CIVIC-SOLIDARITY: new networks of repair

About

Times of civilisational uncertainty require posing and pursuing radical questions commensurate with the challenges and opportunities we discern. Fresh, critical thinking offers the potential to transform ossified conditions and catalyse new networks of repair.

In the realm of human-crafted ecosystems and the collective work of city-making, civic solidarity urges social connection and vitality where the metropolitan-civil-communal coincides with the hallowed-exalted mythological. Here, sacred is understood as capacious yet intimate. Uplifting reverence and respect for all life, diverse beliefs are embraced while avoiding the exclusionary dogmas of any single doctrine. Traditionally sequestered activities are exfoliated and intentionally re-situated to intertwine with quotidian life, allowing the work of memory, lamentation, and healing to be seen and shared.

Course leader

Karla M. Rothstein

Target group

Student research will be fueled by individual curiosity and motivation. It will inform the nature and capacities of infrastructures simultaneously negotiating ephemerality and accumulation, intimacy and collectivity, grief and healing. Projects will explore positions on what we should value, where we can reflect, who, what, and when we will remember, how we prioritise, why we collect, and how we will manifest remembrance.

Course aim

We will tour and document cemeteries in Salzburg, explore our own preconceptions and diverse cultural rituals, and engage emerging sustainable technologies of corpse disposition to inform new possibilities for honouring the dead and celebrating our interlaced lives.

Fee info