<nettime> On the Urgency of Launching the ArtLeaks Gazette, London, 7 November 2012

["Corina L. Apostol" <corina.lucia.apostol@gmail.com>]

*Presentation of the international platform ArtLeaks*. *On the Urgency of
Launching the ArtLeaks Gazette*

*Wednesday, 7 November 2012*
*19:00-22:00*
*Khalili Lecture Theatre, SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies),
University of London*

This is part of the *9th Annual Historical Materialism Conference* ???Weighs
Like a Nightmare???, London, November 7th-12th, 2012

ArtLeaks is an international platform for cultural workers where instances
of abuse, corruption and exploitation are exposed and submitted for public
inquiry. ArtLeaks??? mission is to create a space where one could engage
directly with actual conditions of cultural work internationally ???
conditions that affect those working in cultural production as well as
those from traditionally creative fields. Furthermore, ArtLeaks is
developing in the direction of creating transversal alliances between local
activist and cultural workers groups, through which we may collectively
tackle repression and inequality.

While building on previous models that emerged in the highly politicized
milieus of the 1970s and 1980s, such as the institutional critique practice
of left-wing collectives, ArtLeaks seeks to expand the scope of these
historical precedents towards international geopolitical engagement. One of
the outcomes of ArtLeaks working assemblies and workshops was the
establishment of alliances with international groups such as W.A.G.E.
(NYC), Occupy Museums (NYC), Arts & Labor (NYC), Haben und Brauchen
(Berlin), the Precarious Workers Brigade (London), Carrotworkers???
Collective (London), Critical Practice (London), and The May Congress of
Creative Workers (Moscow). It is our strong belief that only an
internationally coordinated movement would be able to expose and denounce
exploitation and censorship in contemporary culture, and collectively
imagine new types of organizational articulations.

For the 2012 Historical Materialism Conference, members of ArtLeaks will
present the outcome of their previous working assemblies which took place
this year in Berlin, Moscow and Belgrade, and bring up for discussion the
urgent need to establish the ArtLeaks Gazette (forthcoming 2013). This
regular, online publication aims to be a tool for empowerment in the face
of the systemic abuse of cultural workers??? basic labor rights, repression
or even blatant censorship, and the growing corporatization of culture that
we face today.

After these brief introductions, we will break into four working groups,
each focused on a different theme outlined in our Gazette. These will be:

*1) Critique of cultural dominance apparatuses*

Here we will address methodological issues in analyzing the condition of
cultural production and the system that allows for the facile exploitation
of the cultural labor force. We will try to relate methodology with
concrete case studies of conflicts, exploitation, dissent across various
regions of the world, drawing comparisons and providing local context for
understanding them.

*2) The struggle of narrations*

This working group will develop and practice artistic forms of narration
which cannot be fully articulated through direct ???leaking???. Our focus will
be finding new languages for narration of systemic dysfunctions. We expect
these elaborations to take different forms of artistic contributions, such
as comics, poems, drawings, short stories, librettos, etc.

*3) Education and its discontents*

The conflicts and struggles in the field of creative education are at the
core of determining what kind of subjectivities will shape the culture(s)
of future generations. It is important therefore to analyze what is
currently at the stake in these specific fields of educational processes
and how they are linked with what is happening outside academies and
universities. Here we will discuss possible emancipatory approaches to
education that are possible today, which resist pressing commercial demands
for flexible and ???creative??? subjectivities. Can we imagine an alternative
system of values based of a different meaning of progress?

*4) Best practices and useful resources*

In this working group we invite people to play out their fantasies of new,
just forms of organization of creative life. Developing the tradition of
different visionaries of the past we hope will trigger many speculations
which might help us collect modest proposals for the future and thus
counter the shabby reality of the present. This also includes practices
which demonstrate alternative ethical guidelines, and stimulate the
creation of a common cultural sphere.

At the end of the working group session, we will present our findings to
each other and come together for some final conclusions and future common
aims.

Facilitators of the event: *Corina L. Apostol, Vlad Morariu*

The editorial board for the first issue of the Gazette will consist of *Corina
L. Apostol, Vladan Jeremi??, Vlad Morariu, David Riff and Dmitry Vilensky*.

More about the ArtLeaks Gazette: http://art-leaks.org/artleaks-gazette/

More about Historical Materialism :
http://www.historicalmaterialism.org/about-us


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