Suman Ghosh- Virtual Museum of Protest Art as Empathy Machine: A Literature Review
The years 2019 and 2020 were the years of largest anti-government protests across the world – from United States to Hong Kong. The voices of dissent transcended the spatial temporalities in the digital world, in the form of art, music and even memes. However, such artworks, created during the protest, are always effervescent. During the protests between 2019-2020, the artworks that survived were because they got warped into the digital space, shared and reshared on various social media platforms, remediated through various app filters, generating a gamut of meanings and emotions. While my doctoral research aims at creating a virtual reality museum of protest art created during this phenomenal time, this paper maps the existing scholarship in the various fields that my larger project converges. This paper discusses remediation and afterlives of the protest art in the digital form, Aesthetics of digital artefacts, existing efforts of creating virtual museum, and the possibility of immersive technologies and VR environments in giving users a true first-person perspective about political and human right events. The article also discusses the theoretical frameworks that state artistic study as traditions of inquiry, performative theory of assembly, affective practices and social media activism, and the aesthetics of resistance. It also explores key themes that appear in the literature, to explore immersive computer technology as a potential way to improve human empathy is gaining traction, and virtual reality (VR) technologies have been referred to as the “ultimate empathy machines”.
Setenay Gültekin and Ozgu Hazal Ertaş- transformative possibilities of digital experiential encounters in the public space: The case of Audio Choreography Gazhane XL
“Müze Gazhane (Gasworks Museum)” is a former industrial plant which now turned into an accessible and nonprofit public space, cultural center, and exhibition avenue in the heart of Istanbul city, thanks to the long-running, persistent efforts of local residents who gathered under the roof of “Gazhane Çevre Gönüllüleri (Gasworks Environmental Volunteers)”. This paper takes as its subject of inquiry one particular artistic creative project, “Audio Choreography Gazhane XL” by “Taldans Artists Initiative”. This digital interactive experience proposes a different encounter with Müze Gazhane, utilizing digital sound mapping, sound design, voice guidance, and dramaturgy. With the help of a smartphone and earphones, the participants embark on a walking journey in the urban landmark. They simultaneously experience their surroundings and navigate their bodies while engaging with the sounds of the environment.
In this paper, focusing on this artistic project’s sensory and performative qualities and mode of engagement with its participants, we investigate the relationship between aesthetics and the political. The central argument is that the activist endeavors in Müze Gazhane are echoed through such artistic practice, although it is not intentionally designed as a political activity or for any political function in the conventional sense. This is because this digital artistic practice enables the creation of “a different distribution of the sensible” (Ranciere, 2010), and novel ways of public discussion concerning the larger conditions of re-appropriations of urban space. Moreover, it contributes to the alternative ways of being/experiencing together within an urban community. Hence, it opens a window of opportunity into generating critical expressions of public intimacies, care, and hope toward urban futures.
Doris Posch- Collective ways of thinking, being and seeing: Imagining possible futures in the arts
This paper focuses on the care and effort that lies in expanding collective ways of thinking, being and seeing when it comes to cultural production and artistic practice. Selected works of recent collective formations such as the NEST Collective, a Nairobi-based multidisciplinary art collective founded in 2012, draw on urban experiences, working realities including dysfunctions of the everyday, that figure as modes of inquiry both in terms of collective histories and reflections on possible futures. The paper addresses the NEST’s specific references to Nairobi’s urban landscapes in interconnection with a global perspective, whereby the collective artistic act figures as a critical practice in the arena of a global art world, that (still) is deeply structured around individual authorship.
The analysis highlights not only modes of collective networks and artistic alliances as being responsible for a redistribution of work processes and shared responsibilities in the arts, but also delineates their underlying potential of agency in the creation of a multivocality that resonates in the domains of visual aesthetics, cultural narration, film and visual art production at large. The analysis further displays the collective contribution to imagining possible futures in the arts, that focus on establishing new ways of relating culturally, and therefore contribute to the creation of a multiplicity of cultural knowledge production and image circulation and reception, including audience outreach in the global arena. This perspective ultimately aims at strengthening crucial debates on the role and responsibilities of multivocal positions with regards to collective knowledge production and collective artistic knowledge transmission in an increasingly globalizing market of audiovisual image creation, spatial distribution and media mobilities.
Linda Ryan Bengtsson- Constructive resistance: The rural popular culture scene as a counteract to the rural norm
This research examines how popular culture in rural areas and small towns can be viewed as a form of constructive resistance against the dominant urban norm. Historically, the city has been associated with modernity and positive aspects like opportunity, social mobility, wealth, and future prospects, while rural areas have been considered lacking in these amenities. In Sweden, there is a noticeable divide between urban and rural communities, with the former being associated with economic growth and cultural development and the latter with social issues, population decline, and a lack of opportunities. Through interviews with local artists, musicians, and event organizers living in the Swedish countryside, this study finds that their choice to live in and engage with local communities can be interpreted as a rejection of the urban norm. Here we use Jul Sørensen (2016) understating of everyday practices or struggles as a form of constructive resistance. Artists’ work contributes to and is dependent on the production of locality, and by doing so, they challenge the dominant structures already in place. The theoretical framework of constructive resistance is applied to illustrate how these artists’ everyday practices disrupt the urban norm and stage a desired community independent of the dominant urban culture. This research highlights the importance of rural popular culture in the production of locality and its potential to challenge and resist the urban norm.