Yesterday we asked, how do we want to live? Today, we at least already know one thing: not this way!
city – especially a cultural and university city like Graz – lives from open mindedness and the exchange of ideas. Travel restrictions and lockdowns radically cut the society of a city off from this. Now we can see what we are missing as a result.
With its program projects, the Cultural Year Graz 2020 explores the conditions of social interaction. Both in a local and international context. “Art thrives on visibility and culture thrives on social exchange,” Christian Mayer, the program manager of the Cultural Year, states succinctly. The projects of the program, which will be relaunched in the fall, illuminate these essential conditions for urban life:
“uff !” is a children’s theater festival that wants to bring the topics of urban coexistence and urban future clos- er to the smallest inhabitants of Graz. Three different plays will be performed at the button theater in the Frida & Fred Kindermuseum. In autumn 2020 “uff!” will start with theater performances of the theater groups Kollektiv Kunststoff and theater.nuu.
Can the future of a city be won back by citizens simply repairing their city? Can places be sustainably upcycled and thus transformed?
Garbage. City. Death. Repairing a City
City walks and a conference will answer these questions. First of all, city walks are on the program that will lead to critical points in Graz. Selected by the respective hosts, prob- lematic points are first walked through and explored. Together, repair suggestions are then made.
These concepts will form the basis for a city repair conference in spring 2021. “Garbage.city.death” creatively applies the attitude and procedures of repair to concrete socio-economic and ecological areas such as public space, atmosphere, food or clothing. The project is part of the “Future Repair Machine” which will take place in Graz, Berlin, Munich, Budapest, Eindhoven, Brussels, London and Berlin in 2020 and 2021. All actions together should culminate in a joint action in Brussels in 2022.
„present in difference“ with Antonia Manhartsberger, Bruna Diniz Afonso and Olgica Peric
With “present in difference” the dancers Antonia Manhartsberger, Bruna Diniz Afonso and Olgica Peric realize an artistic interdisciplinary reflection on the sociology of space. The performances take place at four different locations, in four different districts of Graz. Dance, sound and voice recordings will be mixed and the audience will be invited to participate in a site-specific discourse. Sound recordings and statements of the residents are musically related to each other and then transformed into dance.
Graz Kulturjahr 2020
www.kulturjahr2020.at
