DAI BULLETIN | WEEK 1, 10 - 15 October 2019
"How to go on making art when everything is all fucked up" ( title of Jimini Higgnet's written thesis for DAI, 2010).
“To ask fundamental questions about art without asking about its relation to capitalism is simply not to ask fundamental questions about art.” Martin, Stewart. A Short Treatise On Art. (as quoted by Ghalya Saadawi to introduce her 2019-2020 HTDTWT seminar).
“Anal pleasure against capital.” COOP study group The Immemorial Body: Betraying Carmelo Bene in Nine Acts (as quoted by Giulia Crispiani in her article Roaming as a way of schooling).
Dear students, tutors, partners, dear comrades, alumni, friends and relations,
This summer I have been wondering “how to go on inside formal education when everything is all fucked up”. Yesterday a Neo-Nazi in Germany attacked a synagogue and a dönershop. Today Turkish bombers are circling the skies above Rojava (the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria, grounded on a libertarian socialist ideology promoting decentralization, gender equality, environmental sustainability and pluralistic tolerance for religious, cultural and political diversity).
Our house is on fire, the powers that be are betraying all that is solid and even those who are leading our crumbling institutions with the best of intentions are failing to see that neoliberal capitalism is not an ally but an adversary. Patriarchy, colonialism, racism, classism, contemporary slavery and ecocide will never be conquered by it.
But yes, I am ready nevertheless! Ready to warmly, warmly welcome our amazing returning and brave incoming students, precisely because I know they are refusing to fall for neoliberal capitalism’s charms. I know they are refusing to be rendered powerless by an ideology so familiar that we fail to recognise it as ideology: consumerism. Our students embrace “study” as a modus operandi for their multitude of activisms, struggles and solidarities and I commend them for taking the future in their own hands.
Yes, I am ready to welcome our partners, old and new, who have been working so hard, against all political and cultural hardships, often already for so many years: working for the commons and for our communities, intelligently decolonizing our canon and consistently siding with the underprivileged of all creeds. Welcome Bulegoa, Casco Art Institute: Working for the Commons, Diakron, If I Can’t Dance I Don't Want To Be Part Of Your Revolution, Open!Platform for Art, Culture and the Public Domain, SAVVY Contemporary, sonsbeek20-24, State of Concept and last but not least WALTER books. At DAI we are humbled and proud to be able to (again)work with you in the upcoming academic year.
Yes, we are ready to embark on the next academic year, because we know that together with the most amazing crew, the backbone, and the most brilliant faculty, the lifeblood, to our program, we can be relevant and strong.
Welcome Sepake Angiama, Akinbode Akinbiyi, Julia Morandeire Arrizabalaga, Alaa Abu Asad, Binna Choi, Nikos Doulos, Nina bell F, Rik Fernhout, Leon Filter, Sara Giannini, Florian Göttke, Jeroen Glissenaar, Stefano Harney, Yolande van der Heide, Krista Jantowski, Aslak Aemot Kjaerulff, Ricardo Liong-A-Kong, Antonia Majaca, David Maroto, Aude Mgba, Arlette-Louise Ndakoze, Ana Teixeira Pinto, Aldo Ramos, Rachel O'Reilly, Francesc Ruiz, Ghalya Saadawi, Clara Saito, Staci Bu Shea, Gabriëlle Schleijpen, Jacq van der Spek, Vincent van Velsen, Leire Vergara, Hypatia Vourloumis, Corine van der Wal, Margret Wibmer, Geo Wyeth and Arnisa Zeqo to Arnhem the place where our introduction will take place, beginning today, October 10 and ending October 15th.
During these days we will introduce our new Syllabus: 6 COOP study groups, 1 new and 5 returning How To do things With Theory tutors as well as the invited guest curators of the Roaming Assembly and Factory 2.0 at our Planetary Campus.
Later on in the year our soft spaceship will bring us to Nieuwvliet in Zeeland, to Epen in Limburg, to Tunis, to PAF in St.Erme, but most notably back again to Arnhem, where we will team up with sonsbeek20-24 throughout the summer of 2020.
In the coming months, we will update you on our moves, while we eagerly look forward to see you at one of our Roaming Assemblies in Antwerp, Tunis or Arnhem.
Take care,
Gabriëlle Schleijpen
artistic director | head of program
PROGRAM DAI WEEK 1 | Introduction Week
PRACTICAL
Students accommodation:
Stay Okay, Diepenbrocklaan 27, 6815 AH Arnhem
Tutors accommodation:
Vesting 10, Coehoornstraat 4, 6811 LA Arnhem
Holiday Inn, Nieuwe Oeverstraat 50 , Arnhem, 6811 JB
In addition: Vincent Zhong (ArtEZ International student Circle) and Nicoline Lodeweges (student-counsellor at ArtEZ) will be present during lunch on Friday and are happy to connect with the DAI-students.
Our chefs this week are: Buitenkoken (Gidy van Gaans), Peter Sattler, Pitchaya Ngamcharoen, Pick-Up (Karin Berentzen).