intro 
by Magnus Ericsson
 
guests: Pelin Tan, Susan Schuppli

Based on a selection of films, the event posed the question:
Is it possible to see matter as an ally in shaping our lives?

How does the knowledge embedded in matter challenge the modern paradigm that considers it an inert stock of resources available for human use, a passive material, a subjugated symbol of unjust power structures, or even a weaponized tool?

What is the tickness of coloniality?

36th CIHA World Congress
(Comité International
d'Histoire de l'Art) 
Lyon, France

role: lecturer

Panel:
Desiderata of the Object, Emergent Meaning and Conservation After the Material Turn

Restoration shapes the future of past material evidences according to a partition of the sensible in power.
National preservation, often automated and bureaucratic, prevents political negotiation.

This lecture stems from the observation of persistent plaster decay in some recently renovated buildings of the fascist village Borgo Rizza in Sicily.

It raises the question: what if, instead of being considered an issue to be fixed, the crumbling plaster, serves, in agential materialistic terms, as the framework for a demodern/decolonial epistemology committed to social justice, capable of acknowledging colonial legacies and ultimately passing down narratives otherwise excluded?

Drawing from the ongoing projects, 2cm: the Thickness of Fascism (Silvia Susanna) and Anti-Atlas of Fascist-Colonial Architecture (Husam Abusalem), together, we delved into the impact of the fascist architectural legacy from broad urban perspectives to the intricate details of construction materials, weaving together floor plans with profanations and wall sections with colonial narratives.

By examining the Western art value system’s reliance on concepts such as authenticity, provenance, and artist intentionality in preservation practices and its contradictions, the session demonstrated how frameworks of the Western value system are upheld through socio-political and technical infrastructures that often prioritize the maintenance of dominant cultural paradigms over the material realities of heritage.

Through an analysis of the village’s material layers—a 4mm layer of Pompeian red paint, 2cm of concrete plaster, and 56cm of volcanic stone—the session uncovered the contradictions embedded in preservation practices.

exhibited at
die-DAS academy Saaleck, Germany

     

The project originates from a reflection on the labels 'Zedler-Restaurierung found throughout the Saalecker Workshop—the first project of the Nazi ideologist Paul Schultze-Naumburg and location for several meetings of prominent National Socialists, including Hitler.

The 'Zedler-Restaurierung' are 5x5 cm paper labels affixed in each room that serve as a testament to the currently authorized preservation procedure. After being designated as a national monument in 1995, a specific material investigation on the building became mandatory. Therefore, any formal changes interfering with Schultze-Naumburg's last implementation required permission from the State Office for Monument Preservation.

What is the relation between the materialization of the racial ideology of Paul Schultze-Naumburg and the current knowledge of cultural heritage? Who is validating a cultural value and according to which criteria? Who earns a place in the chronicles of cultural heritage and for what reasons? Whose narratives are acknowledged, remembered, and endured in the national collective memory while others fade into obscurity?

The project propose to go off the established preservation protocols and open up possible time-material-mattering frameworks that crossover facts, events, and materials for collectively delving into the process of validating the value, the relationship between the evaluator and the value, and the possible positions that everyone could take while defining which materials matter and in relation to which narrative.

credits:
original text / Silvia Susanna
Director of Photography / Silvia Susanna
First Camera Assistant / Simone Montacci
Second Camera Assistant / Gabriele Camilli
Original Music / Giuseppe Canegiallo
Proofreading Subtitles / Sara Aoun, Katia Abi Gerges (fra), Faye Yue (chn), Silvia Susanna (ita)

presentation / SPAN agency Italy
world premiere / NòtFilmFest Italy
online release / DAMN Magazine Belgium
included in the First Season / Terrarista TV online streaming channel
screening / Avalanche Art Space Massachusetts, USA
honorable mention / Deep Focus Film Festival New York, USA
selection / WēVē TV New York, USA

New York: 16th March 2020.
When Covid-19 broke into New York people everyday life normality, as a concept, arose as the condition to return to.

But what we talk about when we talk about normality?

normality shows how the current state of exception is based upon multiple, questionable but established conditions.
normality aims at reflecting the basic structures and the foundations of what we consider normal.
Eventually, in light of what is now happening and it will happen, normality aims at instigating further argumentation on how we define, establish and apply our idea of normality.