Friday 27th March

4.30pm

Bailey Allen Hall, NUI Galway

[…]To look at the watch, the clock, the alarm clock, to listen to the ticking, to think about it to look again, to go to the tap, to open the refrigerator, to close it, to open the door, to feel the cold, to close the door, to feel hungry, to wait, to wait for […]

'To Be in a Time of War' Etel Adnan

Conflicts travel, conflicts get stuck in one place, they are mediated and projected , they are global in their totality yet unique to the bodies living with them: “To look at the watch, the clock, the alarm clock, to listen to the ticking (…)”.  Actions and systematic movement for the conflicted bodies suggests sometimes the same performance yet with different meanings. Bodies living and surviving the conflict creates proximities and distances, they become lazy, observant, active, lazy, suspicious, reckless, collective, projected and militant in some cases. Those actions suggests a temporality in the body yet they differ during the conflict, where the body is traumatized from an event and experienced towards an event that is yet to come. The body becomes expanded, “to wait, to wait for(…)” . 

In this panel Noeth and Najdi will incorporate visuals and audios from different materials , to engage into a dialogue and to highlight the question: What kind of bodies are produced in conflict? And how can we think about various agencies moving and shifting these bodies?
Throughout the dialogue they will highlight the exploration of how initiatives, collectivities and nuances emerging in conflicts, creates moments of rupture, failure, escape, repetition and suspension. Both will question how the later adds to the de-normalization of conflict, violence and borders and how bodies doing so practice and rehearse citizenship.

Rima Najdi’s work primarily engages with performance arts, moving from them to transform into different materials and media such as video, photography, installations and texts. Whether the production of the work manifests into a live performance or a post card, the production usually involves texts and visual elements, costumes and set design.

She has a Diploma in Dramatic Arts (2008) from High Arts Institute, Lebanese University, Lebanon, and an MA in Performance Studies (2011) from Tisch School of the Arts, New York University, USA. Her work has been shown in venues such as WatermillCenter, Long Island, NY(2011) 49B Studios, Brooklyn, NY (2010, 2012, 2013) Bushwick Open Studios, NY (2010, 2013), New York University, NY (2011, 2013), Saifi Urban Gardens, Lebanon (2011) Kule Theater, Germany, (2012) Warwick University, UK, (2012), Kunstraum T27, Berlin, Germany (2014). Najdi is a recipient of Watermill Center International Summer Residency, NY (2011). www.rimanajdi.com

Sandra Noeth is a curator, researcher and writer based in Berlin. Since 2015, she is a fellow of the Research Group Loose Connections: Collectivity in Urban and Digital Space at the University of Hamburg. From 2009-2014, she was Head of Dramaturgy and Research at Tanzquartier Wien where she developed a series of research-based projects on concepts and practices of responsibility, protest, religion and integrity in relation to the body. Noeth is co-author of MONSTRUM. A book on reportable portraits (Norderstedt: Books on Demand, 2009, with K. Deufert and T. Plischke) and co-editor of Emerging Bodies. On the Performance of Worldmaking (Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag, 2011, with G. Klein) as well as the publication series SCORES (Vienna: Tanzquartier Wien, 2010-2014) and Tanzhefte (2007-2009, with E. Boxberger). She is internationally active as an educator, and has led artistic-theoretical laboratories and held several teaching posts on the ethics and politics of the body and dramaturgy in choreography and performance art. Noeth is a permanent member of the artistic committee at the MA Choreography at DOCH/Stockholm.