Open Studios
Digital Studio Visit: Grammar, Apology, and the West
Ada Mukhina, Nazanin Noori, Mia Sanchez, Cássio Diniz Santiago
For the digital Open Studio artists Ada Mukhina, Nazanin Noori, Mia Sanchez, and Cássio Diniz Santiago provide insights into their artistic practices and present works-in-progress in artist talks and performances or silent views into their studios. They present various content and stories they worked on at spaces of the Akademie der Künste in the Hansaviertel in autumn / winter 2020.
Film by Elisabeth Börnicke & Julia Milz
“How to sell yourself to the West?”, asks Ada Mukhina in her lecture performance by the same name at the Akademie der Künste spaces, addressing questions of diversity and stories of success in the Western art world. The starting point is the Archives of the Akademie der Künste and the history of its prizes, such as the Tilla Durieux Jewellery of the Performing Arts Section, which is awarded every ten years as a necklace containing 34 zircons set in platinum. Or the Hermine Körner Ring, inset with an antique Persian coin, which honours an “actress seriously striving for excellence” for their lifetime. Who makes the decisions and according to what criteria? Listen carefully …
In his current project Grammar, performer, theatre maker and researcher Cássio Diniz Santiago considers a new grammar of art and life based on experiences of marginalised voices. The film and research project is based on his work on the performance S.C.H.U.U.U.L.E., which he realised with Susann Maria Hempel, also a JUNGE AKADEMIE fellow, in the form of a scenic classroom. Twelve professors convey unconventional knowledge gained from the experiences of their specific lives. Is it possible to develop a grammar based on other values and different knowledge that does not exclude marginalised voices?
Nazanin Noori‘s work is comprised of theatre and radio play direction, music, and text. Her focus is on the decomposition and manipulation of language, atmospheric narratives in sound, overcoming cultural narratives of sentiment in the dramatic adaptation of non-dramatic texts, and the action on stage as a ritual act. She is currently writing a dramatic text in English and German, which is called Apology / Apologie: It is based on Plato’s Apology of Socrates and a lyrical secession of the defence speech given by Socrates, who is about to be executed.
Mia Sanchez works are often made in series and play with scale and stage-like characteristics. The use of repetition and scene-like settings suggests narrative connections. Some resemble props from a puppet show; the works’ childhood associations open up spaces of remembrance. The serial nature of the objects, however, shift these mementos from the purely personal towards the social. The inner as private, personal experiences, the outer as the structurally order we are enveloped by; being true to the personal is political.
*1988 in Leningrad, lives in St.Petersburg and Berlin
Ada Mukhina is a nomadic artist and theatre-maker with a focus on politically/socially engaged documentary and participatory performance. Her practices include directing, performing, curating, writing, teaching and researching. She graduated with distinction from the Russian State Institute of Performing Arts and earned an MA in Advanced Theatre Practice at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in London. Her theatre work has been presented in the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, South Africa, the USA and Russia. As a winner of the Black Box Residency at the Meyerhold Theatre Center, she recently directed and co-authored two theatre productions in Moscow – Locker Room Talk and Caries of Capitalism.
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*1991 in Wiesbaden, lives in Berlin
Nazanin Noori is an Iranian interdisciplinary artist. Her work includes sound art, installation, direction for theatre and audio plays, and text. Noori addresses the merging of sound, space, sculpture and post-dramatic poetry and focuses on atmospheric narratives. She studied theatre, film and media sciences at Goethe University in Frankfurt a.M. and worked at Deutsches Theater, Berlin and Schauspiel Hannover. Her debut album “FARCE” was released in 2020. Her installation “AMBIENT ROOM” was on view at EIGEN + ART Lab in 2021.
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*1988 in Sevilla, lives in Basel
Mia Sanchez completed her MA in Arts at the Institut Kunst in Basel. Before that, she studied at the Hochschule der Künste Bern (HKB) and spent a year as a visiting student at the Hochschule für bildende Kunst Hamburg (HfbK). Her works are often made in series and play with scale and stage-like characteristics. The use of repetition and scene-like settings suggests narrative connections. Some resemble props from a puppet show; the works’ childhood associations open up spaces of remembrance. The serial nature of the objects, however, shift these mementos from the purely personal towards the social. The inner as private, personal experiences, the outer as the structurally order we are enveloped by; being true to the personal is political.
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*1973 in São Paulo, lives in Greiz
Cássio Diniz Santiago is a performance artist, theatre and dance director, dramaturg, researcher and teacher. He studied Performing Arts at the State University of Campinas, Brazil and attended the MA course in Choreography and Performance at Giessen University. He was a fellow at Akademie Schloss Solitude, using performance art as a research tool in the field of economy. His performance, theatre, dance and multidisciplinary art projects have been shown at the São Paulo Biennial, the Modern Art Museum of São Paulo, the Baltic Circle Theatre Festival, the Akademie der Künste and the Mousonturm, among others.
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