2012

Babi Badalov, Untitled (2012), at Adaptation, The Camp, Graz, photo: Wolfgang Silveri; courtesy of the artist

La Pocha Nostra, The Insurrected Body from the series „Psycho Magic Actions for a World Gone Wrong“, Dom im Berg Graz, 2012, Photo: Wolfgang Silveri

raumlaborberlin, The Camp (2012), Festival Center of steirischer herbst ’12, Opernring, Graz, 2012, photo: Wolfgang Silveri

Heiner Goebbels with Carmina Slovenica, When the mountain changed its clothing (2012), music theater, Helmut List Halle, Graz, 2012, photo: Wonge Bergmann

Lexxus Legal, Worthy Son of Africa, concert, at Truth Is Concrete, The Camp, Graz, 2012, photo: Thomas Raggam
steirischer herbst ’12
Truth Is Concrete—Artistic Strategies in Politics and Political Strategies in Art
Director
Veronica Kaup-Hasler
Festival dates
21.9.–14.10.2012
Curatorial team
Chief Dramaturge & Curator: Florian Malzacher
Dramaturge: Kira Kirsch
Curatorial Advisor Visual Arts: Anne Faucheret
Artistic Assistance: Johanna Rainer, Gerda Strobl
“Everything is different this year. No customary opening, no exhibition tour on the first weekend, instead a one-week ‘24/7 marathon camp’ with round-the-clock programme, an overwhelming kick-off. The fact that steirischer herbst is changing markedly, is the result of rapid global changes. The revolution in many Arab countries, the Occupy movements, the massive upheavals and financial disasters in Europe, all together question the role of art. During The many discussions in the course of our research at places where society is now on the move, it soon became clear that artists had played a major role everywhere and from the outset. But it also evolved that the questions as to the role of art itself is much more difficult: Whether or not there can and should be an art that not only observes, comments and documents, but also gets practically involved.”
—Veronica Kaup-Hasler (original booklet translation)
Everything was different in 2012, as Veronica Kaup-Hasler noted at the beginning of her preface to the program booklet. With the title inspired by Walter Benjamin Truth Is Concrete (idea and concept: Florian Malzacher), which was also the leitmotif for the festival, steirischer herbst reacted to the rapid changes, crises, and upheavals around the globe, which inspired movements such as the Arab Spring and Occupy, as well as to the global rise of the populist far right, environmental catastrophes, and huge financial upheavals with a “24/7 marathon camp.”
In response to the statement by the right-wing populist Geert Wilders that art is “a left-wing hobby,” over two hundred artists, scientists, theorists, and activists—including the Colombian philosopher and politician Antanas Mockus, the theorist Chantal Mouffe, and the radical Russian artist group Voina—analyzed artistic strategies in politics and political strategies in art around the clock for one week. The Camp am Opernring consisted of various modules designed by raumlaborberlin: a bar, living room, black cube and white box, video archive, library, radio, hairdressing salon, kitchen, garden, and relaxation areas.
The herbst exhibition, Adaption (curated by Zbyněk Baladrán and Vit Havránek), was also presented at the camp. Furthermore, a grant program enabled one hundred young students, artists, and activists to actively take part in this “temporary living environment” in workshops. The event, which was unique within the framework of steirischer herbst, was accompanied by a separate program booklet and, in 2014, the publication Truth Is Concrete: A Handbook for Artistic Strategies in Real Politics.
Other central program items were the campaign and benefit gala Rebranding European Muslims by the Israeli performance and research group Public Movement, and the lecture performance 33 Rounds and Few Seconds by Rabih Mroué and Lina Saneh, the fictitious court proceedings 1 Hour 18 Minutes by the Moscow-based documentary theater Teatr.doc, Untitled Feminist Show by the American Young Jean Lee’s Theater Company, and The Insurrected Body by La Pocha Nostra.
Program
Truth is concrete
Donde el tiempo se detiene/ Where time stands still & Holy fire
Austrian politics – a crash course for foreigners
The province and the avantgarde
Welcome & opening of steirischer herbst festival
The 7th black circle declaration: Europe amongst the ruins
Tactic talk by Róza El-Hassan (H/SYR)
Daybreak into the city I: Park politics
Movement. Women power. Bare breasts.
Art and crime. Legally on the edge
Unpleasant cat stories for learning
Random acts: Free Syria air force
From the individual to the collective
Actions and what we learn from them
Magic in interventional politics
VJing the revolution (a nostalgia)
Hack the jellyfish: How to mess with reality
Daybreak into the city II: Meet and greet at squatters’ breakfast
The garden of biological disobedience
History of art, according to the resistance
Random acts: Reverend Billy & The Church of Earthalujah
The politics of artistic practices
Politics: Truth or representation?
Daybreak into the city III: The political in public spaces
Action theatre / Théâtre de l’Opprimé
Political spectatorship within and outside the theatre
Random acts: The Haircut Before The Party
Freethought I: Economy of crisis
Enacting populism: On the transformations of myths
Disobedience archive (the free square cinema)
Daybreak into the city IV: Feminist blinking
Welcome to the desert of the real
Random acts: Metropolitan lice
Freethought II: Crisis education
CorruptTour.com The first corruption travel agency
Network as a medium of critique and action
Methods of social resistance on Russian examples
Daybreak into the city IV: Listening is a political act
Freethought III: Creative strike
Too many protest singers, not enough protest songs
Where has all the protest gone?
Daybreak into the city VI: Redressing the market
Neither working nor unworking: Contemporary politics of art and labour
Daybreak into the city VII: Russian twilight
Photography, performance and guerrilla tactics of communication against financial abuses
Randnotizen
How to talk about what’s important
Garden of biological disobedience
The Mobile Archive – Video library
Network map of tactics & Network map of collaborations
No revolution without innovation
From Cairo to Graz: The Choir Project
Resistant matters Art, activism and permaculture
Hacking doors & media for fighting housing problems
Strategies of public intervention
Work in Progress: Everyday Rebellion
Ataya – Tea palaver in the sahelian tradition
Legwork Goes Truth is Concrete
Performing Rio de Janeiro: Artistic strategies in times of banditocracy
Three Workshops on Books and Hair
Operation-For something black and hot
SOSka group: self organization as survival
Ataya – Tea palaver in the sahelian tradition: On visa issues
Three workshops on books and hair
Three workshops on books and hair 3
Performing disobedience in the streets
Concretizing communism. Being-in-common and the worlding force of radical communities
Global stories / Through different eyes
Presentation and open discussion
Works of Art Academy Students of the International Academy of Art Palestine
Theatre / Performance / Dance
Exhibitions
Music
Literature
Venues
< rotor >
Akademie Graz
Camera Austria
Camp 2012
Camp 2012, Camp: Living Room
Camp: Black Cube
Camp: Black Cube, Camp: Lailas Bar, Camp: White Box, Camp: Living Room
Camp: Black Cube, Camp: White Box
Camp: Bloghaus
Camp: Bloghaus, Camp: Living Room
Camp: Hall
Camp: Lailas Bar
Camp: Library
Camp: Living Room
Camp: Living Room, Camp: Lailas Bar
Camp: Videoarchiv
Camp: White Box
Camp: White Box, Camp: Black Cube
Camp: Workshop space
Dom im Berg
ESC im LABOR
Forum Stadtpark
Grazer Kunstverein
Grazer Stadtgebiet
Grazer Stadtgebiet, Camp: Black Cube
Heilandskirche
Helmut-List-Halle
Klosterwiesgasse 5
Kulturzentrum bei den Minoriten
Kunsthaus Graz
Kunstverein Medienturm
Lailas Bar
MUMUTH
Pavelhaus / Pavlova hisa
Theater im Bahnhof
Publications

Program booklet of steirischer herbst 2012: steirischer herbst festival gmbh, steirischer HERBST (Graz: 2012)

steirischer herbst festival gmbh, herbst. Theorie zur Praxis (Graz: 2012)
→ Available here

Nature Theater of Oklahoma, Life and Times. Episode V (New York: 2012)
→ Available here

steirischer herbst (ed.), September 5th 2120, Prague. Zbyěnk Baladrán & Vít Havránek (Graz: steirischer herbst festival gmbh in collaboration with tranzit.cz, 2012)

steirischer herbst (ed.), Ruti Sela. Images from selected video works (Graz: steirischer herbst festival gmbh in collaboration with tranzit.cz, 2012)

steirischer herbst (ed.), Hafiz. On Sketches & Odyssey (Graz: steirischer herbst festival gmbh in collaboration with tranzit.cz, 2012)

steirischer herbst and Lia Perjovschi (eds.), The Knowledge Museum plan A B C (Graz: steirischer herbst, 2012)

steirischer herbst (ed.), Babi Badalov. Nuage (Graz: steirischer herbst festival gmbh in collaboration with tranzit.cz, 2012)

steirischer herbst (ed.), Ondřej Buddeus. A me (Graz: steirischer herbst festival gmbh in collaboration with tranzit.cz, 2012)
Retrospective
Retrospective