29 February 2008

LabforCulture is pleased to announce the names of the renowned theorists and artists participating in the Victims’ Symptom project, curated by Ana Peraica (Croatia/The Netherlands) and commissioned by LabforCulture.org.

Victims’ Symptom focuses on the concept of the victim as it is practically used in politics and journalism, but also as it is explored theoretically in victimology and in psychiatry and psychotherapy, as well as in the field of cultural studies. The project features critical texts, documentation, commissioned artworks and reflections by the curator and a number of other theorists and artists throughout the project.

A specially designed online space for Victims’ Symptom will be launched at the end of March 2008 featuring texts by theorists and curators Sezgin Boynik (Kosovo), Adila Laidi-Hanieh (Palestine), Stevan Vukovic (Serbia) and Geert Lovink (The Netherlands).

In April 2008, Victims’ Symptom will present a series of online artworks specifically commissioned for this project by Mauricio Arango (Colombia/USA), Alejandro Duque (Colombia/Switzerland), Andreja Kuluncic (Croatia), Marko Peljhan (Slovenia) and Martha Rosler (USA).

Visitors to the project website will also be invited to comment on the artworks and texts as well as participate in a live online debate supported by expert consultants Tihana Jendricko, psychiatrist and Tina Peraica, psychotherapist, from the Center of Psychotrauma, Zagreb, Croatia. There is also an opportunity for site visitors to submit their artistic work that relates to the subject, Victims’ Symptom, which will be discussed by the invited participants of the project.

Exploring different concepts including self-victimisation, “collateral victims”; “ideal victims”, the bureaucracy of death and PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder), but also “cultural engineering of victims”, Victims’ Symptom delves deeply into our misconceptions of culturally engineered victims and actual victims.

Ana Peraica is a freelance curator, theorist and post-academic researcher of art theory and new media. Marko Stamenkovic (Serbia/The Netherlands), a curator currently participating in the Curatorial Training Program of De Appel (Amsterdam) is assisting Peraica with moderation on http://victims.labforculture.org. Together they have also conducted a series of interviews as a run-up to the project with artists, experts and thinkers such as Neery Melkonian, Anur Hadziomerspahic, Enrique Arroyo, Sue Golding (aka Johnny de Philo) and Noam Chomsky.

LabforCulture commissioned Victims’ Symptom to celebrate its first year anniversary in the summer of 2007. Ana Peraica’s curatorial project was selected by a panel made up of Annet Dekker (former Head of Exhibitions and Artlab, Netherlands Media Art Institute and currently Programme Manager at the Virtueel Platform, Amsterdam, the Netherlands) and Kelli Dipple (Webcasting Curator, Tate Modern, London, UK), as well as LabforCulture staff.

For more information on Victims’ Symptom, go to: http://victims.labforculture.org

• Go here for descriptions of the texts and bios of all of the theorists.
• Go here for descriptions of the artworks and bios of all of the artists.

LabforCulture is a partnership initiative of the European Cultural Foundation and would like to thank its funders for their support.

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Communications

Nicola Mullenger
nicola@labforculture.org