Taking as a point of departure the notion of conviviality described by the philosopher Ivan Illich in his text “Tools for Conviviality” (1973), this conference addresses the social and political dimension of the condition of living together. To think about conviviality today means to address the notion of equality under the point of view of social interaction, the way the notion of presence has been interpreted by the social media, the debate around modes of dissent and engagement, and the understanding of political and public forms of distribution.
This conference and the performance A Drunken Lesson that closes the program on June 29 revolve around cultural behavior and, in the case of the performance, reflect on the effects of alcohol on perception and the learning process.
Lars Bang Larsen is an art historian, curator and writer. His work has focused on art from the 1960s, contemporary experimental art practices, and their impacts on culture at large. Bang Larsen is a regular contributor to Artforum, Frieze, and other publications. He is currently involved in exhibition projects at Tensta Konsthal, Stockholm and Roskilde Museum for Contemporary Art, Copenhagen.
Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev is Artistic Director of dOCUMENTA (13); she is based in Rome, Kassel, and New York.
Diedrich Diederichsen is a critic and professor of theory, practice, and communication of contemporary art at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. A former editor of the German music magazines Sounds (1979–83) and Spex (1985–91), he is a regular contributor to publications such as Texte zur Kunst and the Berlin daily Tageszeitung.
Boris Groys is a philosopher and a theoretician specialized in Socialist art, post-communist cultural studies and media with a background in mathematical logic. He is based in New York. Having coined the term “Russian Conceptualism,” he has contributed publications on Russian Conceptual art and on the relationship between power and art that have been central to the wider discussion of postmodernism.
Chus Martínez is Head of Department of dOCUMENTA (13) and a member of its Core Agent Group. A philosophy scholar, her current research focuses on artistic research: how thinking can happen through matter and how sense can be reversed by experience. She was the director of the Frankfurter Kunstverein (2005–08), and chief curator of the Museu d’Art contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA) (2008–11).
Cesare Pietroiusti is an artist based in Rome whose practice focuses on problematic and paradoxical situations that are hidden in common relationships and in ordinary acts. He was co-founder of the artist project Oreste (1997–2001), and initiator of Nomads & Residents, New York (2000). He is currently teaching in the Visual Arts Department of IUAV University of Venice and is MFA Faculty at the Art Institute at Lesley University, Boston.
Suely Rolnik is an unconscious analyst, cultural critic, curator, and professor at the Catholic University of São Paulo, where, in 1982, she founded the Subjectivity Studies Centre in the Clinical Psychology Doctoral Program. Close to Gilles Delueze and Félix Guattari, she has translated their work into Portuguese, published extensively on this subject, and with Guattari is author of Micropolítica. Cartografias do desejo (1986).
Jakob Schillinger is a writer and curator based in Berlin and Dean of the School for Worldly Companions at dOCUMENTA (13). His writings have been published in Artforum, Flash Art International, Mousse, October and other publications. He recently co-curated “based in Berlin” (Berlin, 2011).
Iacopo Seri is an artist based in Kassel who says of himself: “I wanted to become a scientist when I was a child; unfortunately I have never been good at maths. For the time being I work as an artist—not as a scientist, but I still do experiments. I am currently a Resident Artist Intern for dOCUMENTA (13).”
On Conviviality: A Seminar on Living Together is supported by the Absolut Art Bureau.