Nina Prader
area: Media Art: Print
Key Facts
nationality
USAarea
Media Art: Printresidence
Berlin (GER)recommending institution
RIAT – Research Institute for Arts & Technologytime period
December 2016 - December 2016Nina Prader is an artist and arts and culture writer. She was born in Washington D.C.. She received her BFA at the Museum School of Fine Arts in Boston (Tufts) and at the Slade in London in affiliation with UCL. She continued her studies for her MA in Critical Studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, Austria under Marina Grzinic and Diedrich Diederichsen.
She currently lives, works, and researches between Berlin & Vienna, pursuing text and image arts and printed matters. Her printed Matters take shape in zines, comics, artist books and arts and culture journalism, and most recently a radio show “Paper & Tape”. She has exhibited and written internationally in Boston, Vienna, Berlin, and London. She was Coteacher to Nicholas Wild and Sarnath Banerjee at the International Summer Academy in Salzburg and has worked for Sigute Chlebinskaite’s Knygu Salis (Land of Books and artist Book Studio) in Vilnius, Lithuania, Printed Matter Inc., Interference Archive, and Avital Geva’s Greenhouse: Arts and Ecological Center.
Exhibitions
2016
Die Kurbel, Spoken-Word Performance im Rahmen der Ausstellung Ich bin, varim, je suis Abendrot -Susanne Kriemann, Galerie im Körnerpark, Berlin
Lady Liberty Re-mix: Pour la Paix. Spoken word als Teil der Performance Serie kuratiert von Vanessa Grosvenor & Zofia Nierodzinska im Rahmen der Ausstellung Blood, Sweat, Tears -Mathilde ter Hejne, Galerie im Körner Park, Berlin.
Comics zur Post-Erotik. Philosophy Unbound. Flutgraben, Berlin
Akte A-Z: Lehrende der Internationalen Sommerakademie 2016, Salzburg
2015
MemoryGames: Lebendiges Archiv Gesprochener Widerstand, WIENWOCHE und DÖW, Wien
The Front: Cupcake Rant Continued, Ms. Baltazar's Laboratory, Wien
Referring to…Lehrende der Internationalen Sommerakademie 2016, Salzburg
2014
Austerity Cake/ Sparkurskuchen, Vitrine Rheintaler, Wien
Lavare, Sandleiten, Soho in Otterkring Festival, Wien
Memory Games, The Vienna Project and Psychosoziales Zentrum Esra, Wien
Urbanes Sehen: Lehrende der Internationalen Sommerakademie 2016, Salzburg
2013
Collaborations, Im Muschelgrund im Körnerpark, Temporary Autonomous Zone mit ff, Berlin
Herzsplitter/ Heart Shards, School, Wien
The Keys to her Place, curated by Bernadette Atzengruber, Wien
Moss-eum, in Zusammenarbeit mit Olivia Jaques, Friday Exit, Lenikus Studios, Wien
An Evening with Ellador hosted by Mathilde ter Heijne, Magda Tothova, Ruth Weissmann, Berlin
2012
Dildo Anus Power/Queer Abstraction Conference, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, Wien
Abraktion und Subtraktion, selected by Esther Stocker and ff, Galerie Lisa Ruyter, TAZ, Wien
Keine Zeit/ Busy, 21iger Haus, Wien
Heart Shards, Howard Art Project, Dorchester, MA
Museum of Dangerous Women, Wild Theatre Off-Space, Wien
2011
Painters Rags, Howard Art Project, Dorchester, MA
Moreover, Strang Print Room, UCL, London, UK
Dear Susan, Sasoon Gallery, Slade Media Group exhibition, London, UK
Insatiable, Women’s Studies Research Center, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA
2010
Code Girls, Austrian Embassy, Washington, D.C.
Farewell: other Other, Yes.Oui.Si. Space Boston, MA
Utacopalypse, Yes.Oui.Si. Space. Boston, MA
Narratives, Group Exhibition, GASP Gallery, Brookline, MA
Student Annual, All School Group exhibition curated by
Dina Deitch and Andrew Witkin, School of the Museum School, Boston, MA
FABULOUS VISCOSITY, Group exhibition, Museum School, Boston, MA
Theorizing Art, BAG Gallery, Museum School, Boston, MA
Publications
Print & Online:
Wespennest, BerlinArtLink, Exberliner, Metropole: Vienna in English; The Vienna Review; Skug: Journal für Musik; Augustin; Rolling Stone Berlin; An.schläge; Bildpunkt; engagée: politisch-philosophische Einmischungen; Jungsheft; Mitscharf; Vite Editions
Kataloge & wissenschaftliche Texte:
DÖW Jahrbuch. Fanatiker, Pflichterfüller, Widerständige. MemoryGames: Lebendiges Archiv — Gesprochener Widerstand. 2016
21iger Haus. Busy Keine Zeit. 2012
Zines: MemoryGames. 2014-15; The Front. 2014.; Blue Stockings. 2014 ; Luck Star. 2013; Struwwelliese: Burn-Out Revolution. 2012; The Little Doubters. 2011; Gastro-Porn. 2011; Cupcake Rant or Lament. 2011.
Zine Fairs & Workshops:
2016:
MemoryGames in Zusammenarbeit mit nomadicArt, Zentrum für Kunst&Urbanistik, Berlin Make Kit Zine, Workshop, Angewandte Art & Science, Wien
Gastvortrag: "The Leaflet/Zine/Artist Book as a Social Tool" #Riafeniz, Künstlerhaus, Graz
Angewandte Innovation Lab (AIL): Print Weekend., Wien
Knygu Salis: Land of Books Studio, Lit Expo 2016,Vilnius, Litauen
LesVoiZines: Zinefest, Gent, Belgien
Zineship 2#. Coded Cultures Festival. Alte Polizeistation. Wien
ZineShip1#. Transformer. Raum D, Museumsquartier, Wien
Memory Games meets Anne Frank Workshop Fichtnergasse & Kulturkontakt, Wien
Our Comics Ourselves: Vulnerable Paper, Loud Speech Bubbles,Interference Archive, Brooklyn, NY
2015:
Self-Publishing Saturday, Wien
Berlin Zine Fest; Make:it Zine with Artistic Bokeh, Urbanize Festival, Wien
MemoryGames Workshops: Living Archive, Spoken Resistance, DÖW, Wien
Not a Cupcake, Zine-making workshop mit Mz. Baltazars Laboratory, Wien
2014:
Berlin Zine Fest; Helsinki Comic Festival;
2013:
Berlin Zine fest Gastvortrag mit Impulse Tanz und Zine workshop mitVeronika Zott und Amanda Pina im Nada Lokal, Wien
Zine Fair Kunsthalle Wien
2012:
Zine Workshop, Lisa Ruyter Gallery mit FF, Wien; Kunsthalle Wien
Red Emmas Zine’s Fair Baltimore Book Festival, MD, USA
A collaboration with RIAT & LadyLibertyPress
During my stay at the MQ Residency, I aim to design the analog & digital foundations for a Public Open Source Zine Library in close collaboration with RIAT’s Open Publishing Lab as well as conduct applied interdisciplinary and alternative filing and cataloguing experiments through discussions, a workshop & artistic publications on printed matters.
From its origins in analog subcultures like Riot Grrrl, sixties avant-garde to eighties punk, the zine has undergone major cultural shifts, becoming a fixture in art institutions, university archives, and on the art-fair market as a genre and artistic format onto its own. From Ed Ruscha’s hefty artist books to the artist book subcultures surrounding the Risograph-printer, The research project: On Paper Trails collectively, theoretically, and practically seeks to uncover how ephemera has acted and still acts as an agent and carrier for political and artistic discourses. By examining utopian ideologies behind feminist zine-archives to experimental libraries, from printing to the distribution methods, I hope to research and lay the ground-work for a variety of questions, relating to printed matters.
During the course of my residency at the Institute for Research Art & Technology and MQ, I spent my time laying the theoretical and practical foundations for the OZL (Open Zine Library), a presence library dedicated to international and sub/cultural printed matters, specifically zines.
In strong collaboration with the Open Publishing Lab at RIAT, I researched the ethics that define zine-values in contrast to classical notions of the library and experimented with alternative ways of archiving through methods of display and events.
In addition to defining the codes, principles, and values under which the OZL will operate in the form of a manifesto, a workshop on how to DIY file zines and their code of ethics took place, entitled “File_Under: Zine-CORE”. A moderated open conversation on the “State of Zine in Wien” crystallized the vibrant and diverse zine communities world-wide (Link:<link https: cba.fro.at external-link-new-window externen link in neuem>cba.fro.at/331903) and there was a first soft opening of OPEN ZINE LIBRARY DAY which displayed and highlighted certain categories from the collection as well as a tape collection by an OZL donor from Transformer.
The outcome of these tests made apparent how nomadic, precarious and personal —but still, politically radical— these pieces of paper are and can be.
Even within shifting contexts and cultural narratives, they symbolize and activate free and creative thought and agency. Therefore, it is of utmost importance to provide caring, respectful places, moments, workshops, events to come together around these objects to foster thriving zine-communities. The OZL hopes to provide such a space of thought for the readers, technocrats, bibliophiles, activists, authors, artists, self-publishers and newbies who may happen upon it. This library is an event, authored by its people.