South Caucasus - The Power of Images

Images speak a thousand words - everywhere and for everyone, including in the remotest valleys of our world. With this in mind, the Swiss embassies in the South Caucasus partnered with the South Caucasus Photography Hub for Education and Innovation (PHEI) and the Documentary Film Festival (CinéDOC). Together and working with artists, children, local communities and civil society agents, they are engaging civil society, building up professional capacities and building bridges across the three countries of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia. I had the great pleasure of being invited back by the Swiss Embassy in Tbilisi to provide advice and capacity building to this innovative Project.

South Caucasus Moving Museum of Photography © Justyna Mielnikiewicz

South Caucasus Moving Museum of Photography © Justyna Mielnikiewicz

Impromptus lecture at the Zurich University of the Arts

Working with arts in fragile contexts offers potential and limitations - as explored by the ZHdK’s Certificate of Advanced Studies in Arts and International Cooperation. What constitutes “cultural value”? In what way is it relevant to human development? Which methodologies may help demonstrate such value? These are some of the exciting questions that this CAS seeks to address.
It’s always a pleasure to lecture at the ZHdK - and a priviledge to get inspired by the sparkling creativity of its students!

pc ZHdK

pc ZHdK

Review of the Sustainable Mountain Art Programme

A wonderful artist-in-residence programme that I encourage you to discover: when arts becomes the vehicle for exchange, dialogue and collaboration around issues affecting our mountains and their people. I had the great pleasure to accompany a review process and exchange with some of the inspiring personalities and artists at the heart of this imitative: Juan Arias in Colombia, Maralagua Badarch in Mongolia, IbrahimDar Al Mussawir in Lebanon, Mariano Price in Peru, Sarah Huber and Eric Nanchen in Switzerland among others. More on: http://sustainablemountainart.ch/

"Etats Généraux de la Culture" in Tiznit, Morocco

I was thrilled to be invited as a panelist to the annual conference on culture organized by a coalition of cultural actors in Morocco, under the leadership of the association “Racines”. We talked about cultural de-centralisation, citizen participation and examples of processes that truly strengthen each and everyone’s access and right to actively participate in culture.

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Tadjik chronicles

The magazine “Bon Pour La Tête” is publishing my poetic chronicles… Visit www.bonpourlatete.com (photos © Céline Yvon and Muattarkhon Bashirova)

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Artistic practices opening up spaces for dialogue

Participating in the Steering Committee of SDC's Cultural Programme in Central Asia is always rich in learning and inspiration. Key take-aways, this time, included:

#1: People make all the difference. Without strong and committed personalities, even the most robust, well-sourced result-oriented programming will fail to deliver system change. We need women and men to set the tone of the music. We need women and men to take bold approaches and inspire others. And in this regard, I did love the discussions that took place in this year's Steering Committee. Trusting the potential that artistic practices have in terms of strengthening civil society has become mainstream - at last.

#2: We need to talk about the Millenials of Central Asia. They every day navigate a complex context avoiding the pitfalls of black/white analysis, trying to make the best of the existing - democratic, economic, geographic - space. Laboratoria ci and their likes work across disciplines - arts? sociology? education? - towards promoting conscious, reflective and responsible citizenship in the region. Topics that matter to their hearts include gender and feminism, public spaces, the post-modern city... and of course, how to reach out to and empower the youth of Bishkek. 

The team of Laboratoria ci

The team of Laboratoria ci

"Cultural rights under pressure", International perspectives on culture, art and society

The conference "Crossroads" brought together more than a hundred professionals from the field of contemporary arts, worldwide. Organized by ProHelvetia and SDC, it aimed at celebrating international artistic collaborations and at taking stock of challenges and best practices.

I moderated the panel entitled: "Cultural rights under pressure – a contemporary arts perspective". The discussion brought together Ms Jumana Al-Yasiri, a Damascus-born, Palestinian Iraqi performing arts specialist, now with the Sundance Institute in New York; M. Folakunle Oshun, an artist and curator from Nigeria who founded the first Lagos Biennale; and Professor Patrice Meyer-Bisch, who tirelessly advocated in favor of cultural rights to be considered as central to human development processes.

The panel unpacked the central assumption according to which cultural rights are central to the development of our open and democratic societies. We heard about current concerns, restrictions and attacks on those cultural rights – but also, about inspiring stories on how artists and artistic engagements contributed to uphold these rights. We talked about artists being both necessary ingredients of open and democratic societies and facilitator/accelerators of the cultural rights of others. We concluded that talking about cultural rights was inseparable from talking about human development in the sense put forward by Nobel price winner Amartya Sen: Poverty is fundamentally about the lack of rights and opportunities to develop one’s full potential and capabilities. If so, what better vehicles than literature, visual arts, music and theatre to help us think, dream. engage, imagine, argue, cry and lough -- and in doing so, be fully... humane.

 

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A little essay in a big book...

Proud and thankful for the opportunity to have my essay feature in the jubilee publication of the Centre for Contemporary Art of Yverdon (curator: Karine Tissot) launched at ArtGeneva. 

A Central Asian Postcard

I'm just back from Tajikistan, a country that is very close to my heart: located at the crossroad of several civilisations and influences - from the Zoroastrians to the Greco-Bactrians, the Mongols, Samanids and the Russians, this little piece of our earth is a concentrate of history, diversity and inspiration.

Together with my friends and colleagues from the Central Asian Arts and Culture Programme, we worked with several local theaters and festivals, exploring ways to build their capacities so that they can continue to grow as thoughts-provoking civil society organisations. One of them is the Kanibadan Theatre, home to an incredibly talented, inspired and versatile team. Muhiddin, Ghayrat and their associates are bursting with ideas, planning to transform their little town in Northern Tadjikistan along the line of "a theatre in town and a town in the theatre". Kids and youth of Kanibadan: get ready for the journey !

MUHIDDINI MUZAFFAR (Photo credit farhodactor tajikistan) 

MUHIDDINI MUZAFFAR (Photo credit farhodactor tajikistan) 

Back to Mozambique: What is the role of arts and culture in a country in transition?

Mozambique is currently at a crossroad - politically, economically and security-wise - and its artists are not the least engaged in the journey coming ahead. While Mozambique has always been a source of mesmerizing experiences for me - travelling to and working time and again in Maputo, Pempa, Lichinga or La Isla has been incomparably inspiring - this time I had a particularly thrilling task to engage on: supporting the Swiss Embassy in reviewing its four-year programme supporting the arts and the culture of Mozambique. 

We explored in what way building a pluralistic, inclusive and vibrant cultural sector may reinforce democratisation processes and the building of an engaged and organised civil society. We also discussed how concretely, creative forms of expression - theatre, poetry, music and dance - could become effective levers for democratisation and peace-building processes. Looking forward, I outlinled several options for a future continuation of the Programme, and will now follow-up with a local expert on framing the journey ahead… So: stay tuned -- more on that in the next few months...

Meanwhile, let me pick this initiative out of so many, and encourage you to support A Mundzuku Ka Hina. For cultural emergency is no less a priority than that of health and food - and the power of words, images and sounds, relevant to any human being. Get inspired by the work of Fabiao or Adilio, children of the Maputo's slums and landfills, and visit www.amundzukukahina.org

www.amundzukukahina.og
All photos ©A Mundzuku Ka Hina

All photos ©A Mundzuku Ka Hina

Cultural Heritage, Wars and Post-Conflict Recovery

I was invited to give a talk at the conference "Catastrophe and Challenge: Cultural Heritage in Post-conflict Recovery" (http://heritage-post-conflict.com). My presentation focused on the topic of "Ethics and Cultural First Aid" and will be followed by a publication (upcoming). Talking about Cultural Heritage work taking place in contexts plagued by violent conflict such as in Iraq or in Yemen for example. I argued that:

  • the conditions in which Cultural Heritage work unfolds is such extreme that it makes moral questions much more acute than during peace-time; in particular, it is impossible to escape political questions;
  • some of these moral issues are similar to those that may routinely occur in Humanitarian Aid, while others are specific to the field of Cultural Heritage - and I briefly browsed through 6 of these issues; 
  • such moral challenges require the field of Cultural Heritage to (re-)think its rationale and moral compass carefully through; and I made some propositions in this regard;
  • and I ended with recommending the field to adopt an ethics of "intellectual debate" as opposed to getting bogged down into drafting technical guidelines.

Syria: and yet there is art

The City of Light lives up to its name – Paris is currently hosting two radiant exhibitions of Syrian contemporary arts: Et pourtant, ils créent, at the Institut des Cultures de d’Islam; and Cris-action, Artistes en création, at the Institut du Monde Arabe. Both are powerful testimonies of art as a vehicle of sense despite, against and inside violence. 

With the war in Syria came also the implosion of its artistic scene – while some artists fled abroad at the very beginning of “the revolution”, others tried to stay in country. Three years later, many Syrian artists now live in Damas, Beyrouth, Dubai or Paris. Some celebrate life by refusing to give a place to the violence that surrounds them; others choose to tell all about the war, documenting it in a way that makes all denial impossible; almost all use irony and poetry, surprising us beyond the ongoing tragedy. The artist Tammam Azzam for example affixes Klimt’s Kiss to a bullet-destroyed building; in doing so, he juxtaposes the best and the worst human beings are capable of.

“Kiss”, by Tamman azzam

“Kiss”, by Tamman azzam

Many artists are engaged politically and socially speaking. They try to organise and give a collective voice to the people – that is, to the same very people that political forces try to divide and render speechless. Internet and blogs in particular have become powerful platforms for social exchanges, participation and diffusion, all the more in a context where obviously, there are hardly any physical spaces to create and exhibit anymore. No is a collective of artists and activists working through a Facebook page. They use it as a platform for Syrian people to express their opposition to humiliation, despair and vengeance. One of their work streams showed people using their own body to form the word “no” in Arabic, echoing the monumental electoral banners that displayed “yes” (to Bachar All Assad) in the run-up of the elections.

La Voix des Invisibles is an interactive and sonor installation by Samuel Aoun. He wanted to give a voice to the invisible human elements of this terrible war, to the marginalised members of the “civil society” about whom one talks but never listens to. A phone rings, the billboard urges you to pick it up, and so you do. On the line, someone telling you what his/her every day life in the conflict is. And you listen.

La Voix des Invisibles, by Samuel Aoun

The incredible creativity of Syrian artists make us wonder about what it takes to be an artist in a country in conflict, about what it means to create surrounded by chaos and destruction, and about what such violence does to creative practices.

In today’s Syria, creation is perhaps the most powerful act that can be. Creation against destruction, life against death, hope against despair. These artists elevate us beyond the disaster, tragedy, and inhumanity.

See full article here on “Culture Matters”

Background information: Jamel Oubechou and Elsa Jacquemin