Liminoid Encounters: A Three-day Live Program

Day 1: Thursday, December 10

Welcome by Elke aus dem Moore (director Akademie Schloss Solitude)

Short introduction by curator Berit Fischer and roundtable with all contributors to voice the different approaches.

Solælune (Nardeen Galuaa & Alieldin Ayman)
I, In Empathy, 2020
Live screening

»To refuge« is to cross a border, an act of consuming the past to give rise to a possible new future. Refugee is a state of dual existence, two separate entities, rescuer and rescued. The selfless consciousness is consumed to pave the way for the dormant yearning self in total awareness. Alchemy’s magnum opus is the transmutation of base elements into the philosopher’s stone, the transcendence of the human soul into its divine form. The refugee is the dual–natured Ouroboros.

I, In Empathy is a meditative interactive virtual experience that reflects on unsettlement and the liminal state of existing in a continuously fragmented, yet interconnected way, based on the bonds of empathy and by occupying different narratives concurrently. I, In Empathy explores the fickle space between the two »sides« of a refugee, visualizing the erratic temporal span that takes place during the transition and interpreted through symbols of spiritual alchemy.

Lisa Biscaro Balle
Live au Zenith, 2020 
A sequenced, 3-day live dance performance

The project was inspired by Biscaro Balle’s personal sense of incompatibility between her duo of inherited cultures. She views her training in contemporary dance in France while simultaneously absorbing Brazilian dances through her family heritage as placing her in a privileged position that has not only influenced her dance practice, but has also revealed to her certain norms, constraints and stereotypes inherent to each of these cultures. With Live au Zenith, Biscaro Balle seeks to create a dialog with the music of Brazilian composer Chico Buarque, a one-time political dissident during the military dictatorship in Brazil (1964–1985). Many of his songs became popular anthems of Brazil. In Live au Zenith, Biscaro Balle examines the central question of how to live out her cultural heritage outside its original context. It is a subject that exists in multiple relationships, which are constantly in motion. Over the course of the three days, she creates a daily image of these questions through her performances.

Day 2: Friday, December 11

Giuliana Kiersz
Collecting Language, 2020 
A two-part writing gathering – Part 1 
(REGISTRATION REQUIRED, max. 12 participants)

How does language »collect« itself and how do we relate to this language? The writing gathering is conceived as a sensitive, political space to reflect on the overwhelming information we receive through digital platforms and consider how we adapt to/struggle with these structures. How does this information resonate in our body? What narratives are we creating? What worlds?

*Each participant is welcome to analyze and write in the language in which they feel most comfortable. Please indicate your preferred working language when registering. Registered participants will receive a preparation kit via email.

** Please register by December 3 by sending an email to:
register@akademie-solitude.de

The writing-gathering will not be recorded.

Aouefa Amoussouvi
Waiting to Be Born, 2020
An experimental conversation 
(REGISTRATION REQUIRED, max. 16 participants)

With the experimental format Waiting to Be Born, Amoussouvi explores the »in–between« liminoid concept by presenting some of her works-in-progress as well as initiating a conversation on the ambiguity of the creative progress itself.
She will share her current inspirations and interests in an intentionally loose structure to reproduce the chaotic and passive workflow of thoughts passing through the mind. Participants will discuss the non-human, James Baldwin, epigenetics, »Women who run with the Wolves« by Clarissa Pinkola Estes and the need to decolonize digital technologies…

How will the group process these initial topics? How do connections appear between seemingly isolated thoughts? How much control do we really have over the maturation of ideas into a coherent project? Alone? As a group? No expertise on these subjects is required.
Taking Frederick W. Hickling’s Psychohistoriography methodology as an inspiration, both the content of the discussion and the group dynamic itself will also constitute raw material to be further processed into a poem by Amoussouvi after the session.

Registered participants will receive a preparation kit via email and the resulting poem, before and after the session respectively.

** Please register by December 3 by sending an email to:  register@akademie-solitude.de

There will be an audio-recording of the conversation.

Public Program:

Sofie Verraest 
What You Have Heard of Brussels, 2020
Live reading

Sofie Verraest will be reading an excerpt from her novel-in-progress, a story of suffering and renewal, and the moment of transition when all life trembles in the balance. After the loss of her partner, E., stripped of her former self, tries to find out who else she might be in the chaos of present-day Brussels. She came to the right place: »What you have heard of Brussels is true. Of all the cities in the world it is the city closest to Heaven.«

Valentina Sciarra 
The Stone King, 2018
Video screening

The video brings us to the natural site »Strupanitsa« (Bulgarian: heaping), a rock phenomenon and the largest ancient landslide in Bulgaria. It is a large fall of rock blocks, most of which take the form of cubes or parallelepipeds with dimensions exceeding 15 cubic meters.

The audio accompanying the video is an excerpt from Italo Calvino’s final and unfinished book »Under the Jaguar Sun«, which he dedicated to the five human senses. The text has a similar narrative rhythm reminiscent of the act of walking, recreating a sense of movement and an interior journey.

In Calvino’s story, the protagonist is a nameless king. Holed up in his castle-prison, the king cannot move for fear of losing his throne. The only sense remaining to him which permits his connection with the outside world is listening. The king, motionless on his throne and a captive of his passion for power, learns to recognize all possible sounds, which, if repeated, might guarantee his permanence. The noise of the city reaches him almost imperceptibly, until one day he hears a young female voice singing. He is attracted to that voice, he would like to answer, but he cannot. The voice has gone.

The video was made possible with the support of Gaudenz B. Ruf Award 2018.

Lisa Biscaro Balle
Live au Zenith, 2020
A 3-day sequenced live dance performance

The project was inspired by Biscaro Balle’s personal sense of incompatibility between her duo of inherited cultures. She views her training in contemporary dance in France while simultaneously absorbing Brazilian dances through her family heritage as placing her in a privileged position that has not only influenced her dance practice, but has also revealed to her certain norms, constraints and stereotypes inherent to each of these cultures. With Live au Zenith, Biscaro Balle seeks to create a dialog with the music of Brazilian composer Chico Buarque, a one-time political dissident during the military dictatorship in Brazil (1964–1985). Many of his songs became popular anthems of Brazil. In Live au Zenith, Biscaro Balle examines the central question of how to live out her cultural heritage outside its original context. It is a theme that exists in multiple relationships, which are constantly in motion. Over the course of the three days, she creates a daily image of these questions through her performances.

Day 3: Saturday, December 12

Giuliana Kiersz
Collecting Language, 2020 
Writing gathering – Part 2 
(REGISTRATION REQUIRED, max. 12 participants)

How does language »collect« itself and how do we relate to this language? The writing gathering is conceived as a sensitive, political space to reflect on the overwhelming information we receive through digital platforms and consider how we adapt to/struggle with these structures. How does this information resonate in our body? What narratives are we creating? What worlds?

*Each participant is welcome to analyze and write in the language in which they feel most comfortable. Please indicate your preferred working language when registering. Registered participants will receive a preparation kit via email.

** Please register by December 3 by sending an email to:
register@akademie-solitude.de

The writing-gathering will not be recorded.

Maayan Danoch
Telepathy Works, 2020
A workshop on collective consciousness and movement
(REGISTRATION REQUIRED, max. 16 participants)

Telepathy Works is a physical-mental practice addressing collective consciousness and movement. It aims to stimulate synchronicity of thought and action between two people (or more) and summon telepathic moments. It promotes telepathic thought as a human ability that can be developed rather than a supernatural phenomenon.

Seeing the human body as a central common denominator to all human beings, the practice relies on and advances body sensibilities as a prime resource for connecting and communicating with others. Through various exercises, we will enhance our capacity for listening and becoming attentive toward ourselves and others. We will work with different modes of mental imaging and explore their power to change what we perceive, feel and do. Finally, we will enact longer processes via which we will establish an (imaginary) emphatic relationship with another person. Within these frameworks, we will use the tools gained to initiate an instantaneous common process with our partner independent of verbal dialog or protocols of collective decision making. The workshop will take place in an online format for the first time. It thus invites an investigation and a critical reflection on how bodily and interpersonal knowledge can be shared through digital media.

* No prior experience needed; people with different movement abilities are welcome.

** Please register by 3 December by sending an email to:
register@akademie-solitude.de

The workshop will not be recorded.

Genevieve Costello
House Rules (Lower Body Protest (LBP)), 2020
Live screen performance

Printed as part of the hospital letterhead on your patient surveys in tiny, bold text:

Diagnosis,

Lower Body Protest (LBP).

You are a professional swimmer and your leg breaks. No one knows why. Although everyone else in this universe relies on their legs for walking, it’s against social norms to use vision below the waist.

You try to swim with your broken leg. It gets worse. The effects spiral, too endless to name. They become widespread, mixed up. Life as you know it is impossible. You keep doing the best you can, because what else can you do. You go to doctors of all kinds; they don’t know what to tell you. Not much is known about treating legs. Standard medical approaches for LBP? softshrugs, painkillers, musclerelaxants, indifferentandinfinitereferrals to specialistsandCENTERS. Most people have their legs and can use them. Legs, are, usually, just, THERE.

You tape your hospital letterhead to the door to remind you it’s not all in your head. You try to not care that it might as well be while you remain in this legless world.

Diagnosis,

Follow up,

a) You become a torture designer.

b) You become a freak.

c) You work out how to throw a little party.

d) You ___________________.

Seyed Mohsen Hazrati
QQQ [Can vehicles talk to each other?], 2020
Live screen performance
In eternity without beginning, of glory, the splendor-ray of Thy beauty boasted.
Hafiz

A story about creation. How a vehicle has been chosen to be equipped by some terrestrial elements, decorated by different kinds of senses, fed by a pure fuel, to start its mortal journey on the ground.

Warning: The video contains fast flashing images. It may cause discomfort and trigger seizures for people with photosensitive epilepsy.

Valentina Sciarra
The Stone King, 2018
Video screening

The video brings us to the natural site »Strupanitsa« (Bulgarian: heaping), a rock phenomenon and the largest ancient landslide in Bulgaria. It is a large fall of rock blocks, most of which take the form of cubes or parallelepipeds with dimensions exceeding 15 cubic meters.

The audio accompanying the video is an excerpt from Italo Calvino’s final and unfinished book »Under the Jaguar Sun«, which he dedicated to the five human senses. The text has a similar narrative rhythm reminiscent of the act of walking, recreating a sense of movement and an interior journey.

In Calvino’s story, the protagonist is a nameless king. Holed up in his castle-prison, the king cannot move for fear of losing his throne. The only sense remaining to him which permits his connection with the outside world is listening. The king, motionless on his throne and a captive of his passion for power, learns to recognize all possible sounds, which, if invariably repeated, might guarantee his permanence. The noise of the city reaches him almost imperceptibly, until one day he hears a young female voice singing. He is attracted to that voice, he would like to answer, but he cannot. The voice has gone.

The video was made possible with the support of Gaudenz B. Ruf Award 2018.

Lisa Biscaro Balle 
Live au Zenith, 2020
A 3-day sequenced live dance performance 

The project was inspired by Biscaro Balle’s personal sense of incompatibility between her duo of inherited cultures. She views her training in contemporary dance in France while simultaneously absorbing Brazilian dances through her family heritage as placing her in a privileged position that has not only influenced her dance practice, but has also revealed to her certain norms, constraints and stereotypes inherent to each of these cultures. With Live au Zenith, Biscaro Balle seeks to create a dialog with the music of Brazilian composer Chico Buarque, a one-time political dissident during the military dictatorship in Brazil (1964–1985). Many of his songs became popular anthems of Brazil. In Live au Zenith, Biscaro Balle examines the central question of how to live out her cultural heritage outside its original context. It is a theme that exists in multiple relationships, which are constantly in motion. Over the course of the three days, she creates a daily image of these questions through her performances.