Events
Saturday, Septmber 11, 2021, 3pm – 7pm CET, Klapperfeld
Exhibition opening
Press release on the exhibition opening as PDF. (Language: German)
Friday, Septmber 10, 2021, 6pm CET (Language: English)
Afghanistan after the Collapse: Forced Migration, Borders & Transnational Solidarity
With Cavidan Soykan (University of Osnabrück) and Abdul Ghafoor (Afghanistan Migrants Advice and Support Organization)
Moderation: HT94FFM-Team
Afghanistan is on everyone’s lips after the takeover by the Taliban. This workshop discusses the situation not only in the country but also the question of migration, border politics and national discourses on (long-term) migration from Afghanistan to countries in the region. Our speakers will pay attention to the situation of Afghan migrants, deported, returned or stuck at the borders or in neighboring countries, and the situation of Afghan activists involved in migrant solidarity work after the Taliban takeover. They will also address the German/Turkish discourses prompted by the “fear of Afghan refugees” seeking exodus from the country. Moreover, they will dwell on gender speeches triggered by this takeover and how Afghan women and children are particularly affected and address networks of transnational solidarity and their work and possibilities in the current situation.
Sunday, July 25, 7PM CET, Filmforum Höchst (Language: English)
Public Film Screening: »Border South« & »Bag Mohajer«
Venue info: Filmforum Höchst
The film evening in cooperation with the ›Klapperfeld‹ and the exhibition ›Hostile Terrain 94‹ will be a political one: The films BAG MOHAJER & BORDER SOUTH deal with refugee experiences at the Mexican border and in the shelter for refugees on Lesbos. Our experiment this evening will be the joint conversation with the filmmakers directly in the cinema and via Zoom from the USA.
Bag Mohajer
The documentary tells the story of Hakim, Mansour and Morteza and their project »Bag Mohajer – Bag of the Refugee«. They tailor bags from the boats and life jackets stranded on the Greek island of Lesbos. Bag production is a way for them to tell their story and to carry a part of their refugee experience to places where they themselves are not allowed to travel. For they, too, have dared to make the dangerous journey to Europe in rubber dinghies. The film lets them tell about the bag production and their life stories and also portrays the work of the project.
Movie-Website: Bag Mojajer
Border south
Mexico and the United States force immigrants into more dangerous areas as they close off the routes of border crossing. Set against the backdrop of the North American migrant trail, BORDER SOUTH composes stories of resilience and survival from multiple perspectives. The film reveals a global migration system that renders people invisible in both life and death.
Movie-Website: Border south
March 18, 2021, 7pm CET (Language: English)
Online Roundtable: Deadly Borders and Activist Interventions in the European Migration Space
Online Roundtable with Natalie Gruber (Border Violence Monitoring Network), Charles Heller (Forensic Oceanography) & Jacob Berkson (Alarm Phone)
Moderator: Valeria Hänsel (Border Monitoring Aegean)
The so-called ‘Refugee Crisis’ of 2015 turned European borders into closely surveilled zones, where, simultaneously, the migrants’ right to move freely has been restricted and violated. Pushbacks in the Mediterranean Sea and at borders across the EU-Turkey migration space caused humiliation, physical injuries, and even death of thousands of migrants in recent years. Activists problematize the presence of migrant search and rescue agencies in the migration space, failing to intervene and save lives; but they also went further by introducing their own investigations, search-and-rescue actions and political campaigns. In this event, our speakers will talk about what they understand by activism and intervention targeting the border violence across and at the peripheries of Europe. They will also address questions such as how to deploy the visual analysis and mapping in the investigation of migrant deaths, how to collaborate with other activists and in what ways different activists may communicate with each other and increase the impact of strategic action against the (in)action of state agencies.
Youtube-Link: youtu.be/8S3bFmQHI40
March 9, 2021, at 6pm CET (Language: English)
Online Roundtable: from Afghanistan, Iran & Turkey. Meeting the »Hostile Terrain 94 Frankfurt« contributors.
Online Roundtable with presentations by Ali Sadeqi (artist, Iran); Kemal Vural Tarlan (documentary photographer, Turkey), and Morteza Rezai (graphic designer & artist, Iran)
Further discussants: Mostafa Mazari (photographer, Iran) Reza Heidari Shahbidak (photographer, Afghanistan)
Moderator: Hilal Alkan (Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient, ZMO)
How are border politics in the Middle East captured by different aesthetics? This online roundtable brings together artists from Afghanistan, Iran and Turkey who contribute to the “Hostile Terrain 94 Frankfurt” show. The presenters, living in the border regions, reflect on the consequences of geopolitical border regimes on countries, communities and personal lives. In their works, they have intensely and creatively visualized borderlands, border crossers, from people fleeing war to nomadic populations, and how conflict and shifting regimes produce im/mobilities. The roundtable will reflect how their work relates to the border realities and the various approaches, genres, and styles they apply and develop in their art pieces and documentaries. Art is not just representation but rather an active form of engagement and can serve as a form of resistance and intervention to these border realities.
March 4, 2021, at 6pm CET (Language: English)
Online Questions & Answers Session | From Deserts to Shores: Engaged Archaeologies of Forced Migrations – An American-European Dialogue on Hostile Terrains
With Prof. Jason de León, Austin E. Shipman, Nicole Smith & Gabriel Canter (University of California/ The Undocumented Migration Project) & Prof. Yannis Hamilakis, Ayşe Şanlı & Darcy Hackley (Brown University)
Moderation: HT94FFM-Team
From the US-Mexican border that divides the Sonora desert into the State of Sonora and Arizona to the Aegean waters of the European coastal borders, border regimes have turned landscapes into hostile and lethal terrains. From deserts to shores, these geopolitical conditions cause staggering fatalities and force people to become stuck in miserable conditions at the borders, border detention, and illegality. Jason de León with the Undocumented Migration Project team and Yannis Hamilakis have researched the people, infrastructures, and assemblages of borders and clandestine border crossing using archaeological and ethnographic approaches. The materials collected not only served as a basis to document and understand structural violence, quotidian conditions, and capabilities to act. Things are also used in interventionist displays to raise awareness about the victims and the humanitarian crisis at the borders, as the global pop-up exhibition, Hostile Terrain 94 and the Transient Matter (onsite/online Haffenreffer Museum) display impressively make present.
This questions & answers session is meant to establish a US-EU dialogue on current border developments, the capabilities, issues, and constraints of researching borderscapes and forced migrations by material culture approaches and beyond.
Youtube-Link: youtu.be/ax43PchfGk0
Registration
Please notify us ahead via sign-up_ht94ffm@posteo.de; we will then send you the access data of the respective event.