Digital Interventions. Bodies, Infrastructures, Politics

Whether we are online or off, there is no outside of "the digital”: it is always already inside us. Our bodies, infrastructures and politics are fundamentally pervaded by digital technologies. Our attention is increasingly governed and monetized by social media, our lifestyles are structured by platform capitalism, and our political discourse is undermined by algorithms – but what are the practices and where are the breaches for artists and activists to intervene and challenge these developments? The Collaborative Research Centre “Intervening Arts”, located at Freie Universität Berlin, invites scholars, artists and activists to discuss these issues within the framework of their annual conference 2025. The programme combines keynote lectures by Aria Dean, Joanna Moll, and Azadeh Ganjeh, roundtables, a workshop, and the performance “NFTs: Non Fuckable Tokens” by Claudix Vanesix.

Programme

Friday, 9 May

18:00 – 18:30 Welcome and introduction with Sarah Reimann (HAU Hebbel am Ufer), Karin Gludovatz (Freie Universität Berlin), Simon Teune and Iryna Kovalenko (Organizing Team)
18:30 – 19:45 Aria Dean: “Labor, Art, and the Vernacular Aesthetic Online”
19:45 – 20:15 Reception

Saturday, 10 May 2024

09:30 – 10:00 Introduction by Florian Schlittgen and Naomi Boyce (Organizing Team)
10:00 – 11:00 Brigitte Weingart: “The (Micro-)Politics of Meme Culture”
11:00 – 11:15 Break
11:15 – 12:30 Roundtable: “Art Challenging Digital Repression” with Aram Bartholl, Jean Peters, and Şirin Fulya Erensoy. Moderation: Simon Teune
12:30 – 14:00 Lunch Break and Workshops
14:00 – 15:15 Roundtable: “Desinformation (and) War” with Pekka Kallioniemi, Roman Horbyk, Veronika Solopova and Johanna Hiebl. Moderation: Florian Schlittgen and Iryna Kovalenko

15:15 – 15:45 Break
15:45 – 16:45 Azadeh Ganjeh: “Not a Body for Burial”
16:45 – 17:00 Break
17:00 – 18:00 Joana Moll: “Follow the Body: Materiality and Resistance in the Age of Data Extraction”
18:00 – 19:00 Concluding Discussion with Sambojang Ceesay and Doris Kolesch. Moderation: Margarita Tsomou