Archival Sites of Speculation: Storying the Silence

Katharina Birkmann, Maja Bojanić, nathan c’ha, Mark Chehodaiev, Alessandra Ferrini, Onyeka Igwe, Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński, Ivana Lazić, Arina Nekliudova, Carmiña Tarilonte Rodríguez, Elske Rosenfeld & Olia Sosnovskaya, SKGAL (Nina Höchtl, Julia Wieger), Tsai-Ju Wu, Lorenz Zenleser
Curated by Georgia Holz and Stephanie Misa

The exhibition Archival Sites of Speculation: Storying the Silence seeks to contribute to critical discussions on the archive as a space of artistic research and the experimental methods deployed in examining the convergent and divergent histories. It creates an experimental space within which methodologies of proximity and engagement with archives can be tested and divulged. The participating artists seek to negotiate the constitutive limits of the archive. The artworks make visible what is absent from documentation and refer to the gaps in the transmission of memory, testimony or kept historical material. With these methods, historical and archival research is combined with critical fabulation to make productive sense of gaps and silences within an archive.
Participants of the seminar Working the Archive especially contribute specific positionalities to the exhibition in relation to working with the archive of the Austrian Association of Women Artists (VBKÖ) and other archives. This exhibition is a culmination the year-long research project Anonymity and Absence – Archival Sites of Speculation, supported by the Angewandte Programme for Inter- and Transdisciplinary Projects in Art and Research (INTRA), University of Applied Arts Vienna.

Program

Thursday, January 11th, 7 p.m.
Gadaffi in Rome: The Expanded Script
Lecture-performance by Alessandra Ferrini

Saturday, February 3rd, 2–5 p.m.
Let’s build our own acid-free archive!
Workshop with Tsai-Ju Wu
Max. 7 participants, free donation
Please register until January 31st via e-mail: tsaiju.w@gmail.com

Friday, February 9th, 3–6 p.m.  
Archive of Gestures: Becoming In/visible
Workshop with Elske Rosenfeld & Olia Sosnovskaya

Saturday, February 10th, 3–6 p.m.
Finissage and guided tours by the curators

Please register until Feb 8th via e-mail: info@vbkoe.org

Austrian Association of Women Artists (VBKÖ), Maysedergasse 2/28, 1010 Vienna

Picture credits:
-    Exhibition poster Archival Sites of Speculation, design: Matthias van Baaren, photos: Mark Chehodaiev


Exhibition poster Archival Sites of Speculation, design: Matthias van Baaren, photos: Mark Chehodaiev
Exhibition poster Archival Sites of Speculation, design: Matthias van Baaren, photos: Mark Chehodaiev

Events

Opening
11. January 2024 - 18:00
VBKÖ, Maysedergasse 2/28, 1010 Wien
Lecture-performance with Alessandra Ferrini
11. January 2024 - 19:00
VBKÖ, Maysedergasse 2/28, 1010 Wien
Duration
12. January 2024 - 11. February 2024
VBKÖ, Maysedergasse 2/28, 1010 Wien
Workshop mit Tsai-Ju Wu
20. January 2024 - 14:00
VBKÖ, Maysedergasse 2/28, 1010 Wien
Workshop with Elske Rosenfeld & Olia Sosnovskaya
09. February 2024 - 15:00
VBKÖ, Maysedergasse 2/28, 1010 Wien