From February 2020 to the end of 2020 the collective is hosted by Kunsthal Gent for a development residency. In these 3 months, the collective aims to build up artistic practices that transcend language and cultural barriers and address a broad audience. it also seeks to extend its network and knowledge on how to sustainably structure itself and its agency.
The group will work on the fields of speculative design, self-publishing, graphic design, performance/sound art, collective reading and viewing, cultural activism, and other artistic and critical practices.
PUBLIC PROGRAMME
The Post Collective offers free workshops, screenings, and public meetings in Kunsthal Gent between March and May 2020. Please join if you want to learn new skills, share stories and practices, want to augment your voice, and find new ways of expressing your voice:
– LUNCH ASSEMBLIES: COLLABORATIVE SPECULATIONS
Saturdays 22.02, 29.02, 07.03, 04.04, 11.04, 18.04, 13:00-17:00
Facilitated by Elli Vassalou, Sawsan Maher, and Mirra Markhaëva
The Post Collective is researching its own modes and conditions of collectivity and legal presence. How to design a collaborative environment regardless of the legal status of its participants? How to structure codes of conduct and build agency inside a group of people who do not only struggle with structural exclusions of race, class, and sex but also legal exclusions, citizenship, and human rights? How to surpass cultural barriers and create a safe environment of trust, commitment, and opportunities for all?
– VOCAL PERFORMANCE WORKSHOP
Fridays 13.03, 03.04,10.04, 17.04, 10:00 – 15:00
Conducted by Marcus Bergner
Visual work lead by Mirra Markhaëva
No previous experience required other than being prepared to use your voice and language in new and exploratory ways. We will create a chorus where participants can write and design their own songs for collaborative performing. After the introductory workshop (13.03) those who wish to continue will meet on a regular Friday basis to develop material for public performances. We will draw from the diverse musical, language, and poetical experiences of those participating.
The process will be documented by the visual representation of spoken sound by the use of different languages in their traditional calligraphies fused together. The letters will be done in lino cutting in order to create an abstract calligraphic ornament.
– PARALLEL PERCEPTIONS: a workshop on video walking
Friday 20.03, 10.00 – 15.00
developed by Elli Vassalou and Maya Dalinsky, with the insights of Christina Phoebe Thomopoulos
Since 2015, Elli and Maya have been making and researching video walking as a creative tool for community building, proprioceptive expression, group composition, environment-based art, participatory design, choreography, and counter-mapping.
On 20 March, together with Christina Phoebe and the post collective participants, they will explore the medium as another non-verbal tool of exploring collectivity.
– DESIGN A BOOK COVER WORKSHOP
Saturday 21.03 + Sunday 22.03, 10:00 – 15:00
Conducted by Hooman Jalidi A workshop open to all. Learn how to design and produce a book cover using the participant’s own illustrations, drawings, pattern making, collage, and handmade prints. Material such as paper, inks, and basic printmaking equipment will be provided.
– SCREENING ‘ON BELONGING’
Saturday 21.03, 15.30 – 18.00
introduced by Elli Vassalou
invited guests: Christina Phoebe Thomopoulos and Maxime Jean Baptiste
A dialogue between two filmmakers, the Post Collective and the audience. Screening of 2 poetic documentaries which merges questions of belonging, borders, and foreign-hood through dreamlike images and fleeting voices
– 15.30 introduction Elli Vassalou
– 16.00 “Nou voix” by Maxime Jean Baptiste (15′)
– 16.15 film fragments of Christina Phoebe Thomopoulos films
– 17.30 discussion with the audience
– ZINE WORKSHOP
Sunday 19.04 +Monday 20.04, 13:00 – 17:00
Conducted by Mirra Markhaëva
Open to all. A workshop about the designing and making of Zine publications.
Learn how to compose collectively a visual diary-like documentation, using your drawings, texts, and notes. We will work with the material created from the different workshops and art projects to create a small zine publication of our work together.
– FILM SCREENING – The Wasp and the Weather (2019, 19′, EN )
Wednesday 22.04, 20:00
Robin Vanbesien
In Robin Vanbesien’s new film poems ring out. At former youth centre Rzoezie, founded by young folks of Moroccan and Amazigh descent in Mechelen, some of the youngsters wrote poetry. Some of the original authors (M’Hamed El Ouali, Abdelhay Ben Abdellah) and contemporary poets (Samira Saleh, Mathieu Charles, members of the Post Collective) revisit, recite, and discuss these poems, probing their resonance in today’s social and political climate.
– ‘ON CO-ELABORATION’, study circle
Thursday 23.04, 10.30 – 18.00
with Robin Vanbesien, Vooruit, Ghent – Theaterzaal Foyer
The study circle facilitates an encounter of two artist’s collectives, The Post Collective and The Living and the Dead Ensemble, that both, through the exploration of storytelling, performance, and poetry, look for ways to compose new forms of alliance and common-ability. These are artistic practices that take up the role to reframe our gaze toward a work on co-elaboration. It is a work whose composition is continuously incomplete, ever to be sculpted – like a gift in the expanded present.
– COLLABORATIVE DRAWING WORK
ongoing
Conducted by Mohammed Tawfiq
An ongoing collaborative drawing that is open to everyone to contribute to producing a large onsite drawing work.
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The Post Collective is a young collective striving to establish an autonomous platform of co-creation, co-learning, and cultural activism created by and for refugees, asylum seekers, sans-papiers, and accomplices. It seeks to introduce a range of artistic, cultural, and employment opportunities, as well as provide an overall collaborative environment for the participants regardless of their legal status. The collective arose from the ‘Open Design Course for Refugees and Asylum Seekers’ 2018 at KASK school of arts, Ghent (BE) when some alumni and teachers decided to continue working together.
The Post Collective are Mirra Markhaëva, Marcus Bergner, Elli Vassalou, Sawsan Maher, Mohammed Tawfiq, Hooman Jalidi and Kinda Ghannoum
Supported by: Kunsthal Gent, Stad Gent, Arts in Society Award 2019 – 2020, Refu Interim, KASK School of Arts
