In these times of war and multiple crises it seems to become more and more difficult for the arts to reflect on their interventionist potential. The human-made catastrophes seem too overwhelming to be discussed between the fields of politics and aesthetics, they seem too far apart from each other in the face of the traumata, and the feelings of loss and grief, which are added every day. But how can we “learn to live with the ghosts” (Heiner Müller), and accept that “there is something to be done” (Avery Gordon). How can we escape a paralyzing complicity? How can we listen to the stories told by the injured human and non-human beings? (How) can we continue to think about practices of care and healing, when things and relations seem unrepairable? With this perspective our workshop aims to think about the potentials of choreographic practices and to reflect modes of insisting on possible futurities in face of the ongoing catastrophe.

One dimension we could find in learning to listen to our surrounding environments, while not silencing what has already been oppressed. That means giving up the status of a sovereign subject position. Furthermore, listening to the unheard pushes us to deeply investigate our “Beziehungsweisen” (Bini Adamczak) and reconfigure anew the constellations we work in.

Another, closely related dimension might be to think about the issue of care: in both everyday life and artistic contexts, care is often wielded as a tool of control or conformity. While it can be framed as an altruistic practice, care can also uphold structures of power. For example, in art institutions or creative industries, care can be used to pacify dissent, maintain hierarchies, or reinforce traditional roles. Artists or workers who are placed in the position of needing to be "cared for" may find that such care comes with expectations to conform to normative behaviours or to produce in ways that align with capitalist agendas. Care in art is never neutral; it is always embedded in power dynamics and historical contexts. It is crucial, then, to engage with care critically, asking who benefits from it, who is excluded, and how it can sometimes perpetuate the very inequalities it seeks to address. In Matters of Care, Maria Puig de la Bella Casa explores care as a relational, transformative practice that challenges colonial and capitalist systems. She argues that care is not an isolated responsibility but a collective practice rooted in interdependence, crucial for rethinking social structures and that it must consider the diverse cultural, emotional, and historical contexts in which it occurs.

In this sense, choreographic practices also come with their world, can serve as spaces where these interconnected worlds of care are actively engaged and explored. Choreographic expressions can reflect and disrupt dominant narratives, creating new worlds of meaning and connection. Just as Listening and care resist the logic of exploitation, we want to ask, if and how choreography can become a subversive practice that nurtures solidarity, empathy, and transformation? In the context of decolonizing care, artists can envision practices that reimagine care as a form of resistance and collective well-being, connecting individuals to broader communities and histories - or not? To think about listening and care in choreographic practices is above all a political issue, as it involves ways of producing, living and dying.

Program

10:00 – 10:30 Introduction (Kirsten Maar)

10:30 – 10:45 Body Welcome/Embodied Land Acknowledgement (Sophie Schultze-Allen)

10:45 – 12:00 Session 1: Agata Siniarska

Break (15 minutes)

12:15 – 13:30 Session 2: Marina Guzzo

Lunch Break (13:30 – 14:30)

14:30 – 16:00 Session 3: Arantxa Ciafrino

16:00 – 16:30 Closing Reflections and Discussion

Session 1: Agata Siniarska: “null&void”….                                                                         
When humans wage war, the landscape suffers injury. What would a piece of land with a bomb crater in it have to say? How can we humans hear the voices of the animals, plants, stones and soil when the explosions finally stop, and pass on their stories? In the proposed presentation I would like to share my artistic practice based on the work “null&void”. null & void is a legal term and means as much as “worthless, without legal force”. In this case, it is an attempt to listen to the forgotten, neglected and silenced voices of non-human beings, searching for extinct and/or as yet non-existent organs of perception to see more and hear more in a world ravaged by war.

Session 2: Marina Guzzo: Choreographing the Crisis: Gestures Between Art and Ecology
The investigation revisits a series of artistic and ecological experiences developed within the contested terrain of futures—often referred to as the climate crisis or climate emergency. Guided by the materiality of gestures and the elements of nature, it introduces artists, activists, and their practices with the understanding that no single solution will suffice. Instead, it proposes a multiplicity of exercises, speculative propositions, and narrative strategies that offer other ways of telling, imagining, and rehearsing possible futures. It focuses on the ways in which art, in its diverse practices and poetics, can propose situated modes of inhabiting this shared condition—through gestures of care, attention, and reparation. Special emphasis is placed on performative arts, which position the body as both a site of inquiry and a vector of transformation. Also engages with community-based and participatory practices, creating openings for more-than-human convivialities and reconfiguring perspectives that are often limited to geological, material, or technoscientific frameworks.

Session 3: Arantxa Ciafrino: Reframing Care: Decolonial Approaches to Museum Collections and Possibilities of Reparation through Performance and Dance                 
Within the framework of this workshop, which seeks to critically examine the concepts of care and repair, my presentation will explore how museums have contributed to the colonial/modern matrix. Through their collections, non-Western cultures have often been symbolically and epistemologically subjugated. Drawing on three case studies at the intersection of Decolonial Studies, Anthropology, Museology, Dance, and Performance, I will invite participants to collectively reflect on how museum collections, dance, and performance can serve as tools for critical engagement with colonial histories. Furthermore, we will examine how dance and performance offer alternative modes of care beyond the ontological dualisms of Western thought that separate nature from culture, body from mind, and categorise people and knowledge into hierarchical structures.

The workshop is organized by Arantxa Ciafrino, Friederike Hartge, Kirsten Maar and Sophie Schultze-Allen from subproject B02 and Marina Guzzo.