[Nettime-nl] STATE OF EMERGENCY - conference

[geert <geert@xs4all.nl>]

From: State of Emergency <soe@janvaneyck.nl>

STATEOF EMERGENCY

Territorial Identity in the Post-Political Age
Thursday 23rd September 2004, 2 – 8 p.m.
Stedelijk Museum CS Amsterdam 

Presentations by

Slavoj Zizek
Anselm Franke
Boris Buden
Meta Haven: Sealand Identity Project
Office for Metropolitan Architecture 
Dieter Lesage

Introduction and moderation by Lieven De Cauter

Organized by the Jan van Eyck Academie in association with theStedelijk
Museum CS.

STATE OF EMERGENCY = NOW
As the information age proceeds, the hegemonic coordinates ofthe present
world order are changing in front of our very eyes. Thenation state’s
sovereignty is put under pressure by a myriad ofinter-, sub- and
trans-national forces. A new and entirely globalizedform of sovereignty
emerges, based on the permanent and ever-presentexchange of capital,
information and goods. As a result, the constructcalled ‘nation state’ –
and its identity – cannot be founded merely ona continuation of values
that we have come to think of as ‘sovereign’.Simultaneously, a whole
range of ‘single-issue spaces’ and spaces ofexclusion engulf the earth,
challenging the political world map to aneven greater
degree.Terraincognita =everywhere.
Design, architecture, theoryand philosophy are increasingly relevant
lines ofapproach as new political, spatial and informational conditions
areexplored. Rather than taking on passive or descriptive roles,
theygenerate thought-provoking new ideas. Whether it is thetemporary
suspension of the juridical order, themapping of a whole range of new
political spaces emerging acrossthe earth, the foundation of an
international tribunalquestioning the ‘Project for a New American
Century’, thedesign of an experimental identity for a law-freemini-state
or the re-thinking the visual identity of theEuropean Union, these
disciplines are becoming key to animaginative understanding of what
territorial identity means today andwhat it might mean tomorrow. 

State of Emergency – Territorial Identity in the Post-PoliticalAge
questions the modern conception of the Europeannation-state, its
self-definition and its visual representation.Modern sovereignty – and
likewise, identity – has often defined itselfagainst an outside ‘Other’.
When the ‘Other’ is lacking, does thisentail that one invents an
imaginary ‘outside’ of one’s own in orderto secure an even more
imaginary inside – as is the case with the‘Axis of Evil’, the hostile
‘Other’ that the West has conceived? Andwhat about a trans-national
entity that merely manifests itself inoverweight politicians shaking
hands on television? How is thetransformation of the former Eastern bloc
affecting Europe’s identity– and vice versa? What is the meaning and
impact of ‘single issuespaces’, tax and internet havens, camps, states
of exception andmicro-nations? Do new conditions produce new symbolic
realities andimages? By bringing together architects, designers,
academics,theorists and curators, State of Emergency aims totrigger off
inspiring insights into the relevance of territorialidentity today.

PROGRAMME 
Thursday 23rd September 2004 
12 noon   – Registration
2.00 p.m. – Welcoming note: Jouke Kleerebezem
2.05 p.m. – Introduction: Lieven De Cauter
2.15 p.m. – Lectures: Slavoj Zizek, Anselm Franke, Boris Buden
4.30 p.m. – Break
5.00 p.m. – Lectures: Meta Haven: Sealand Identity Project, Office
forMetropolitan Architecture, Dieter Lesage
7.15 p.m. – Break
7.30 p.m. – Panel discussion moderated by Lieven De Cauter
8.00 p.m. – End

>From 10.00 p.m. onwards – Club 11 party

PRACTICAL INFORMATION
Admission
Tickets at € 7,00 
All tickets can be picked up and paid for at the main entrance –ground
floor of the Stedelijk Museum CS on 23rd September from 12 noononwards. 
Registration (advance booking is recommended)
Please use the online registration form to book your tickets prior
to22nd September.
See registration form: http://www.janvaneyck.nl/%7esealand/form/

Contact
Madeleine Bisscheroux, Jan van Eyck Academie
madeleine.bisscheroux@janvaneyck.nl
+31 (0) 43 3503729

Location
Stedelijk Museum CS (Club 11, 11th floor)
Oosterdokskade 5
1011 AD Amsterdam
The Netherlands

How to get there
The Stedelijk Museum CS is a few minutes’ walk from AmsterdamCentral
Station. Please check at www.stedelijk.nl/
orwww.bereikbaar.amsterdam.nl/ for a route description. More
informationis available at www.amsterdam.nl/

Further information
www.janvaneyck.nl/
www.stedelijk.nl/
www.metahaven.net/
www.janvaneyck.nl/sealand

The Speakers

Slavoj Zizek is philosopher, cultural theorist and professor atthe
Institute for Social Sciences (Ljubljana). Slavoj Zizek will speak
about:’Theright of those who were missed by thebombs’,in which he takes
up a recent NBC debate on the Abu Ghraib scandal. The prisoner’s right
to live was forfeited by being legitimate targets of bombings. He is now
a case of what Giorgio Agamben calls ‘homosacer’, the one who can be
killed with impunity since, in the eyes of the law, his life no longer
counts. We encounter here the logic ofemergency state gradually
pervading life. Zizek is one of today’s most significant
interdisciplinary thinkers. His work is apowerful, often explosive
combination of psychoanalytical andphilosophical concepts. His books
includeDidSomeone SayTotalitarianism? (2001)andWelcome to the Desert of
theReal (2002).He is currently writing a book on the war in Iraq.   

Anselm Franke is curator andcritic (Berlin). Anselm Franke will present
hisIslandsand Territoriesprojects.Franke’s research results shows that
our world is increasingly beingfragmented into issue-related
enclaves:Islands,Camps andOther States ofUtopia,which all surpass the
solid borders of the nation-state. He willpresent new and previously
unpublished case studies, which furtherrelate to the European Union. The
exhibitionTerritories(2003) was curated by Franke in collaboration with
Eyal Weizman, RafiSegal and Stefano Boeri, and was initially shown at
the KW Institutefor Contemporary Art (Berlin, 2003), Witte de With
(Rotterdam, 2003)and at the Malmö Konsthall (2004). 

Boris Buden is a writer andcultural theorist (Berlin). Boris Buden’s
concepts of a culturally andpolitically divided Europe permeate his
writings on the formerYugoslavia, Western Europe and the USA. An
activist in the Yugoslavianpeace movement, Buden founded the
journalArkzin(1993) and published the first Croatian new edition of
theCommunistManifesto(1998). He participates as a scholar
inThePost-Communist Condition,a research project led by media critic
Boris Groys, Center for Art andMedia (ZKM), Karlsruhe. Buden will relate
his expertise to theshifting territories and demographics of
post-communist societies, towhat was formerly called the Eastern bloc. 

The Meta Haven: Sealand IdentityProject is a Dutch design project in
charge of aresearch-driven national identity for the world’s first ‘data
haven’and Europe’s smallest nation-state, the Principality of
Sealand.Amsterdam-based graphic designer Daniel van der Velden,initiator
of the project, will present the design team’sresearch and proposals.
Having existed in the North Sea close to theUnited Kingdom since
September 1967, Sealand is an internationallyrenowned legal test case
regarding sovereignty, connected toinformation networks through its
internet hosting services, existingon the borderline of traditional
sovereignty, piracy and ‘Empire’. TheMeta Haven project has developed
new strategies for Sealand’sidentity, exposing it as a complex web of
instable signifiers. Designteam: Tina Clausmeyer, Vinca Kruk, Adriaan
Mellegers, NextArchitects. The Meta Haven: Sealand Identity Project
issupported, hosted and financed by the Jan van Eyck
Academie,Maastricht.

The Office for MetropolitanArchitecture (OMA) is an architectural
officefounded by Rem Koolhaas. At this conference Reinier DeGraaf will
present parts of OMA / AMO’s research of the€-conographyproject. During
their branding process for the European Union, OMA /AMO unveiled an
‘iconographic deficit’ in the visual identity of theexpanding EU, an
impasse in the representation of a dynamic andemerging political entity.
Parts of the€-conographyproject were shown as part of OMA / AMO’s
recentexhibition Content(2004). The office most notably created a new
European flag, showing acoloured barcode that refer to the national
flags of the Europeannation states, replacing the twelve gold stars. 

Dieter Lesage is philosopher and lecturer at theRITS / Erasmushogeschool
(Brussels).
Dieter Lesage will speak about‘Resistance,Identity, Europe’andtackles
issues such as: Should Europe be resisted? Or is Europe ourmain hope for
any resistance at all? Should Europe be proclaimed‘post-political’ even
before it really gets political? Or should werather consider the history
of the European Union to date as itspre-political prelude? Should
‘identity’ be the banner of ourresistance? Is there a European
‘iconographic deficit’, as RemKoolhaas argues, or is the logo-centrism
andbrandingby think tanks such as AMO something we would better do
without?Finally, Sealand: why it fascinates us more than it should...

Lieven De Cauter is philosopherand lecturer at the University of Leuven
(K.U. Leuven) and at the RITS(Brussels). Lieven De Cauter’s introductory
statement is partiallybased on his forthcoming bookThe
CapsularCivilisation. On the City in the Age ofFear (2004).De Cauter is
co-founder of theBrussels Tribunal2004, People vs. Total
WarIncorporated,an organization that publicly questions the new imperial
world orderas it was launched by the Bush administration under the title
‘Projectfor the New American Century’. De Cauter moderates the
paneldiscussion. 



--------------------------------------------------------  
Jan van Eyck Academie
Academieplein 1
6211 KM  Maastricht
Nederland
e  soe@janvaneyck.nl
t  +31 (0)43 350 37 37
f  +31 (0)43 350 37 99
w www.janvaneyck.nl
--------------------------------------------------------
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K i m   T h e h u
director's assistant
Jan van Eyck Academie
Academieplein 1
6211 KM  Maastricht
Nederland
e  kim.thehu@janvaneyck.nl
t  +31 (0)43 350 37 37
f  +31 (0)43 350 37 99
w www.janvaneyck.nl
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