Mladen Stilinović’s text-based work Drei Tage bis zum Ende der Kunst (2002)

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School of Mutation within the framework of the iteration We have a situation here. The online meeting is on Thursday July 23 at 19:00 CEST. Facilitated and composed by Dmitry Vilensky, with WHW Akademija (Zagreb) and School of Engaged Art (Saint Petersburg) 

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A dialogue between two informal art schools – WHW Akademija (Zagreb) and School of Engaged Art (Saint Petersburg) 

Art practice was always adventurous journey into unknown – to shape something which not yet exist, or it is already with us but people need some navigation to discover it. Such practices were often happening at the back ground of more or less stable world outside art. Now the background for art making is changing – the whole societies stays in limbo and no experts could predict what would happen in a next few days. 

The global pandemic has already completely transformed the situation with education from elementary schools to Universities.  The “temporary” shifting of all classes online has created a crucial dispute about the future of pedagogy and relations inside schools. What is the community of learners would mean nowadays? And how this situation has influenced the art education which was always based on personal live encounters with mentors and between students? 

Also we are faced with deep transformation of the whole idea what art could and should be. The shift of art practice into direction of reproductive work, care, therapy, healing and community building has questioned the whole convention of art making and its distribution. 

What do we teach and how do we learn during pandemic? 

How does our school survived under this condition – what have we already learned? What do we gain and lost already? 

BIOS

WHW Akademija is an independent, tuition-free interdisciplinary study program for emerging artists founded by the curatorial collective What, How and for Whom/WHW in 2018.  The name of the program, like that of the collective, includes the acronym for the three crucial questions of economic organization, What, How, & for Whom. Based in Zagreb, Croatia, the program accepts 8–12 fellows per year. Its aim is to work with the participants in Zagreb over the course of seven months on new forms of self-determination based on modes of critical reflection, curiosity, and encounters among artists, artworks, arts professionals, scholars, and practitioners in various disciplines. The program consists of a series of intensives, experimental exercises, workshops, and seminars, as well as a range of exhibitions, performances, and discursive programs that are in large part open to the public.  WHW Akademija is realized in partnership with the Kontakt Collection, Vienna. The collection focuses on experimental and neo-avant-garde art in Central, Eastern, and South-Eastern Europe from the late 1950s onwards. See more here https://akademija.whw.hr

The School of Engaged Art was initiated by Chto Delat collective in 2013 The School of Engaged art is a radical art education initiative with the goal of establishing a community of cultural workers which use art practice as a tool for transformation of society based on the values of justice and equality. The School is established and operate inside Russian social and political situation where basic democratic freedoms are under threat, in conditions that offer no support for any critical culture, and where there are no academic programs in contemporary art at all – this situation demands to develop its own tactics and method how to survive and reclaim the access to art and public sphere. The curriculum of the school is a hybrid of poetry and sociology, choreography and street activism, political economy and the sublime, art history and militant research, gender and queer experimentation with dramaturgy, the struggle for the rights of cultural workers with the “romantic” vision of art as a mission. A central component of our school is the care for collective practice.  We are convinced that a community of learners together are able to challenge the status-quo of artistic life and combine horizontal and delegation power structure. In the last 7 years we worked closely with about 140 young professionals who are now play a decisive role in the local cultural life – organizing public campaign (feminist-queer, precarious workers, conferences and exhibitions). The project is realized with the support of Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, Moscow and Chto Delat Mutual Aid Fund. See more here: http://schoolengagedart.org/en/