In 2021, the participants of Architectures of Noise were working individually and collectively in art-based research processes. They involve reading sessions, walks, talks, accompanied by architectural and sculptural interventions, performances, workshops, and experiments, especially in the sense of experiri (experience), reason, and resonance in the public and private domains.

During the summer session at W139, artifacts of diverse but interconnected aspects of these genealogies of experience and epistemic architectures are shared with the public. Surveying how these specialized and sometimes also ambiguous instruments (i.e., language, laws) materialities and political concepts crystallized from the past influence future progress.

Architectures of Noise is curated by Evelina Rajca and made possible in collaboration with:

Clara Palli
Pierfrancesco Gava
Arefeh Riahi and Sher Doruff
Ellington Mingus
Susanna Schoenberg
Thomas Hawranke
Lillian Rosa, Gudrun Schoppe in collaboration with Samer Makarem
Evelina Rajca in correspondence with Felipe González and Konrad Bohley
and guests­

More information:
Handout with extended text
Information about the works

POLAR ROOM | WhatDoYouFightFor?

Lillian Rosa, Gudrun Schoppe in collaboration with Samer Makarem

“What empowers people to be the heartbeat of a civil society that drives the change we need in the world?”

This is the key theme of the long term interdisciplinary art work WhatDoYouFightFor? by Lillian Rosa and Gudrun Schoppe. Following up the short documentary (R)EVOLUTION and a series of events in Berlin, they used their collective (digital) Artist in Residency in Amsterdam as the starting point for developing a series of film portraits with citizens from around the world who engage in action around democracy, sustainability and civil rights.

In cooperation with Lebanese activist Samer Makarem and his network engaged in leading a civil alliance for reconstructing and building a civil state without corruption but with civil rights and democracy they are sharing artifacts of the ongoing collective research approach at W139’s Polar Room in the context of their joint (digital) residency.

PERFORMANCE | Palindrome |  29 July

Sher Doruff and Arefeh Riahi 

In a collaboration with artist and researcher Sher Doruff, Arefeh Riahi researched the uncertainty of language, as well as its potential for resisting archival modes of communication. What do ‘limitation’ and ‘consolidation’ mean in relation to language? In what ways are borders manifested within language? In every form of language, an inclusion and exclusion process are at work. Is there such thing as a lever that exists solely to resist this process of othering, inside the structure itself?

This research manifests itself as a constellation of coalescent components – a site-specific performance that leaves behind a residual installation, accompanied by a sound composition and a video production. While each component can be understood as its own independent work, they also act as annotations and a recollection of the collaborative process. In this regard, the works too, exist within a self-referential dialogue with one another.

The performance on 29 July takes place at a glass border between interior and exterior, located at the entrance of the W139. The audience of the work is thereby extended to the transient public who can observe it from the street through the windows of W139.