Grüner Salon
Discourse
English

Tuesday, March 26, 2019 at 7pm
Doors open 6pm

The public spaces we move through are primarily designed following logics of traditionally masculine connotated ideas. Even if not always visible, the aesthetics and functionality of cityscapes, public leisure space, architecture and interiors of public institutions are deeply intertwined with decades and centuries of patriarchal organization and the conditions of cultural production underlying these infrastructures. Even if the binary distinction of the female, private and domestic space and the male, public exteriors is nearly as ancient as space itself, it is still inscribed in the ways our environments are designed. Historically, the study and application of perspective coincides with “men looking at things”: from Vasari, through Night-Shift devices in war technology, POV Pornography to Google Street View. In the iconic Figure of the Flaneur, Brutalist Architecture or the psychogeographies of public space, masculinity has become form. The definitions of ‘functionality,’ ‘efficiency,’ or ‘neutrality’ in design, which are entangled with what historically is associated with a masculine identity, become evident in how things appear and are reproduced in our everyday surroundings. And even if not explicitly phallic: The symbolic function of architecture and city planning as illustrations of prestige result from centuries of need to manifest and signify male power, regardless of whether it’s on behalf of the church or the state.

In her performance and installation piece WOMEN at Haus am Lützowplatz for ASSEMBLE’s first season, Amy Hugo Ball explored the conditions of gendered space through an opaque character filling in the traditionally masculine figure of the rider. The image of the lone adventurer roaming the vast outdoors, on horseback or motorbike, is strongly connected to fictions of masculinity and freedom.

In conversation with Anna Gien, Fette Sans, and Verena Dengler, PANIC ROOM evolves around these questions, looking at various artistic approaches towards the possibilities of feminizing space: How do these conditions inflict the way we move through these spaces? What is the body’s potential, as a political subject, for appearing affected by them? How are our imaginary and emotional spaces tied to the aesthetic reality of our environment? Are there ways to reclaim the aesthetics and designs of space? Is there any way to define a feminine/feminized alternative which is not defined by lack? And how to avoid clichés of femininity which are geared at white, cis women?

ASSEMBLE
The performance series @ASSEMBLE commissions new live artwork for cultural institutions throughout Berlin. ASSEMBLE was founded in 2017 by Adela Yawitz and Anna Gien and is led by an inquiry into art institutions as public spaces. Its monthly program proposes public, open gatherings in art spaces, and invites artists interested in the potentialities of crowds or assemblies, and their political significance. ASSEMBLE looks at the conditions in which some bodies become visible in public, while others are hidden, exposed or discounted; how groups form and disperse; and moments of interdependence amongst bodies in a hyper-individualized environment. Over the course of the series, the performances suggest forms of public gatherings, resistance, or identities; and consider possibilities of action in public, private, and institutional spaces.

ASSEMBLE’s series for Grüner Salon runs parallel to the public performances and addresses its main questions through conversation and reflection. It invites participating artists to expand on their work; leading academics and practitioners to speak on the public sphere; and exciting perspectives on the online public sphere, Queer and feminized spaces, and Berlin-specific public space.

ASSEMBLE’s 2019 performance program launches on May 3rd at Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien with a new production by Raimund Hoghe.

Volksbühne Berlin
Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz
10178 Berlin

ASSEMBLE is funded by the Capital Cultural Funds, Berlin.