A little bit further down and to the side

TQW Winter School

For three days, TQW hosts an ephemeral community of theorists, curators, artists, and artist-researchers to question how our thoughts and practices on dance may shift if we deviate our attention away from Western European cultural centres. With a specific focus on Southern/Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean, we investigate dance and performance in regions relegated to the "periphery" of Europe, be it through their culturally, financially, or politically minoritarian position in the continent, their positionality in the "Cold War" and its aftermath, or through colonial history and neo-colonialist hierarchies. At the same time, we interrogate the forms of privilege that appear in these interstitial positions.

Each day is structured around a practice-oriented workshop, a communal lunch, a symposium, and a keynote or performance. On 13 January, we explore processes of decentralisation and trans-local alliances and exchanges that question the role of Western Europe as a reference point; on 14 January, we host perspectives that reshuffle chronological and stylistic categories that classify dance and performance, looking for reappropriations, recontextualisations, and resistant translations. Finally, on 15 January, we look at territories relegated to the margin as spaces of potential, filled with opportunities to practice differently and interrogate concepts taken for granted.

A series of exciting parallel projects will accompany the Winter School. A video installation by Nicholas Rowe will gather voices of contemporary dance artists from Palestine: Noora Baker and Ata Khatab. Art historian and sound artist Heather Marina Saenz will weave audio documentation from the event with interviews in a sonic investigation leading to three podcast episodes. In collaboration with Professor Nicole Haitzinger, PhD candidates from the Doktoratskolleg "Wissenschaft und Kunst" (Universität Mozarteum, Paris-Lodron Universität Salzburg) Martina Fladerer, Marcel Kieslich, Ielizaveta Oliinyk, Anna Stadler, and Ivana Pilić, will respond to the event in writing on the TQW blog. Finally, a book installation and video selection with material from the TQW library will be curated by Christina Gillinger. Download peripheral projects programme

Workshops
Open Level / 10–13h / free admission / registration required

Fr 13.01., Sevi Bayraktar: "Diaspora temporalities – gathering through dispersing" More

Sa 14.01., Olia Sosnovskaya: "Reading is a gesture" More

So 15.01.,  Kinga Szemessy, Domokos Kovács: "Inside" More

Symposium
Fr 13. to So 15.01., 14.30–17.30h / free admission

Presentations by Lukas Bengough, Evgenija Filova, Maria Kardash, Anastasios Koukoutas, Ana Lessing Menjibar & Isabel Gatzke, Jitka Pavlišová, Ivana Pilić & Myassa Kraitt, Sasha Portyannikova and Nadja Rothenburger

Download symposium programme

Lecture performances
18h / free admission

Fr 13.01., Steriani Tsintziloni & Rok Vevar: ""Cold-War" era cultural policies on dance and performance on either side of the Iron Curtain" More

Sa 14.01., Mariem Guellouz: "Looking for my belly. A postcolonial performance-lecture on "belly dance"" More

So 15.01., Ulduz Ahmadzadeh & Maria Vlachou: "Dance immemorial" More