From Critique to Action: The Art of Transformation
Dr. Aude Florence Bertrand-Höttcke
What role can contemporary artists play in transforming society?
Over the last 30 years, critique has undergone profound questioning and redefinition.
Simply put, post-critique has learnt from modern critique, while turning it into a “transformatory practice”.
Amidst critical times, solutioning our multiple contemporary crises requires not only decisiveness (krinein) and awareness, but also mobilisation and joint action across several communities, as well as prefiguration.
Over the last two decades, pioneering artists have developed methods, trainings and prototypes 'toward the not-yet', both facing certain uncertainties and imagining possible desirable futures, while mobilising people from various fields across civil society.
The seminar looks at both essays on post-critique and transformative projects by influential contemporary artists, such as Jeanne van Heeswijk or Rirkrit Tiravanija.
We will also have a guest intervention by Markus Ambach, co-initiator of Manifesta Ruhr (2026).
Dr. Aude Florence Bertrand-Höttcke
Aude Bertrand-Höttcke (born 1980 in Paris) is a senior researcher, lecturer, author and practitioner in the field of contemporary arts and culture.
She joined the WittenLab in 2023 as a research fellow after completing her PhD at the former faculty for cultural studies at Witten/Herdecke university.
Prior to joining Witten and in parallel to her dissertation, she worked for fifteen years in the field of contemporary art, with a focus on experimental projects in-between public and digital space.
She has been a visiting researcher in cultural sociology, aesthetic theory and cultural studies at MESHOPOLIS research institute, Aix/Marseille, ACTE Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris and New School for Social Research, New York. She is also part of the urban collective "common spaces" initiated by YesWeCamp in Marseille and Paris.
Ziele & Kompetenzen
Input -
Theoretical framework:
-current discourse on (post)critique in the field of social science (with authors such as Foucault, Butler, Latour, supplemented by influential critics such as Hal Foster)
Artistic resource:
-recent workbooks on cultural transformation through artistic practice
Expected Outcome -
Future and transformational literacy:
-imagining future scenarios and using them to understand and shape the present in a desirable way
-managing uncertainty and ambiguity
-engaging in dialogue with persons from various disciplines, with various experiences and backgrounds
-envisioning various paths, methods, and levels of transformation through case studies with artistic and cultural projects (e.g. as thought experiment, prototype, temporary 'as if' installation, 'micro-utopia' within the art institution, or large-scale/ real-life organisational renewal)
Practical application (subject to participants' willingness to engage in experiments and bring in own ideas) through:
-unlearning exercises
-envisioning exercises
-prototyping
Maximale Teilnehmendenzahl
25 Teilnehmer