Nietzsche 5 : The Fragmentary
(2016)
author(s): Michael Schwab, Paulo de Assis
published in: RUUKKU - Studies in Artistic Research
‘Nietzsche 5 : The Fragmentary’ is a collaborative research exposition, which presents a number of compositions by the young Friedrich Nietzsche (organised top to bottom) as well as various layers of reflection, interrogation, and speculation (organised left to right). It focuses on a moment of transformation around 1872 when Nietzsche moved from a serious interest in music composition to a career as a writer and philosopher. This period also coincides with the breakdown of Nietzsche’s friendship with Richard Wagner. The exposition suggests that Nietzsche’s own music as well as that of Wagner serves as a (negative) point of reference for the later Nietzsche, whose work, following Maurice Blanchot amongst others, can be characterised through the notion of the fragmentary, which places it also in relation to early Romanticism, in particular the writings of Friedrich Schlegel, Novalis, and Friedrich Hölderlin. While Nietzsche’s more monumental compositions, such as his unfinished Mass (1860) and the symphonic poem Ermanarich (1861), may be more problematic, the exposition suggests that in some smaller pieces – in particular in So lach doch mal (1862) and Das ‘Fragment an sich’ (1871) – a sense of the fragmentary in Nietzsche may already be constructed.
Beyond interpretations that focus more narrowly on Nietzsche’s work, this research exposition sets out to render the notion of the fragmentary productive for the wider context of artistic research. It does so with reference to Nietzsche’s notion of the untimely as a way to challenge both the dominant instrumentalisation of research and the notion of contemporaneity that seems central to present-day artistic practice. This not only provides perspectives into artistic epistemologies but also, more concretely, provides the methodology by which the research itself and its exposition have progressed. The overall mode is, thus, also that of the fragmentary, in which various media including text and image as well as audio and video recordings are distributed across a two-dimensional grid allowing multiple relationships and readings to emerge. The research exposition aims not only to discuss but ultimately also to employ the fragmentary so as to touch upon a specific artistic and intellectual motivation that we have come to identify with Nietzsche and which we suggest is also relevant today.
PERFORMING WORKING PD HKU
(last edited: 2026)
author(s): Philippine Hoegen
This exposition is in progress and its share status is: visible to all.
Performing Working is an ongoing doctoral project by artistic researcher Philippine Hoegen at the University of the Arts Utrecht. The project explores the performativity of work, with particular attention to undervalued, hidden, and unwaged forms of labour. Hoegen's artistic practice is grounded in performance, approached both as a way of thinking with, through, and from the body. Methodologically, the project builds on traditions in performance research that treat artistic practice itself as a mode of inquiry, where making, documenting, and reflecting intertwine. This orientation frames performance not only as a method but also as a field with its own resources for generating and sharing knowledge, and as a discipline with its own creative, infrastructural, and relational tools.
JENNY SUNESSON
(last edited: 2026)
author(s): Jenny Sunesson
This exposition is in progress and its share status is: visible to all.
Jenny Sunesson (b. 1973) is a Swedish artist predominantly
working with sound. Her practice ranges from field recording and live collages to conceptual sound art and video. Sunesson uses her own life as a stage for her dark, tragic and sometimes comical re-contextualised work where real and invented characters and
derogated stereotypes, collaborate in the alternate story of hierarchies and normative power structures in society.
Working Title
(last edited: 2025)
author(s): Kristin Anna Eyjolfsdottir
This exposition is in progress and its share status is: visible to all.
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
“Working Title” is an art performance about labor
conditions and class structures. The motivation behind the
piece is to interrogate the many ways in which work affects us. The boundaries between labor and art are also examined, as the physical and mental demands placed on the performers reflect the burdens of modern working life. The format mirrors a regular workday: the performance lasts eight hours, including a break. It is presented in two versions—a day shift and a night
shift.
Today, many sectors are marked by rapid change, demands for efficiency and ever-increasing productivity. Which values are prioritised, and which are undermined to meet the needs of such a labor market? In the piece, structural challenges will be studied and observed through scenarios acted out on stage.
Some examples of questions that will be used to form these scenarios:
-At what cost do you actually sell your time?
-What kind of value is, beyond the monetary, created for those who buy your time?
-In what ways, physically and mentally, do you experience your labouring hours, after you have clocked out?
The performance will explore themes such as:
- Monotony and repetition as fundamental elements of labor
- Power dynamics in the workplace and how privileges are
maintained and reinforced
- The body’s needs in relation to work: illness, disabilities,
menstruation, and pregnancy
- The physiological consequences of labor
- The value of time as an economic and social divide
- The close link between economic stability and mental health
In a time when the job market is shaped by rapid technological development, climate change and an uncertain future, thinking through alternatives for how to organise ourselves has become crucial. With this performance, we aim to dig into the mechanisms at stake in order to hopefully be able to both raise questions and think deeply about how we may face the challenges ahead collectively. A dynamic, experimental and collectively driven form of artistic expression is combined with societal critique. We believe in art as a way of adding to the discourse in poetic manners, activating questions through embodied experiences. With this unique format, we hope to open new perspectives on what labor means for individuals and society—and what values we
wish to build our common future upon.
Ixodos2019: Notes 1
(last edited: 2024)
author(s): Chrystalleni Loizidou, Someone has to do this
This exposition is in progress and its share status is: visible to all.
We hereby begin to frame the internationally collaborative work of Ixodos to be reviewed, and propagated by the Research Catalogue and its affiliate institutions.
This exposition is based on questions initially asked by/with artist Livia Moura, Carolina Cortes, Bianca Berdardo, for Instituto Mesa.
Ixodos is an international platform for transversal-translocal art exchanges, facilitating and accompanying residencies, projects, exhibitions, the sharing of knowledge, and the building of our common soul and greater selves.
These art exchanges are not just between artists and art institutions but also between social, political and ecological projects and movements around the world, starting from Cyprus and Brazil. Ixodos was ritually initiated In June-August 2018 by Carolina Cortes, Chrystalleni Loizidou, Evanthia Tselika, and Livia Moura in Greece and Cyprus, initially in connection with Hippocrates' Garden in the island of Cos, It generated its second residency programme at A Casa Lar, Rio de Janeiro, in June-August 2019.
Ixodos é uma plataforma de intercâmbios, trocas, facilitando e acompanhando residencias, projetos, exposições, o compartilhamento de conhecimento, e a construção e expansão de uma alma comum e de nossas existências.
Esta troca artística não é apenas entre artistas e instituições artísticas, mas também de projetos e movimentos sociais, políticos e ecológicos (ambientais) no mundo, começando com Chipre e Brasil.
Jenny Sunesson (b. 1973) is a Swedish artist predominantly working with sound. Her practice ranges from field recording and live collages to conceptual sound art and video. Sunesson uses her own life as a stage for her dark, tragic and sometimes comical re-contextualised work where real and invented characters and derogated stereotypes, collaborate in the alternate story of hierarchies and normative power structures in society.open exposition comments (0)