Dates

23 & 30 May, 6 & 13 June, 2023 | Hopscotch Reading Room (Berlin) |
27 June 2022 | Kampnagel (Hamburg) |
25 September 2022 | Casa Tranzit (Cluj) |
23 September 2022 | Atelierele Malmaison (Bucharest) |
14 September 2021 | Synth Library (Prague) |
14 August 2021 | Kombinatas Left Festival (Lithuania) |
The reading group prioritizes collective close reading as a deliberate counterpractice to Western academic hegemony, linguistic hierarchies, and the artificial divide between institutional and non-institutional knowledge. Sessions require no long-term commitment, centering accessibility for artists and workers excluded from academic resources or time-intensive research. Non-native speakers are supported through collaborative translation and definition.
The project interrogates how extractive dynamics—environmental (mineral/gas/water exploitation), intellectual (appropriation of ideas, sounds, labor), and aesthetic (“mining the for branding for branding)—permeate sonic and performative arts. It asks: How do hierarchical collaborations normalize extraction? Can such processes resist their own dynamics? What are the framework’s limits? How might reciprocal artist-subject-nature relations emerge?
Methodology
Participants select a text (chapter or excerpt) to read collectively during sessions, rejecting preparatory labor. Dialogue prioritizes utility for members’ real-world work over academic abstraction, resisting institutional pressures by centering non-academics. The group fosters engagement with critical theory outside traditional academic spaces, emphasizing lived experience over performative expertise.