Syndicate: moneynations@access, Zurich, October 1998

[Andreas Broeckmann <abroeck@v2.nl>]

Date: Tue, 19 May 1998 15:42:26 +0000
From: shedhalle <shedhalle@access.ch>
Subject: Shedhalleinfo:MoneyNations

moneynations@access

a Web- and VideoZine with contributions of artists, activists
and theoreticians from Middle and Central European cities

including a Conference
from 24. October- 25. Oct. 1998
and a Presentation of the Zines
from 23. Oct. to 15. Dec. 1998
at Shedhalle Zurich, Seestr. 395, CH- 8038 Zurich
Phone :++41-1- 481 5950, Fax.: ++41-1-481 5951, shedhalle@access.ch

second part of moneynations@access with artists, activists and theoreticians
from Central and South America at the Swiss Institute, New York (concept will
follow from Swiss Institute)

"..For business purposes.the boundaries that separate one nation from another
are no more real than the equator. They are merely convenient demarcations of
ethnic, linguistic and cultural entities. They do not define business
requirements or consumer trends." (IBM 1990)

"The aparatuses of discourse, technologies and institutions (capitalism,
education, mass media a.s.f.) which produced what is generally recognized as
the "national culture"...but the nation is an effect of these cultural
technologies, not their origin. A nation does not express itself through its
culture: it is the cultural aparatus that produces "the nation". What is
produced is not an identity or a single consciousness...but (hierarchically
organized) values, dispositions and differences. This cultural and social
heterogeneity is given a certain fixity by articulating the principle of "the
nation". The national defines the cultures unity by differentiating it from
other cultures, by marking its boundaries; a fictional unity, of course,
because the "us" on the inside is itself always differentiated."(Donald, 1988)

The project "moneynations@access" has a double focus. It is concerned with the
complex and contradictory nature of contemporary cultural identities, and with
the role of national-politics in relation to the "transnational flow of
capital" and their affect on the reconfiguration of those identities. The part
of the project initiated by the Shedhalle Zurich addresses these issues in the
context of the current changes in a European identity, which has always been
defined and is now newly defined in relation to the important "Others", i.e.
America, the "East", Islam, Japan or the Orient. In the case of the first part
of "moneynations@access", our greatest interest will placed in the question how
the big Other, "the former Eastern Bloc", is redefined in relation to the
constitution of a West European Union as a "fortress", and its contemporary
economic politics. The production of a pan-European identity will not only be
investigated before the background of contemporary national-politics, but also
in its historical context of the Third Reich, the Cold War, and the effect
which the so-called "collapse of Socialism and Communism" had, on the one hand
for a leftist discourse, and on the other hand for the power structures of
transnational accumulation of wealth.

The question is to what extent is the Western "identity" composed in opposition
to the former Eastern Bloc states and to what extent does this affect the
so-called "fortress" and its restrictive migration politics? How are the West
in the East, and the East in the West represented and valued?  What kind of
reports and information does the media convey? In what way does the market and
the promotion of the "Euro", as the new common currency, morally exclude and
marginalize people within Europe? And what are our perspectives as to a
critical discourse, now, after the utopia of Socialism is breaking down,
converting into Neo-Liberalism?

The aim of "moneynations@access" is to create a "counter-institutional pool" of
theorists, (media) activists and artists from Middle and Central European
cities. However, this "counter-information network" will not consist of a group
of a few individuals. The aim is to exchange a wide range of policies of
resistance; to link new identities and economic theories with anti-border
campaigns, anti-racist and feminist movements; to discuss, understand and
criticize the protectionism of Western Europe with regard to migration, while
"capital flows beyond national borders and labor rights.

The communication network starts out on two different levels. First a mailing
list will be issued to instigate open email conversation via a WebZine, in
which people from different disciplines can submit texts, projects and
suggestions referring to the issues. The WebZine will be established by the end
of June. The Second exchange medium is a VideoZine. The VideoZine will be used
as a correspondent network initiated by a so-called editorial correspondent
group. They contact artists, activists and theoreticians from Central Europe,
who wish to address counter-institutional strategies within the framework of
the project. The VideoZine starts right now. The first video has already been
made by the Liga (a group of non-profit gallery spaces) from Budapest. The
videos will be sent to Zurich, where we will copy them for the editorial group
members. (have a look on ...how to proceed)

The Shedhalle in Zurich established a project team (Agnes Bieber, Sascha
Rvsler, Natalie Seitz , Marion v. Osten). The Shedhalle team will be
responsible for the coordination of the information, texts and videos, and will
establish the Web- and VideoZine in cooperation with the "editorial
correspondent group", different (media) activist groups in South-Eastern and
Central Europe as well as with the ProHelvetia offices in Bratislava, Kraksw,
Budapest and Prague. Extracts of the incoming internet texts will be published
in a special edition of a Newspaper. This Newspaper will function as a small
publication and could be organized together with "nettime" (Geert Lowink,
Amsterdam). The video productions of the VideoZine will be presented at the
Shedhalle in October 1998 in the context of a conference of theoreticians,
anti-racist groups, media activists and artists.  The VideoZine, the
Webproject and the Newspaper will also be presented in the Swiss Institute, New
York, in November 1998, where the project will be proceeded with Central and
South American participants. The aim of the project initiated by the Shedhalle
is not only to represent the "East" in the "West", but also to encourage the
further use of the WebZine and the VideoZine for "multiple" shows or screenings
in the various cities and countries of the participants. It would be our wish
that the project will be more than a "one off exemplary project", but an
attempt to establish communication and discourse between critical working
people on both sides of borders.


Theoretical Background:

The West and the Rest... In the past years, the concept of Euro-Centrism has
repeatedly been accused to stand for the hegemony of Western cultural
conception, since the euro-centrist concept always seems to reflect a "Western"
view of Europe only. The "construction of Europe" as a "fortress" has started
in 1989: A fortress that excludes the Central European cultures, and with media
that blocks them out at the borders. This "fortress Europe" produces new
cultural identities, which are on the one hand based on regionalism and on the
other hand the very same is denied and replaced by a common European identity.
Who is in and who is out is redefined. New boundaries and new identities are
produced, which are strongly related to market orientated values and
ideologies. The international economic "competition", as an effect of the
so-called globalization, serves as the main argument for the European Union.
The spatial matrix of contemporary capitalism is one that combines and
articulates tendencies towards both globalization and localization. Even if
capital significantly reduces the friction of geography, it cannot escape its
dependence on spatial fixity. Space and place cannot be annihilated. "The new
culture of enterprise enlists the enterprise of culture to manufacture
differentiated urban or local identities. These are centered around the
creation of an image, a fabricated and inauthentic identity, a false aura,
usually achieved through the recuperation of "history (real imagined, or simply
recreated as pastiche) and of "community"(again, real, imagined, or simply
packaged for sale by producers). (Harvey,1987:274).  In this context the
Schengen Agreement fixed the boundaries of cultural identities into borders
that are protected by military and laws. Meanwhile the "East" has become a
low-wage location for international investors. New technologies of control have
been developed on the borders: genetic fingerprints; high-tech equipment; new
border architecture has been erected; and the fortress is now protected by a
specially trained border police who decide on the new Western European identity
as a part of their job. Those developments, i.e. social restructuring, spatial
transformations and discontinuities of identities are to be seen in the context
of the social and economic restructuring of the former socialist states through
investment, commercialization and privatization as well as through
transnational accumulation developments.

The conception of identity in a "Western European" society is increasingly tied
to the lifestyle attributes of a more flexible, creative and efficient service
elite. These cultural discourses or distinctions of the "European identity
crisis" include repressive political means against so-called "illegalized"
people at the borders and within the "fortress Europe". These exclusions and
stigmatizations of the "Others" are present in Middle and Western European
cities too, where a low wage working class of "illegalized" people serves the
service elite to polish up their status, whereas in the inner cities there is
an increase in repressive and racist politics against different marginalized
groups. Along its eastern and southern edges, Europe, as an economic and
political entity, must now re-negotiate its territorial limits. Last year a lot
of critical events and campaigns took place focussing on these developments
(Kein Mensch ist illegal, Innenstadtaktionen) . "MoneyNations@ access" is
trying to broaden these critical actions by relating them to the perception of
the so-called EAST in institutional politics, and its consequences regarding
the construction of the borders, new nationalism and low-wage production
locations.

The Crisis of the "Blind Spot" In the current reports of the West it is
obvious that the propaganda machines of the "Cold War" go on, either through
refusing to recognize the situation in Central Europe, or through its
capitalization. The postulation of Capitalism in all its violence is
legitimized through the reasoning of cultural difference: On the one side that
of "the East", historically associated with racist representations, and on the
other side that of power claims against the former socialist states.
Nationalism and racism are constructed on this, and the West uses it to polish
up its identity, or better, to create a status of an "acceptable" identity.

The premisses of the perception of the "East" are confirmed by the
misrepresentation of an intellectual and cultural tradition of Central Europe
during Socialism; by the never-ending representation of poverty; by spectacular
reports on the "new-rich" and the "Mafia"; by the former categories of
business; by professionalism, advertising and competition; and above all, by
the unquestioned Western European legislation of rights of asylum made for
Central Europeans.  The social change from Socialism to Capitalism was
described by many "Eastern" friends of mine as an every-day conflict. In
capitalism the way you have to behave, do business, produce art, or dress,
seemed to create a barrier: In order to cope with this adjusting of your
personality you either had to position yourself against it, or over-affirm it.
The capitalist ways of behaving are received as colonization. They reflect
power relations and Western categorization of values. Alternatives like "self-
professionalizing" or models of non-profit orientated ways of life are rarely
found.

The representation of European history in relation to a socialist tradition,
used only as a negative projection, creates, historically and socially, a blind
spot, which produces an identity crisis in the former Eastern Bloc states and
its citizens. The only cultural identity which is given to the former Soviet
states is that of an "older (deeper) European tradition", the tradition of the
"Abendland". This sentimental and nostalgic view refers to a tradition of
"culture", which is the very heart of the difference between Europe and the
so-called "non-cultural" Others (Africa , America, Asia and Islam). This
collective memory of "what Europe once was", excludes the experiences of
forty-five years of life in socialist states, as if it had never existed. For a
Western-socialized person, it is hard to understand what effect this
devaluation can have on a person's identity. Once there is that feeling that
Capitalism has "won", we, as Westerners, realized what that might mean with
regard to our critical potential.

Former West - Former East It is an aim of the project to reflect on this
historical "blind spot" and its political and social implications. We suggested
that it may be interesting to start a discussion, not from the point of view of
traditional, materialistic leftist discourse, but rather from a perspective of
identity politics. Working together with feminist activist groups and
theoreticians from the "East", in this context, seems to be highly political.
How did the social and economic situation for women and homosexuals change
during the transition from the former socialist to the now almost completely
capitalist situation? How is feminism, as analytic category, valued on each
side of the border? Is there a deconstructing feminist economic movement which
questions the over-determination of the economic discourse in terms of being
right or left wing? What position and what kinds of resistance politics might
we share together against the transnational accumulation processes? Where are
the differences? How is the political valued? What part plays Pop Culture in
the former west/former east resistance politics to build new subjectivities
which go beyond a "whites only" and traditional "genderdifference" identity?
All this questions and more might be asked, answered or discussed through
several media in the project. Join and Let's start.

How to Proceed and how to Take Part: The project will develop progressively on
an exchange basis throughout the next month and can be accessible and presented
in different places and institutions and in all the cities of the participating
artists and theoreticians (if wanted). The project should not stop because of
the conference in Zurich or elsewhere, it can proceed as long as necessary.
The submissions of the Web- or VideoZine correspondents can be of a
documentary, narrative, fictional or theoretical character. Besides the
presentation of political and economic background data and information, the
contributions can be texts, internet projects, photo stories and videos. They
can be, for example, in the form of a guided tour through a city by video.
(Where does gentrification happen? Where does the transformation of the city
start? etc.), or may be a report of activities, interviews, statements about a
video of other participants, or fiction. No institutional politics should be
involved but current institutional forms should be criticized, or
counter-institutional points of view could be developed.

The editorial group (April 1998): A group of artists and theoreticians has been
formed at my suggestion, which will from now on be looking for new partners in
relation to their research and subject fields. Each member of this group is
personally related to the subject of the fortress Europe, either through their
own biography, or through the content of their work. This group acts as an
editorial group in which information can be processed and brought together. The
artists of the "editorial group" are: Glsn Karamustafa (Istambul), who has
often worked on the theme of migration and works as a correspondent for the
complex "suitcase economy", in the Black Sea region ( Bulgaria, Georgia,
Turkey); Marion Baruch, as artist "Name Diffusion" (Paris, Milan), a former
Jewish Romanian migrant who will be our editorial correspondent for
Romania/Ex-Yugoslavia, as well as for migrants from these countries living in
Paris or Milan. Marie Ringler and Meike Schmidt Gleim (PublicNetbase, Vienna )
are invited to monitor the feminist perspective of the project. Geert Lovink,
nettime Amsterdam, will inter-link the different media activist groups, and is
himself asked to work on the question of Georg Sorros in the "East". The art
historian Edith Andras, former correspondent in New York for Hungary, is
invited to work on the representation of "Eastern art" in the West . She has
made the first contacts with economists, sociologists, activists, artists and
art historians made, together with Susi Koltai, Pro Helvetia Hungary. The
group of editorial correspondant members can and will be enlarged.


Marion v.Osten Please send your comments or contributions to
shedhalle@access.ch