Worpsweder Spekulationen #2 symposium with lectures, workshops, screenings by Melanie Bonajo, Bracha Ettinger, Anselm Franke, Laboria Cuboniks (Diann Bauer, Helen Hester) invited by Sam Basu, Anke Hennig and Anja Kirschner

Increasingly we are organised around global emergencies that reach into every facet of life, disseminating an underlying apprehension of horror. These urgencies, mediated through spectacular polarizations, limit our comprehension of and capacity for being in the world. Given the recent resurgence of discourses on ‘horror’ what is mostly imagined with and against it tends towards an acceleration of the crisis-vortex and a staring into the abyss of a radically indifferent world. But can ‘horror’ become a lever for emancipation?

This symposium invites participants to contribute to an understanding of the horrific in multiple ways. We affirm the experience of horror in life, a fascination with it in popular culture, and horror’s presence in the mechanisms of extreme or radical change. Alongside this we weave the idea of horos, the ancient Greek word for a boundary marker, something that points to a limit and horizon.

WE NEED YOUR CAR KEYS! will explore the horizons that open up as we navigate through experiences of ungrounding and the 21st century condition of horror. How do the art and culture of our times express the alienation that arises in periods of great change, mapping issues of (historical) trauma, new technology and gender? We ask, what are the erotic, poetic, political and critical implications of the horrific and how does it participate in developing emancipatory drives for a complex and turbulent world?

WE NEED YOUR CAR KEYS! proposes that horror is a necessary tool to understand and foreground strategies that undo the dichotomy between inside and an opposing outside. Can we harness monstrous becomings in a positive way? Does not any talk about our post-human condition already affirm alienation; will not the application of science and reason further ‘humiliate’ our human selfie? And on the other hand, if nature is “unjust”, should we not change nature itself as the Xenofemists Laboria Cuboniks ask in their manifesto? What does being alien tell us about ways of monstrous becoming and how can we use this alternative monsterism in creating new alliances?

The symposium sees “horror” as a fluid ooze that transgresses the disciplinary and methodological boundaries weaving together discourses in humanities and sciences such as psychoanalytic theory, aesthetic theory, theory of affect, anthropology, biology and mathematics. What new subjectivities are emerging from within and beyond 21st century conditions of horror - super-communes, Xenofeminist, animist, artificial and networked intelligence? We assume horror spreads through and permeates body and reason, creating a connective tissue between subjectivity and matter. Analysing horror we find, that the encounter with affects and sheer anxiety do not precede our cultural and social formations. Horror proposes an allegory of affect, compiling bodily reactions, psychosomatic mess, leper creative and transgressive responses. It befalls a mind encountering its horizon to grasp its conditions of survival.

The symposium is organised by Anja Kirschner, Anke Hennig, Sam Basu, and Tim Voss, who came together as a group of art practitioners, curators, and theorists who share an interest in the excessive potential of horror.

In order to sign in please write to carkeys[at]kh-worpswede.de

The Symposium is entrancefree. Your accommodation will be organized by the team, as soon you will sign in: youthhostel (26€ incl. breakfast, discounted 16€), guestappartements (40-65€) or Hotelroom (single 65€ / double 100€) Vegetarian Food will be organized by the symposion as well.

schedule

Friday, October 28th (Künstlerhäuser Worpswede, Vor den Pferdeweiden 16)


  • 11:00 am Introductory Student’s Workshops 
 (Anke Hennig, Sam Basu)
  • 1:00 - 2:00 pm Lunch Break

  • 2:30 pm Welcome to the Teufelsmoor/Künstlerhäuser Worpswede (Tim Voss) / opening with works by Diann Bauer, Bracha l. Ettinger
  • 4:30 pm “Invocation of our Demon Sisters!!” (Anke Hennig, Sam Basu, Anja Kirschner)
  • 5:00 pm Bracha L. Ettinger (Keynote)


  • 7:00 pm Dinner 

  • 9:00 pm Screening of Anja Kirschner’s flm Moderation

Saturday, October 29th (Bötjersche Scheune, Bauernreihe 3, Worpswede)



  • 11:00 am - 12 noon Helen Hester “Towards a Theory of Thing-Women” (Laboria Cuboniks)

  • 12noon - 1:00 pm Diann Bauer “It’s not you, it’s me (working title)” (Laboria Cuboniks)

  • 1:00pm - 2:00 pm Lunch Break

  • 2:30 pm - 4:00 pm Anselm Franke “The Horror, the Horror - Primary Violence and the Underworld of Modernity”
  • 4:30 pm -6.30 pm Follow-up Seminar Bracha L. Ettinger (Bötjersche Scheune) & Workshop Anke Hennig “Zombie Formalism” 
 (Künstlerhäuser Worpswede)
  • 7:00 pm Dinner 


  • 9:00 pm "Can I Get a Cuddle? Horror or Fun - on the ethics of non human labour online", Lecture by Melanie Bonajo (Künstlerhäuser Worpswede, Vor den Pferdeweiden 16)
 


Sunday October, 30th (Bötjersche Scheune, Bauernreihe 3, Worpswede)



  • 11:00 am - 1:00 pm Follow-up Seminars
  • Diann Bauer & Helen Hester “What is Xenofeminism?” (Bötjersche Scheune)
  • Anja Kirschner “The Processed and the Possessed” (Künstlerhäuser Worpswede)
  • Melanie Bonajo "
  • 1:00pm - 2:00 pm Lunch Break

  • 2:30 pm - 4:30 pm "The Final Girl" - Panel (Bötjersche Scheune)