November 25, 2017
BAK, basis voor actuele kunst, Utrecht, The Netherlands

Assemblism was a day-long gathering in the context of BAK, basis voor actuele kunst, Utrecht’s long-term program Propositions for Non-Fascist Living. The gathering addressed the current rise of the new authoritarian world order, and the millions of bodies that have assembled in resistance in liberated autonomous zones, occupied buildings, city squares, prisons, and cultural spaces to collectively enact a different demand for egalitarian society.

In length of Judith Butler’s Towards a Performative Theory of Assembly (2015) the gathering explored what democratic cultures manifest through assemblist practices, and how such democratic cultures contribute to establish new forms of emancipatory (self-)governance. Through three consecutive blocks, titled The Pan European Assembly, Non-Human Assemblages, and After the Assembly, art workers, political representatives, and activists discussed the cultural dimensions of assemblist practices, in search of new alliances. A composition in three acts, Composing Assembly, by Maya Felixbrodt (composer and musician), Aurélie Lierman (radio artist, vocalist, and composer), and Samuel Vriezen (composer and writer) was presented throughout the gathering for the first time.

With contributions by: Kate Shea Baird (Barcelona en Comú); Merve Bedir (architect, Land+Civilization Compositions); Grégory Castéra (curator and co-founder of Council Paris); iLiana Fokianaki (writer and curator, State of Concept Athens, Extra City); Quinsy Gario (artist, activist); Menno Grootveld (DiEM25 The Netherlands); Havin Güneşer (journalist and women’s rights activist, Freedom for Abdullah Öcalan/Peace in Kurdistan); Ernst van den Hemel (researcher at Utrecht University and activist); Birgitta Jónsdóttir (poet, Icelandic Pirate Party); KUCHENGA (writer and agitator, Black Lives Matter UK, Bent Bars Collective); Lorenzo Marsili (founder of European Alternatives and member of DiEM25 coordinating committee); Shela Sheikh (researcher at Goldsmiths, University of London); and Igor Stokfiszewski (journalist, artist, and activist, Political Critique, DiEM25).