OnCurating magazine launches the latest issue 62: “Let’s Talk About … Anti-Democratic, Anti-Queer, Misogynist, Antisemitic, Right-Wing Spaces and Their Counter-Movements”.
Please register here, you will be informed about the exact venues closer to the dates.
Launch in: Kunsthochschule Kassel, Hörsaal, October 22, 6pm
Editors: Michaela Conen, Daniel Laufer, Dorothee Richter
There is a global movement towards authoritarian, patriarchal ideologies that are misogynistic, queerphobic, xenophobic and, last but not least, antisemitic. This involves resorting to strange, ideologically charged, twisted narratives that ignore differentiations, contradictions and historical events—fuelled by algorithms in favour of closed worldviews. This happens not only in authoritarian states, dictatorships and kleptocracies (see Russia), but also—disguised as social movements—in neoliberal democracies. The tolerance of ambiguity called for by Nathan Sznaider, i.e. the recognition and endurance of contradictions, has largely been lost in the process. We would therefore like to leave the camp debates in art and culture behind us and present intellectual, intercultural artistic and curatorial positions in a series of panels.
With this issue, we want to look for some missing links in the history of cultural developments and hopefully show historical developments and contradictions, removed from the simplifying theory in which right- and left-wing tendencies are seen as being similar. One has to look into the historical connections and alliances carefully.
With contributions by: Dagim Abebe (on Wendimagegn Belete); Inke Arns; Artists at Risk; Jonny Bix Bongers; Jutta Ditfurth; Fabienne Dubs and Jana Kurth (on Maria Eichhorn); Michaela Dudley; Sergio Edelsztein; Ulrich Gutmair (on Hamza Howidy), Ana Hoffner; Leon Kahane; Hadas Kedar (on Khader Oshah); Veronika Kracher; Daniel Laufer (on Nir Evron, Omer Krieger and Ariel Reichman); Ahmad Mansour; Oliver Marchart; Michaela Melián; Ruth Patir; Doron Rabinovici; Dorothee Richter (on a project curated by Elena Levi, Ronald Kolb, Dorothee Richter, Rotem Ruff, Maayan Sheleff and Hillit Zwick); Maria Sorensen; Nora Sternfeld; Simon Strick; Klaus Theweleit; Stephan Trüby
Dorothee Richter, PhD, is Professor in Contemporary Curating at the University of Reading, UK, where she directs the PhD in Practice in Curating programme. She previously served as head of the Postgraduate Programme in Curating (CAS/MAS) at Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK), Switzerland. Richter has worked extensively as a curator: she initiated the Curating Degree Zero Archive and was artistic director at Künstlerhaus Bremen, where she curated various symposia on feminist issues in contemporary arts, as well as an archive on feminist practices entitled Materialien/Materials. Together with Ronald Kolb, Richter directed a film on Fluxus: Flux Us Now, Fluxus Explored with a Camera. Her most recent project was Into the Rhythm: From Score to Contact Zone, a collaborative exhibition at the ARKO Art Center, Seoul, in 2024. This project was co-curated by OnCurating (Dorothee Richter, Ronald Kolb) and ARKO (curator Haena Noh, producer Haebin Lee). Richter is Executive Editor and Editor-in-Chief of OnCurating.org, and recently founded the OnCurating Academy Berlin.
Miki Lazar, artist, designer and part of the board of the Jewish community in Kassel, besides this, Miki Lazar is involved in installing and de-installing projects of different documenta and got to know the directors and administrators often closely. Miki was also involved as a political activist to get the NSU Material out in the public.
Ariel Reichman (b. 1979 in South Africa; lives and works in Berlin.) Freud preferred the form of the silent word, that is, of the symptom, which is the trace of a story. This would be a good description of Reichman’s practice: he creates objects and artistic artifacts that evoke feelings of confusion and conflicting emotions. Often, they cannot be resolved, and in that way they are analogous to the contemporary conditio humana. Reichman creates an ambiguous and subtle play between private and collective memory, apparent idyll and subliminal brutality. He has exhibited at Kunsthalle Mannheim; Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg; Tel Aviv Museum of Art; KW; Kunstverein in Hamburg; Goodman Gallery; and PSM, among others. In 2025 he opened a solo exhibition Keiner Soll Frieren! at the Felix Nussbaum House in Osnabrück. The exhibition runs until May 2026 and will be accompanied by talks and workshops.
Stephan Trüby, PhD, is Professor of Architecture and Cultural Theory and Director of the Institute for Principles of Modern Architecture (IGmA) at the University of Stuttgart. Previously, Trüby was Visiting Professor of Temporary Architecture at the State College of Design in Karlsruhe (2007–09), Head of the postgraduate study programme ‘Scenography/Spatial Design’ at Zurich University of the Arts (2009–14), a lecturer at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design and Professor of Architecture and Cultural Theory at the Technical University of Munich (2014–18). His publications include Exit-Architecture. Design Between War and Peace (2008), The World of Madelon Vriesendorp (2008, with Shumon Basar), Germania, Venezia. Die deutschen Beiträge zur Architekturbiennale Venedig seit 1991 (2016, with Verena Hartbaum), Absolute Architekturbeginner: Essays 2004–2014 (2017), Geschichte des Korridors (2018) and Right-Wing Spaces. Political Essays (2020).