1-3 June 2017


No one seemed to be prepared for this. Ten years ago, progress was still taken for granted and a worse future looked as unthinkable as the need to go back to past forms of representation and activism. But then came austerity, a generalized attack on public services and the intervention of foreign financial institutions. Below the international context of economic disruption and neo-liberal orthodoxy, life itself was suddenly deteriorated with the collapse of familiar forms of sociability and political imaginary.

The event Culture and Crisis will bring together artists, activists, films, videos and other cultural forms that somehow tried to respond to austerity in Portugal and other southern European countries in the last decade. Through a series of debates and screenings, we will analyse both the ways in which cultural forms were able to come up with reliable accounts on contemporary events and evaluate society’s ability to reinvent life and politics in challenging times.

Download the event poster here.


Programme:
1 June, Thursday 
2pm – Notas de Campo, Catarina Botelho (Portugal, 2016), Malet Street, room B20
3pm/5pm – Round Table – Activism and Crisis, Malet Street, room B20
with Guya Accornero (Political Scientist, CIES/IUL, Lisbon), Kostis Kornetis (Historian, Universidad Carlos III, Madrid), Ricardo Noronha (Historian, New University of Lisbon)
Chair: Pedro Ramos Pinto, (Historian, University of Cambridge)
7pm – 9pm – Round Table – Culture and Austerity, Gordon Square, G01
with Catarina Botelho (photographer, filmmaker, Lisbon/Barcelona), Miguel Cardoso (poet, Lisbon), Marina Vishmidt (writer, editor and critic, Goldsmith, London), João Fazenda (illustrator)
Chair: Luis Trindade (Historian, Birkbeck, London)

2 June, Friday
12-2pm – Revolução Industrial, Tiago Hespanha and Frederico Lobo (Portugal, 2014), Birkbeck Cinema
2pm/5pm – Arabian Nights, vol. 1, Miguel Gomes (Portugal, 2015) , Birkbeck Cinema
6pm/8pm – Vida activa, Susana Nobre (Portugal, 2013), Gordon Square B04

3 June, Saturday
10.30am – Arabian Nights, vol. 2, Miguel Gomes (Portugal, 2015), Birkbeck Cinema
2pm – Arabian Nights, vol. 3, Miguel Gomes (Portugal, 2015), Birkbeck Cinema
5pm – Final Debate – The crisis isn’t over yet. Chair: Patrícia Brás, (critic, Birkbeck, London), Dean Kenning (artist, critic, Kingston University & Central Saint Martins, London)


Sponsored by
Birkbeck Institute for the Moving Image (BIMI)
Camões – Instituto da Cooperação e da Língua 
Centre for Iberian and Latin American Visual Studies (CILAVS)