Protozone12: Syncretic Sites (Sept-Nov 23) negotiated a syncretic understanding of the world at the same time as the renewed outbreak of brutal violence in Israel and Palestine. The text of ‘Syncretic Sites’ states that “a syncretic understanding opens up the world to its multiplicity and density. Thus, what is stacked on top of each other, entangled in each other and fused with each other does not create one singular world, but worlds of coexistence – in the plural.” In times of affective states of emergency, polarization occurs to a point where it becomes almost impossible to maintain complexity.

PS: Syncretic Sites is dedicated to cautious zones of coming together in the same space as a counterpoint and complement to the confrontation with current events through media channels and news services. In addition to shared words, thoughts and concerns, it is about embodied practices and neighborliness in the presence of each other.

The Syncretic Sites exhibition was about expanded ways of listening, among other things. We build on this and propose to meet each other in appreciative listening, speaking and focusing on the co-existence of different perspectives and interests in the same space. What needs are in the room? What options to act?

PS: Syncretic Sites is aimed at the cultural field (artists, freelancers and employees in institutions) as well as an interested public. We work with communication support, conversation scores and embodied practices.

Communal Dreaming with Chris Paxton

Eine solastalgische Koch- und Hörperformance

Solastalgia is a neologism, formed by the combination of the Latin word sōlācium (comfort, ease, solace) and the Greek root -algia (pain, suffering, grief), to describe a form of emotional or existential distress caused by environmental changes. The term was coined in 2005 by philosopher Glenn Albrecht, who described it as “the homesickness you have when you are still at home.” How do we experience comfort or pain together on a disappearing planet? Can we dream the future through the darkness of our present? What sonic ecologies can we bring to life by listening and dreaming collectively? Let’s stew on this together for a while…

A vegetable curry, perhaps a prime example of comfort food, will be prepared collectively with the ingredients and tools we have at hand as we share our feelings, desires and dreams for a disappearing Earth. Participants are invited to contribute to a soundscape while preparing the meal together. Sonic contributions can take the form of a poem, a dream, a text, or otherwise, so long that it resonates with the question: Now, what are our dreams for Earth?

Come as you are. All are invited to cook, share and listen. Silence is welcomed.

Chris Paxton

Berlin-based culinary artist Chris Paxton, host of the seasonal artist dinner-listening event Dreams at Kwia, also co-founded Lucky You Studios, curating unique dining experiences for clients such as Highsnobiety and Resident Advisor. As chef-in-residence at Nuova Atlantide in 2023, he explored movement, language, and landscape. His work, featured in Planetary Embodiments, includes “Recipes in Ruins,” a collaboration with Maia Magoga, blending magical recipes with dreams for the future. Chris’s immersive culinary art, rooted in cyclical time and local specificity, fosters collective visions through shared meals that transcend the table. His work challenges environmental (dis)connections and confronts the haunting of food cultures by capitalist and colonial histories. In a collaborative dreamscape, Chris weaves sound and food, proposing a culmination of desires expressed through commensality, collaboration, and listening.

Belia Winnewisser

Producer and DJ Belia Winnewisser lives and works in Zurich.
For the completion of her studies in music and media art Belia tried to combine sound art and pop music in her work. With her first album Radikale Akzeptanz,
released by Präsens Editionen, she succeeded in doing just that. In addition, the release gave her an international perception. On July 2nd 2021 Belia’s second album SODA appeared likewise on Präsens Editionen. With this album, the artist marked another milestone in her solo career and she solidified her approach to
sound production. The media response to the release showed that Winnewisser had not only found her own way with it, but also an exciting one. A year later the
EP Mother Earth Took Poison In Her Soil was released on the Frankfurt label Die Orakel which presented Belia’s refreshing approach to club music.
Besides her work as a producer, Belia is resident DJ at Kapitel Bollwerk in Bern and enjoys various bookings. Belia’s DJ sets are bursting with energy and emotion and are characterised by her sense of rhythm and tension.

Contemporary Queer Chinese Art is the first English-language academic book that explores the intersections of queer culture and contemporary Chinese art from the mid-1980s to the present. This book brings together 17 internationally renowned artists, activists, curators and scholars to explore heterogeneous expressions of Chineseness and queerness in contemporary art from China and Chinese diasporas in Asia, Europe and North America.

Examining contemporary visual art, performance and activism, this book offers a rich archive of queer Chinese artistic expressions. It provides valuable insights into the status quo and intersectional struggles of Chinese artists who identify themselves as queer and who have associated their work with queer positionalities and perspectives. By sharing personal experiences, art expressions and critical insights about what it means to be queer and Chinese in a transnational context, the book reveals multiple forms and potentialities of queer politics in the domains of art and activism.

Monday 27.11.23

19:00 – Door Open & Apero

20:00 – meet Diyi Mergenthaler, co-editor of Contemporary Queer Chinese Art and doctoral student in art history at the UZH

20:35 – artist duo Ziwei Huang & Yumo Cheng talk about their queer art performance The Grand Gay Wedding, screening of trailer of their new performance Little Whore House de Chinois at Porny Days

21:15 – conversations with art historian Daniel Berndt x Diyi x Yumo x Ziwei

This workshop uses methods from Live Action Role-Playing (LARP) to expand on the world and characters of Winged Eros.

A LARP is a type of role-playing game in which players interact with each other in character, pursuing goals or acting out desires within a fictional setting. This inherently involves a form of collective worlding as players give shape to the fictional world and its narration through improvised action. In this workshop, we will work through practices of worlding through the lens of agency, ritual and gesture:

Worlding emerges from the interplay between the agency of players in relation to their characters, other players and the world. A world is forged through the negotiated or pre-determined setting in which the players’ improvisation unfolds. LARP makes use of game mechanics, rituals not determined by their meaning, but by their repeatability as well as gestures that allow players to express their intention.

The workshop is organised in cooperation with the research focus Aesthetics at Zürcher Hochschule der Künste. It is open to everyone without prior experience in LARPing.