“Museum on the Couch” – Reflexive and creative explorations of ethnographic collections
The Museum on the Couch :
Reflexive and Creative exploration of the ethnographic museum
« THE INVITATION »
Winter Semester 2018-2019
Wed. From 4 :30 0 to 6:30 PM
This 5th “The Museum on the Couch” seminar will decline the notion of “invitation” crucial to both the worlds of art and anthropology, and their museums.
Conceived and animated by the anthropologist Bernard Müller and the artist Neven Allanic, together and through the duo “the artist” and “the researcher” that they form, their approach results from a common desire for interconnection between the worlds of art and anthropology in order to create links between artistic practices and anthropological research, in the light of a specific case whose ins and outs will be discussed during this workshop-seminar.
One will wonder how to open an area of dialogue between different worlds in an ethnographic museum … INVITING each other on a symmetrical basis, without reproducing the relations of power at work in a postcolonial situation.
To what extent is the ethnologist invited to his field by his “informants”? In the context of the ethnographic museum, during the collection period, were former owners invited to donate their items?
Can the artistic approach revisit the ethnographic relationship by making the invitation the moment of another encounter? What would be its architecture, what are its aesthetic mechanisms and what information does the visitor?
This semester will allow students to follow, and participating, to the very construction process of the exhibition “Megalopolis # 1 – Stimmen aus Kinshasa” (https://www.kulturstiftung-des-bundes.de/nc/de/projekte/archiv/detail/megalopolis_1_stimmen_aus_kinshasa.html, inauguration on 31 November 2018 – until March 2019).
In the same spirit of creative research of the previous sessions, students are invited to propose a form (Performance, guided tours, flyers, etc.: see the other years: https://ethno.gko.uni-leipzig.de/index.php/museum/kooperation-grassi) in connection with the documentary space, and in resonance with the notion of “information,” “document” or “archives”.
The most deserving students will be selected for the exhibition.
A seminar-workshop of the Grassi museum für Völkerkunde in coopération with l’Institut für Ethnologie zu Leipzig directed by Bernard Müller with Neven Allanic.
Grassi Museum für Völkerkunde, Kleiner Vortragsraum (1. Etage)
Johannisplatz 5-11
Leipzig
Former Semestres :
This module is designed as a workshop. It gives students the opportunity to discover the museum while helping to transform it through practical exercises. In the rooms of the GRASSI Ethnology Museum in Leipzig, course participants are invited to create their own exhibition: installations, interventions, disruptions, guided tours (inside or outside the museum) or any kind of performance. The approach is interdisciplinary and collaborative.The students’ work will be presented to the public at the end of the semester. The most convincing proposals will remain in the permanent exhibition until the end of July 2018. Access: The course is intended for BA and MA students in ethnology, drama, visual arts, graphic arts and media arts/communication and any other field of study. Students are invited to participate in a creative and free approach. Credit :You receive 10 credit points in your main domain or in your elective domain Organization: The seminar-workshop is organized jointly by the Leipzig Institute for anthropology and the State Ethnographic Collection of Saxony and directed by Bernard Müller. The contact persons at the GRASSI Museum or the Institute for anthropology are Philip Schorch, Antje Bäcker and Kevin Bress.
Assessment :
Design and Implementation of a project echoing a problem of the ethnographic museum to be presented in the permanent exhibition of the Grassi museum, alone or in a small group and documented by “making of” / written report.
Sessions:
On Mondays: April 9th, April 16th, April 23rd, April 30th, May 7th, May 14th, May 28th, June 4th, June 11th, June 18th, June 25th 2018
11am to 2pm
Kleiner Vortragsraum (1. Floor)
Grassi Museum for Völkerkunde Leipzig, Johannisplatz 5-11
GERMANY
Info :
https://ethno.gko.uni-leipzig.de/index.php/museum/kooperation-grassi
Reflexive und kreative Erkundungen in den ethnographischen Sammlungen
Dieses Modul ist als Workshop entworfen. Es gibt Studierenden die Gelegenheit mittels praktischer Übungen auf experimentelle Weise das Museum zu entdecken und mitzugestalten. In den Räumen des GRSSI Museums für Völkerkunde zu Leipzig sind die TeilnehmerInnen des Kurses eingeladen, ihr eigenes museographisches Display zu kreieren: Installationen, Interventionen, „Störungen“, Touren (innerhalb und außerhalb der Mauern) oder jegliche Art der Performanz. Die Herangehensweise erfolgt interdisziplinär und gemeinschaftlich.
Präsentiert werden die studentischen Arbeiten dem Publikum am Ende des Semesters. Die besten Arbeiten verbleiben bis Ende July 2018 in der Dauerausstellung.
Teilnehmer: Der Kurs richtet sich an BA und MA Studierende der Ethnologie, der Theaterwissenschaften, der plastischen, graphischen und medialen Künste und jeder anderen Fachrichtung. Studierende sollten Spaß an kreativer und selbständiger Projektarbeit haben.
Anrechnung Sie erhalten 10 Leistungspunkte, in ihrem Kernfach oder im Wahlbereich
Organisation: Dieser Seminar-Workshop wird gemeinsam vom Institut für Ethnologie in Leipzig und den Staatlichen Ethnographischen Sammlungen Sachsen veranstaltet und von Bernard Müller geleitet. Ansprechpartner im GRASSI Museum oder im Institut für Ethnologie sind Philip Schorch, Antje Bäcker und Kevin Bress.
Assessment
Entwurf und Durchführung eines Projekts, das eine Problematik des Ethnographischen Museums reflektiert (Installation, Performance oder freie Intervention) in der Dauerausstellung des Grassimuseums, allein oder in einer kleinen Gruppe und “Making of” / schriftlicher Bericht.
Termine
Workshop-Treffen: Montags : 9. April, 16. April, 23. April, 30. April, 7. Mai, 14. Mai, 28. Mai, 4. Juni, 11. Juni, 18. Juni, 25. Juni jeweils
11:00-14:00
Kleiner Vortragsraum (1. Etage), Grassi Museum für Völkerkunde Leipzig, Johannisplatz 5-11
Eröffnung der Ausstellung der studentischen Arbeiten:
Info
https://ethno.gko.uni-leipzig.de/index.php/museum/kooperation-grassi
Reflexive and creative explorations in the ethnographic collections
This seminar-workshop aims to analyse the malaise that are facing most of the European ethnographic museums today. Just the once, this crisis will not be addressed only theoretically but also by proposing practical solutions. In an experimental approach and on a small scale level, the participants / students will elaborate during the semester their own museum-related propositions, envisaged as a curatorial answer to a theoretical problem.
In order to try to understand the stakes of the current crisis, having identified the symptoms of the malaise, we will retrace the history of the ethnographic museum as an institution but also as a scenographic and performative practice, echoing the current global situation, in a critical and postcolonial state of mind. Considering the form of the ethnographic exhibition as a theatre of objects (the latter not necessarily being material, as in “intangible culture” or “oral history”), we propose to approach the biography of the object by the multiplicity of appropriations and variety of uses/usages to which it is subject/object, as expression of the variety of temporalities it relates to.
Resting preferably upon objects of Ethnographic Collections of Saxony (SES), on related past projects or connected topics, the participants of the seminar-workshops will implement genuine museum projects (ethnographic propositions, artistic installations, performances, small exhibitions, multimedia devices, and outside the wall actions, such as guided tours in town, for instance ) that will be presented to the public in the permanent exhibition of the Grassi Museum in the last week of June 2016 (see Student Works WS 2015-2016).
In order to move away from disciplinary compartmentalisation, this workspace is envisioned as a collaborative platform, a place that aims to gather ethnologists, artists, philosophers, art historians, curators, mediators, designers / architects and various professions (and not only ethnologists), in collaboration with several departments.
Organised jointly with the Institute of Anthropology at the University of Leipzig, the Staatliche Ethnographische Sammlungen Sachsen, and at first for this semester with the HGB- Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst, this and the following seminar-workshops are open to all.
Every two weeks, Friday : 13 – 15 H.
First session Friday of 15th of April
Venue : Grassi Museum für Völkerkunde, Johannisplatz, Leipzig