday December 14th
Time: 19:00-21:00
Touching beginnings and endings: In the fabric of our lives, touch is omnipresent. From the air we breathe to the ground beneath our feet, every movement, every entrance, and every exit leaves an imprint. Join us in this laboratory of exploration, where we navigate the intricacies of space in our togetherness, orchestrating the dance of corporeality.
Key Themes:
Breath and Air: How do we touch the air with our breath, shaping our presence?
Movement and Ground: Exploring the touch between our bodies and the ground we tread.
Togetherness: Negotiating space, distance, and proximity in the interconnectivity of bodies.
Arrivals and Departures: Understanding the nuances of presence and absence in our corporeal journey.
RSVP required at anastasia.putsykina@gmail.com
Max. 15 people
BIO
Patricia Woltmann is a choreographer, dancer and performance artist. Working with dance-based performance and video, Patty explores concepts related to the transformative potential of the body – presence in relation to absence and memory. In her performances, she creates space for collective, embodied experiences. She holds an M.A. in Dance Studies and a Postgraduate Diploma from Trinity Laban, London. Prior to this she studied contemporary dance at Erika Klütz School, Hamburg. Her performance – and video works have been presented across several countries, e.g. England, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Sweden, Czech Republic, Mexico and Brazil. Recently Patricia has been a recipient of the Solo-Dis-Tanz Stipend by BKM, Neustart Kultur (2022). In 2022 she was artist-in-residence at AADK Spain, where she researched and presented on the theme of touch, presence and absence (“closer”, “for record”). In 2020 she produced two films, “untitled” commissioned by Bode Museum Berlin, and “dislocated angle”, developed during her residency with Kinitiras/Athens and Goethe Institut Athens. Commissions include Museo del Chopo/ Mexico City and KW Institute of Contemporary Art/ Berlin. Her group work “To: my future body” (2019) was presented at KW Institute of Contemporary Art, Berlin. Since 2017 she is a collaborator of lab.Bode, Bode Museum Berlin. Her performance “drive” (2014) was presented at Museo de Chopo, Mexico City. Under the collective patty&britty, Patty developed together with dance artist Britta Pudelko the video and performance series “molecules”. pattywoltman.com
Event held onsite: Donaustr. 84, 12043 Berlin