MC: Bärbel Küster: Approaches to Dialogic Principles from Theory and Practice in Culture (GCSC)

The masterclass will take a closer look at research techniques that are based on dialogues and methodologies as interviews and oral history. Examples will draw on knowledge production in academia and likewise in artistic approaches. The seminar will open up discussions of disciplinary differences: participants are invited to contribute from their field of expertise. In anthropology and ethnology much effort was made to question the role of testimonial expressions and reinvent a scientific ideal of dialogical knowledge production. Contemporary artists have taken up this question of dialogical production in postcolonial contexts and community based art. Here, the art work is transferred into the communication of participants. Is this principle applicable to academic research? Here, not only methodologies but also main scientific parameters are effected. The masterclass aims to discuss the role of the spoken word and narrative exchange principles in the artistic and academic field.

PART I  (10-12:00)

1.) Project B. Küster Photography and Orality, 2017 (short introduction)

2a.) Scientific research based on dialogues/ methodologies:

       - informative interview and narrative interview

       - oral history from different disciplinary perspectives

       - artist interview (Lichtin 2010)

       - dialogic knowledge production and participation 

         Film example: Trin T. Minh Ha: Reassemblage, 1983

2b.) Discussion of theoretical texts
Kester 1985, Bachtin 2008, Benjamin 2007, Steyerl 2008, Bhabha 1998
Discussion FIRST PART:
„Participation“ in humanities? What is „Knowledge Production“?
--> perspectives from different disciplines

PART II (12-14:00)

3.) Artist-produced dialogues
Martin Krenn: The political sphere in Art Practices
Maria Melián: Memory Loops
artist’s methodologies ans ‚participation
Discussion: Interview versus oral history vs. dialogue
--> mulitplication of perspectives; „community-based art“ (Kester 1985, Lacy 1995; Green 2011)

4.) Transcultural perspectives
Transcultural frictions and hegemonial questions, perspectives in arts and humanities
(Araeen 1999)

The following titles are required reading: 

Rasheed, Araeen: The artist as a post-colonial subject and his individual’s journey towards ‚the centre’, in: Views of Difference: Different Views of Art, hg. v. Catherine King, New Haven u. London 1999, S. 229-255.

Bhabha, Homi: Conversational Art, in: Conversations at the Castle. Changing audiences and contemporary art, hg. v. Mary Jane Jacob, Cambridge MA 1998, S. 38-47.

Kester, Grant: Conversation Pieces. The Role of Dialogue in Socially-Engaged Art, in: Zoya Kocur und Simon Leung (Hg.): Theory in Contemporary Art Since 1985, Oxford 2005, S. 153-164.

Lacy, Suzanne: Debated Territory. Toward a Critical Language for Public Art, in: Dies.: Mapping the Terrain. New Genre Public Art, Suzanne Lacy (Hg.), Seattle u. Washington 1995, S. 171-185.

Green, Renée: Paradoxes experienced by artist thinkers, in: Intellectual Birdhouse. Artistic Research, hg. v. Florian Dombois, Ute Meta Bauer, Claudia Mareis und Michael Schwab, London 2011, S. 271-288.

Optional titles:

- Bachtin, Michael: Autor und Held in der ästhetischen Tätigkeit, Frankfurt/M. Suhrkamp 2008   

- Benjamin, Walter: Der Erzähler, in: Erzählen. Schriften zur Theorie der Narration und zur literarischen Prosa. Ausgewählt und mit einem Nachwort von Alexander Honold, Frankfurt a. M. 2007, S. 103-129

- Lichtin, Christoph: „Herr Duchamp, wie geht es Ihnen?“ Zur Geschichte und Analyse des Künstlerinterviews, in: Dora Imhof und Sibylle Omlin (Hg.) Interviews. Oral History in Kunstwissenschaft und Kunst, München, 2010, S. 43-58

// Prof. Dr. Bärbel Küster (University of Zürich, Switzerland)