30.9.2022 Seminar
Dirty Strike
Introduction to the Dirty Art Department Program 2022 – 23
with Florence Parot, Catherine Somze, Anna Reutinger, Kirtis Clarke, Caroline Gieszner, Helena Lambrechts and Jerszy Seymour.
‘It was the best of times, it was the worst of times’, so said Dickens in a Tale of Two Cities, but today things seems pretty much more f**d up, and indeed, as Achille Mbembe said in his
text ‘A Universal Right to Breathe’ (written in advance of the murder of George Floyd), ‘what we need is a voluntary cessation, a conscious and fully consensual interruption,
without which there will be no tomorrow’, and so the concept of strike, of stopping, becomes more and more relevant.
But a strike is far from doing nothing… it’s a total action… it’s far from a breath, it’s all about anxiety, climax, giving a lot, to go towards more solidarity and equality. It’s all about the
future. In typical dirty fashion, we will take the challenge, and with a tempered optimism and necessary humour, we look forward to dance, delve, talk, explore and get busy with you,
as a considered stop should be the most careful of creations. May the sun beams fly!