CONVIVIALITY IN PRACTICE:
Lecture, workshop, discussion, conference.
Vienna, June 3-8, 2024
Program
3 June 2024
Workshop
Thinking through Cacophony: An Experiment in Sounding Our Different Knowledges
with Thabang Monoa
WHERE: Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, Atelierhaus, Lehargasse 8, 1060 Vienna, 1st floor Atelier Süd (M1), Studio ART and INTERVENTION/Concept (PCAP)
WHEN: 16.00 to 19.00
Workshop Thinking through Cacophony with Dr. Thabang Monoa (Michaelis School of Fine Art, University of Cape Town) is meant to think through how disparate knowledge systems and perspectives can come into contact with one another through cacophony and generate new insights and alternative interpretations of how to inhabit the world.
The workshop is open to all students of the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna.
Dr. Thabang Monoa’s research interests involve art history, art criticism, visual culture, curatorial practice and cultural studies. He completed his undergraduate studies at the Tshwane University of Technology and then went on to work and study at the Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture (FADA) at the University of Johannesburg where he worked as an Art Historian in the faculty’s Department of Visual Art. His doctoral study, which he undertook with the SARChI Chair in South African Art and Visual Culture, focused on the notion of Blackness in Afrofuturist aesthetics. Monoa is currently a member of the CAA (College Art Association) based in the United States of America, he is a former council member of SAVAH (South African Visual Art Historians) and is a co-convenor of the Gerard Sekoto Summer School, which is administered through the Johannesburg Art Gallery. In his current capacity as a lecturer in Art History at the University of Cape Town’s Michaelis School of Fine Art, Monoa continues to generate academic output dealing with concerns in contemporary art and aesthetics.
Organized in the frame of the Erasmus + project and the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. An event in the scope of Conviviality as Potentiality: From Amnesia to Pandemic towards Convivial Epistemologies (FWF AR 679, 2021–2025).
4 June 2024
Keynote lecture
Dialogical Speech Acts across the Atlantic: Freedom as Eternal Recurrence
by Thabang Monoa
WHERE: Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, Schillerplatz 3, 1010 Vienna, Mezzanine, lecture room M13a
WHEN: 18.00
How do we locate the co-ordinates of freedom? If the future is the psychic site that enables us to affirm our existence, then disrupting the tyranny of linear time becomes essential for our “becoming-free.” Through a temporal lens, this presentation looks at transatlantic continuities in jazz music between South Africa and the United States of America and looks at forms of collective freedom-imagining.
Presentation and moderation: Prof. Dr. Marina Gržinić
Dr. Thabang Monoa is a lecturer in Art History at the University of Cape Town’s Michaelis School of Fine Art, South Africa. Monoa’s research interests involve art history, art criticism, visual culture, curatorial practice and cultural studies.
5 June 2024
Communities’ Talks in Vienna, Reflections, Exchange.
WHERE: Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, Schillerplatz 3, 1010 Vienna, Mezzanine, lecture room M13a
WHEN: 18.00
An exchange session with Dr. Thabang Monoa and members from art, activism, and cultural communities in Austria exploring the complexities of art, futurity, communities, and narratives in an open dialogue. How does art shape our vision of the future? What role do communities play in shaping narratives This is an invitation to engage in critical discourse, broaden our perspectives, and create connections within different voices of communities.
Moderation: Asma Aiad, MA
7 June 2024
Art, Performativity, Blackness, Futurity: Cape Town. Vienna. Talk with Elisabeth Tambwe & Thabang Monoa at Depot
WHERE: Depot – Kunst und Diskussion, Breite Gasse 3, 1070 Vienna
WHEN: 19:00
Join Thabang Monoa of the University of Cape Town, South Africa, and Elisabeth Bakambamba Tambwe of Vienna in an engaging conversation that interweaves their powerful practices in art and performativity.
Dr. Thabang Monoa’s research spans art history, criticism, visual culture, curatorial practice, and cultural studies. Meanwhile, Elisabeth Bakambamba Tambwe, based in Vienna since 2005, brings a unique perspective to her pioneering work, delving into performativity, the fragility of the body, and the histories of contemporary art. In this live discussion, Tambwe and Monoa will converge their distinct viewpoints, offering insights into the intersections of art, performativity, Blackness, and futurity. Through their dialogue Tambwe and Monoa will challenge dominant narratives and envision new possibilities for the role of art in shaping our collective future.
Moderation: Asma Aiad, MA, and Prof. Dr. Marina Gržinić
Organized in the framework of the Erasmus + project and the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna in collaboration with the project Conviviality as Potentiality: From Amnesia to Pandemic towards Convivial Epistemologies (FWF AR 679, 2021–2025).
Elisabeth Bakambamba Tambwe was born in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo, and spent her formative years in France, where she pursued her artistic studies. In 1998, she achieved the “Diplôme National d’Expression Plastique” with distinction from the jury for her sculptural work at the School of Fine Arts in Tourcoing, France. As an artist, choreographer, and stage director, Tambwe explores a diverse range of creative expressions, including performance, choreography, film, interactive and generative art, as well as various dramaturgies and spatial concepts such as installations and stages. Her focus lies in the exploration of new forms of otherness and the unique relationships and languages they inspire. She delves into what these forms reveal about our humanity and how they challenge the notion of anthropocentrism. Tambwe’s projects are collaborative and transdisciplinary, aiming to establish shared research spaces that bridge performance art and the social sciences. (www.elitambwe.com)
Dr. Thabang Monoa’s research interests involve art history, art criticism, visual culture, curatorial practice and cultural studies. He completed his undergraduate studies at the Tshwane University of Technology and then went on to work and study at the Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture (FADA) at the University of Johannesburg where he worked as an Art Historian in the faculty’s Department of Visual Art. His doctoral study, which he undertook with the SARChI Chair in South African Art and Visual Culture, focused on the notion of Blackness in Afrofuturist aesthetics. Monoa is currently a member of the CAA (College Art Association) based in the United States of America, he is a former council member of SAVAH (South African Visual Art Historians) and is a co-convenor of the Gerard Sekoto Summer School, which is administered through the Johannesburg Art Gallery. In his current capacity as a lecturer in Art History at the University of Cape Town’s Michaelis School of Fine Art, Monoa continues to generate academic output dealing with concerns in contemporary art and aesthetics.
8 June 2024
A one-day conference Muslim Futures
Concept by Dr. Amani Abuzahra
WHERE: Sigmund Freud Private University Vienna, Interdisciplinary Research Center Islam and Muslims in Europe (IFIME), Campus Prater, Freudplatz 3, 1020 Vienna
WHEN: 9.00–18.00 (registration mandatory)
Who has the privilege to dream – and who does not? What circumstances need to be created to think about Muslim futures? At a time when racist discourses and policies are affecting Muslim imaginations, how does this affect visions for Muslim futures? How do Muslims shape their identities and presence in a world that is increasingly characterised by anti-Muslim racism, among many other challenges? Can Muslim Futurism be used as an approach to support the development of future strategies by and for Muslims and demonstrate the important role that art and culture can play in this? In this context, collective imagination processes would be understood as a project of decolonisation.
11:30–12:00 Plenary lecture I: Dr. Thabang Monoa, University of Cape Town
The Future as Our Will to Power: Creating Potentialities for Self-Sovereignty
This presentation immerses itself in the registers of (Afro)futurist thought to think through what might it mean to enact power and autonomy through the work of imagination.
12:00–12:15 Response by Prof. Dr. Marina Gržinić, Conviviality as Potentiality (AR 679), Academy of Fine Arts Vienna
12:15–12.30 Q&A
Workshops in the afternoon (registration mandatory).
Dr. Thabang Monoa is a lecturer in Art History at the University of Cape Town’s Michaelis School of Fine Art, South Africa. Monoa’s research interests involve art history, art criticism, visual culture, curatorial practice and cultural studies.
Dr. Marina Gržinić is a full professor at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, head of the Studio ART and INTERVENTION/Concept (PCAP), IBK, and a principal investigator of the art-based research project Conviviality as Potentiality (AR 679).
A plenary lecture by Dr. Thabang is organized in collaboration with Prof. Dr. Marina Gržinić, head of the research project Conviviality as Potentiality: From Amnesia to Pandemic towards Convivial Epistemologies (FWF AR 679, 2021–2025), in the framework of the Erasmus + project and the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna.
Thanks to: Mag. Angelina Kratschanova, BA, EMBA, Head of International Office, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, Dr. Thabang Monoa, Elisabeth Bakambamba Tambwe, Amena Shakir, Sigmund Freud Private University Vienna, director of the Research Centre IFIME, Dr. Amani Abuzahra, Sigmund Freud Private University Vienna, Research Centre IFIME, Depot – Kunst und Diskussion, Vienna.