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BAK, basis voor actuele kunst, Utrecht
BAK, basis voor actuele kunst, Pauwstraat, Utrecht, Netherlands

 work

30 January–01 May 2016

BAK, basis voor actuele kunst, Utrecht  

New World Summit, Rojava – Jonas Staal (2015)

The New World Summit installation at BAK includes:

New World Summit—Rojava, Part I

October 2015, Derîk, Cezîre Canton, Rojava
Documentation of the first part of the New World Summit in Rojava that brought together representatives of the Democratic Self-Administration of Rojava with representatives of other stateless and autonomist organizations from all over the world. This assembly was organized as part of an international delegation to Rojava, in celebration of the beginning of the construction of a new public parliament developed by the New World Summit with the Democratic Self-Administration of Rojava.

Rojava Film Commune
Interviews with representatives of the Rojava Film Commune (Diyar Hesso, Onder Çakar, Şéro Hindé, and Khwshman Qado) a collective of filmmakers founded in 2015 with the task to represent the values and ideals of the Rojava Revolution. The wall print shows a screening organized by the Rojava Film Commune in the cultural center of the city of Qamiişlo, of the film The Kid (1921) by Charlie Chaplin.

Abdullah Abdul and Masun Hamo
Interviews with artists Abdullah Abdul and Masun Hamo, whose sculptural works reconstruct the lost and looted historical sites of Mesopotamia, considered to be the birthplace of Kurdish history, politics, and culture.

People’s Parliament Rojava
2015–2016, Derîk, Cezîre Canton, Rojava

Visual design, photo documentation, and architectural model of a new public parliament and the surrounding park, developed by the New World Summit together with the Democratic Self-Administration of Rojava. The parliament takes the form of an “agora,” a public space that represents the ideals of the Rojava Revolution and its practice of stateless democracy. The fragments of flags that form the canvasses covering the parliament each belong to one of the local organizations at the heart of the project of political self-governance: the Movement for a Democratic Society (Tev-Dem); the Democratic Union Party (PYD); the Syriac Union Party (SUP); Star Union of Women (Yekiîtîiya Star); the Rojava Democratic Youth Union (YCR); and the flag of the autonomous region of Rojava itself. The public parliament will be inaugurated with a second summit in April 2016.

Suggestions from the archive

Learning

10 May, 12.00–12 May, 18.00 2023

Complaint Making: Setting Up Conflict-Positive Spaces for Community Building Praxis

Vishnu would like to share feminist governance tools (FGT) focused on three of many tiers in community building praxis. FGT is based on the values of equity with an emphasis on creating psychologically safe environments, drawing on the use of consent. Decision-making processes, setting up conflict-positive spaces, and complaint-making as diversity work will form the body of this three-day training. Rooted in Vishnu’s autho-ethnographic practice, this work will explore the power dynamics that impact decision-making processes.

Performative

10 May, 12.00–12 May, 18.00 2023

The Diamond Mind II

In this dance training, the people will use a one-minute film of their own movement as material for a booklet—a sixteen page signature—that distributes their presence, their gesture, as an act of EQ. 

Learning

3 May, 12.00–4 May, 18.00 2023

Too Late To Say Sorry? 

A bad apology can ruin a friendship, destroy a community, or end a career. In this workshop, we will investigate the impact of apologies on our relationships and our worlds. Why and how do we make apologies? What can giving and receiving apologies teach us about values and integrity? Should you apologize for something you don’t really feel sorry for? We will explore conflict and how we like to be in conflict with others. We will dive into our own boundaries. We will seek to understand how honoring limits becomes an act of building (or freeing) better worlds capable of holding so many, many more of us.

Learning

28 April, 12.00–29 April, 18.00 2023

Huisje, Boompje, Beestje (D.A.F.O.N.T.)

In this rare masterclass, retired teacher and artist Glenda Martinus teaches participants a thing or two about painting with Microsoft Word. Martinus shares tips, tricks, and secrets on how to use this software to its unexpected potential as a drawing tool. Participants learn how to draw three basic objects—a house, a tree, and an animal—in a seemingly innocent exercise that perhaps contains more layered social commentary. Drawing the worlds we desire does not require expensive tools or education, simply a curiosity to understand how the monster’s tools can topple the house of the master.