Venue:Kulturwissenschaftliches Institut Essen (KWI)
Goethestr. 31
45128 Essen
Those who are ashamed lose face, want to sink into the ground or at least escape the eyes of others. Shame always goes the whole hog, it punishes minor indelicacies as well as serious misdemeanours, participates in the most ancient emotional stock and is at the same time a reaction of the most subtle kind. If "shame is the great silencer", as author Lea Schneider writes, it is not surprising that she has lent herself to the image. Because it is almost impossible to abstract from a visual exposure, she must always - at least in her imagination - reckon with an audience before whose eyes she shows herself.
This performance character of shame has a long history of images of shame and defamation, which are still articulated today in the shaming dynamics of social media or can even become part of artistic strategies: When Nan Goldin demonstrated against the opioid manufacturer Sackler at the Guggenheim Museum in 2019, she carried a banner with the words "Shame on Sackler".
Where such forms of extrajudicial punishment always include a "moment of reification", because one is "robbed of one's sovereignty of action and interpretation" and becomes the "object of the gaze of others", as journalist Anette Köhler writes, there is also a demand to withdraw from the judging gaze from outside.
The panel will discuss examples such as the photographic work Social Justice 1: School by Susanne Keichel and ask how the interrelationship between shame and visibility can be understood in an artistic-activist way, where shame must be protected or overcome and who takes the right to the sovereignty of interpretation. When do images become sites of dishonour and accusation? How does Linda Hentschel combine "desire to look, fear of looking and prohibition of looking"? And can vulnerability be a weapon?
Speakers
Linda Hentschel, Mainz University of Art and Design
Susanne Keichel, Academy of Visual Arts Leipzig
Lea Schneider, FU Berlin
Concept & Moderation
Mona Leinung, KWI & Folkwang University Essen
Anja Schürmann, KWI
Participation on site
Participation is free of charge, registration is not required.
Participation via Zoom
For online participation, please follow the link published here.
Organiser
An event organised by the Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities Essen (KWI) in cooperation with the Folkwang University Essen.
