Workshop Friday, July 15, 2016
(postponed, please look out for new date)
Werkstatt, Adalbertstr. 71, 10997 Berlin
In the midst of the Anthropocene and the human caused geological, biological and
atmospheric transformations vapor, fog and gloss articulate modes of susceptibility. As
phenomena of the threshold they enable to understand processes of entanglements of
material textures and to apprehend, how matter in inter- and intra-action matters. Hence
they are non-human responses to human over-determinations and thus queer agents of
susceptibility.
credit: Opaque (Boudry/Lorenz 2014, 16mm/HD, 10min, film still), courtesy of the artists
As aesthetic descriptions vapor, fog and gloss range between corporeality and abstraction,
reification and recognition, depth and surface. They be-come as figures only gradually, they
are graded and echoloned figures und therefore less recognizable than perceivable, sensible.
Against this background which kind of queer visual aesthetic do they enable? How – based
on theories and practices of susceptibility within art, popular and low culture – can a queer
ecology be established that does not exercise itself in catastrophism, but rather plays with
obliterations of boundaries caused by climate change and discloses possibilities to become
„more susceptible to [queer] pleasures [and environmental politics] (Halperin 1995: 81).
The workshop serves as a first survey of contemporary art, popular culture and research
projects/interests at the intersections of ecology/technology/queer art and aesthetics/low
culture. Participants are welcome to present 10-15-minute papers on an artwork, a
performative work, a piece of popular culture along with initial thoughts or assumptions.
Registrations and/or proposals: katrin.koeppert@ufg.at