Online summit, online exhibition and local events in 20 cities across Europe
November 19–20, 2021
The Freiraum Platform presents the Hybrid Pan-European Freiraum Festival 2021. Developed jointly by more than 40 organisations, the Festival discusses the crisis of democracy and the future of protest, new political subjectivities and art in the digital public sphere.
The programme includes an online summit, an online exhibition of works selected through an open call, and 20 local events in 19 cities across Europe. Tackling issues of democracy, freedom, agency, creativity and technology, the talks, discussions, and artistic interventions delve into the systemic issues revealed by the pandemic, imagine the day after, and question the amalgams of hope and pragmatism populating the in-between.
Format
The Freiraum Festival is built on the intersection of the physical and the digital worlds, which are now, more than ever before, constituting our new, digital public sphere. The festival format itself is an attempt to explore the tension and the emerging possibilities in-between the online and the offline. The online summit and exhibition are live-streamed combining a mobile live-editing studio, a teleconference platform, and live connections with local events in various locations.
Local events
Spread around Europe, Freiraum Platform members organise local events addressing issues particular to their localities and audiences, while engaging with global audiences in the live-streamed online summit. Their contributions offer best-practice examples for community engagement and hands-on cultural and artistic action that aims to create a lasting impact on societies, taking into account that while our world is becoming more digital, it is also becoming more local.
Online summit
The live-streamed online summit includes talks and discussions exploring four topics: Demo-Crisis and the Future of Protest, New political subjectivities, social movements and solidarities, Art in the Digital Public Sphere—Curating, and Live Arts.
These will be discussed by internationally established thinkers Nour Abuzaid (Researcher and Regional Liaison - MENA, Forensic Architecture), Jesse Cameron Alick (dramaturg, artistic producer), Athena Athanasiou (Professor of Social Anthropology and Gender Theory, Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences - keynote), Slavcho Dimitrov (researcher, queer and gender theorist, curator, activist), George Drivas (visual artist, film director), Silvia Federici (Professor Emerita and Teaching Fellow, Hofstra University - keynote), Paolo Gerbaudo (Reader in Digital Politics, King’s College London), Vladan Joler (Professor, Academy of Arts, University of Novi Sad), Angela McRobbie (Professor, FBA), Karen Van Den Berg (Chair of Art Theory & Curating, Zeppelin University), Ana Vujanović (theorist of performing arts, cultural worker), and Kay Watson (Head of Arts Technologies, Serpentine). Discussions are moderated by representatives of the Freiraum Platform curatorial committee, Ira Bliatka (researcher, educator), Lydia Chatziiakovou (curator, ArtBOX.gr) and Ondrej Timco (researcher, project manager), as well as Sotirios Bahtsetzis (Associate Professor in Contemporary Art Theory and Curating Practices, University of Thessaly, scientific advisor at ArtBOX.gr).
Some of the questions to be addressed are: Can the Internet substitute the “old” public sphere? What are the emancipatory possibilities in a world of emergency injustice and medically prescribed disconnection? Can we speak about gender in way that surpasses identitarian political categories? What is the role of arts into the shaping and understanding of this rapidly emergent hybridity?
Online exhibition
Short artistic interventions selected by the Freiraum Curatorial Committee through an open call, form an integral part of the programme, offering artistic approaches to the discussed subjects, and investigating the possibilities of online formats in different mediums. Engaging with the Freiraum Festival themes, works also take into account that they are presented and experienced online on multiple devices.
Freiraum Festival 2021 is realised in collaboration and with the support of Goethe-Institut. It is organised by Freiraum’s curatorial committee representing the members, under the artistic direction of ArtBOX. Day two of the online summit—Art in the Digital Public Sphere, the Freiraum Mobile Stage and the broadcasting mobile studio are developed in partnership with Common Lab by Goethe-Institut Thessaloniki & ArtBOX, in collaboration with Helexpo, Freiraum and Hyperwerk Institute for Postindustrial Design.
