I’m delighted to have been asked to contribute to MAP 3: Archiving ‘Asia’ event at the Live Art Development Agency along side DARC colleague Jemima and Tara to question the role of Documentation.
4 November, Saturday, 12pm – 7pm: Dr Eva Bentcheva (Batubalani), DARC (Tara Fatehi Irani, Manuel Vason, Jemima Yong), Melanie Keen (Iniva), Lois Keidan (LADA), Dr Ray Langenbach (University of the Arts, Helsinki), Hammad Nasar, Raju Rage, Erika Tan (with Whiskey Chow, Jess Heritage and Michael Taiwo), Sung Tieu, Loo Zihan.
Here some info on the event:
A two-day event curated by Something Human to launch a new special collection of Southeast Asian performance materials and a newly commissioned Study Room Guide. These will be made accessible at the Live Art Development Agency in London for researchers, artists, students and academics.
On 3 and 4 November, the launch event of the Southeast Asian performance collection will feature a programme of performative interventions, workshops, presentations and panels to explore the themes and issues that are connected with building this new archive and its relationship with its contributors within the context of London.
From 2014 to 2016 Something Human curated three editions of CCLAP (Cross-Cultural Live Art Project), a programme of outdoor and indoor performances, artist residencies, presentations, performative lectures and panels with the aim of instigating the sharing of the developments and critical reflections of significant and diverse live art practices in Southeast Asia and the UK, to connect the critical contexts of Southeast Asian live art practice with that in the UK/Europe.
The project of building an archive out of the CCLAP experience began with the realization of the lacunae of information and materials about Southeast Asian live art practices here in the UK, and raised a series of questions: what are the ethical and legal considerations with regards to the gathering of such materials from artists from and working in Southeast Asia? How do we maintain the non-linear, fragmented and open nature of an archive, contaminating and contesting its very existence, bearing in mind, such an archive of practices, experiences, stories are from artists who work within the blurred and contested borders of Southeast Asia?
Building an archive can be an act of resistance, of care, and of creating the possibility of a polyphonic narrative through a range of diverse resources. If building an archive is something that cannot be described in its totality and that emerges only in fragments of perspectives, M.A.P. (Movement x Archive x Performance) is a platform to initiate these critical discussions and instigate further research.