Connecting Cultures
CONNECTING CULTURES
hinterland in KURDISTAN
WORKSHOP and PUBLIC TALKS
Oct 1-15, 2022
Center of Kurdology, University of Sulaimani
Sulaimani, Iraq
How can we create better mutual understanding?
How can we build bridges between humans, cultures and traditions?
In our opinion the answer is simple: bringing people together. Make them spend time together, exchange their ideas, concepts, worries as well as hopes. Art can serve as a great tool to foster exchange and mutual understanding. With these workshops we try to create transcultural dialogue through objects as well as (hi)stories; through personal details of our lives and memories. Artists living in Europe collaborate with art students from Sulaimani, all of them share their experiences, memories and traditions. Together we can approach new ways of teaching, learning and understanding. New ways and ideas of exchange should be developed. This process of learning and exchange will be featured in a final presentation – an installation, concert, exhibition, discussion…these first weeks should only be a start for further collaborations between international artists, institutions and students.
Thanks to Daro Rasul, Osman Ahmed, Parastou Forouhar, Renald Deppe, Vooria Aria and Baris Seyitvan who are willing to participate on this unknown endeavour for a better transcultural understanding. Thanks a lot, to the institute of international Relation Germany (IFA), to the Austrian Ministry of Culture (BMKOES) and the Austrian Embassy to Amman to support this project to finally become reality.
PROGRAM
Oct 2-4: Welcome and Presentation by the invited artists
Oct 5 - 12: Workshops.
Oct 13: Exhibition opening; Presentation of Results
Contact
Osman Ahmed, Center of Kurdology
Kurdistan[at]hinterland.ag
PARTICIPANTS
Parastou Forouhar
*1962 in Teheran / Iran. Lives and works in Germany since 1991. Internationally acclaimed artist and professor of Fine Arts with a focus on transculturalism at the Kunsthochschule Mainz / Germany. https://www.parastou-forouhar.de/; https://parastou-forouhar-narratives.com/
Parastou Forouhar´s workshop enables the participants to generate new approaches in their artistic works. Patterns as a visual way of expression will be in the focus of the artistic work: Symbols, shapes, sounds, behaviours, whatever we encounter and deal with on a daily basis should be collected, be brought along and discussed in a larger context; Out of these recurrent and repeated issue and/or object unique works will be developed; new perceptions will emerge and presented in a final exhibition.
Vooria Aria
* 1979 in Sanandaj, Iran; Vooria Aria is an Iranian/Austrian Kurdish artist. Lives and works in Vienna.
He studied sculpture at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna. In his works Vooria deals with social phenomena and questions related to it. He uses sculptural features such as ornaments, alignments, projections etc. and imbues them with new dimensions and new meanings. At the same time, he engages with his traditions and the changes he has experienced. https://vooriaaria.net/
Developing materials sculptures or reliefs. Interpretation of material connected to visual expression. Materials that students provide will be interpreted metaphorically. Each material could evoke different statements and associations depending on cultural and individual views. We will talk about shape, color, material and their confrontation in and with space associatively. With a final exhibition, associations from the audience will be included in our personal experience.
Osman Ahmed
* 1962 in Sulaymaniyah, Kurdistan Iraq. Director of Kurdology Center. PhD from Chelsea College of Arts, University of the Arts London, UK (2013): Documenting the Kurdish Genocide (Anfal 1988) through drawing and recording the testimonies of 15 Anfal survivors as well as investigating the Kurds’ collective memory of the genocide.
Along with historical narratives of war men have left behind artistic depictions of war; over the centuries the artistic approach has changed from glorifying war to condemning it as mere barbarism and carnage; a wholly destructive and traumatising experience. The documentation and preservation of war images by the museums, galleries and the media, and people’s access to and interactions with war images have changed their perception of war, civil war, international politics and refugees. There has also been an increasing number of war artists/journalists/reporters who have directly been involved in war or voluntarily participated as eye witnesses to the atrocities, and provided their subjective and objective views of war; some realistic, some abstract or surreal, contradicting and challenging the official versions of war. In this presentation I will share with you the process of the ‘pictorial documentation’ of the Kurdish witnesses’ and survivors’ memories of the Kurdish Genocide of 1988, as well as the interactions of the Germans, Armenians, Jewish and Kurdish audiences’ with these images, including the young Kurdish students who were born after 1988 or were too young at the time to remember the Genocide.
Gudrun Wallenböck
Gudrun Wallenböck is the founder and artistic director of hinterland, Vienna / Austria, an independent art space and platform dedicated to the promotion of intercultural and interdisciplinary projects. Since its inception hinterland has remained committed to supporting the work of emerging and established artists from the Middle East and in particular artists living and working in Iran.
Interviews Parastou / Vooria / Osman
Workshops and Interviews with participants
Culture Factory / Esta Gallery (Daro, Khabat
Supported by
