joonas lahtinen

Great end-of-semester news – Katarzyna Winiecka, whose diploma thesis “Unmaking the Smuggler Narrative” I supervised at the , received a Honorary Award (Würdigungspreis) for research-led Final theses at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna 2021/2022 at the Graduate Celebration on 1 July 2022.

Winiecka’s thesis “illustrates how territorial, social and also legal borders are sites of permanent contestation and transgression. Starting from the criminalization of refugee activists of the Refugee Protest Camp Vienna under the criminal charge of “commercial smuggling within the framework of a criminal organization”, the impact of victimizing, criminalizing and heroizing discourses on refugee*migrant subjectivities is discussed. As a methodological tool, a triangle is designed that encompasses the reciprocal relations of the three figures victim, perpetrator and heroine in the discursive as well as linguistic field of “Fluchthilfe” [escape aid] and human smuggling. Using activism, art, and intersectional research approaches, the project will present ways to break down the hegemonic victimization of refugees, the heroization of humanitarian, unpaid escape aid, and the racialized and gendered demonization of paid human smuggling. Fluchthilfe & Du corresponds with the theoretical part of the work and is discussed as a possibility to elaborate a collaborative and solidary practice of knowledge production and mediation within the art field.”

I wish Ms. Winiecka the very best and courage for her future artistic, activist, research-led and mediative work with the acute and multi-dimensional problematic of agency, visibility, migration, refugees, justice, law and power.

I am overwhelmed by the generosity and engagement of all the participants and partners of last week’s Soup Session at de Wintertuin, Royal Academy of Art Antwerp (RAFA / AP Schools of Arts) – our installation and talk – that also involved my ongoing project Love Letters, exceeded all of my (high) expections! 
Many thanks for Renata Lamenza, Stefania Assandri, Ria de Boodt, Nico Dockx and all other persons who made the event possible! Our artistic research journey continues… 

Below you find a few snapshots from our event, more photos to follow!

Together with Renata Lamenza, Stefania Assandri and the spectator-participants, we discussed challenges and possibilities of participatory performance practice and artistic research, as well as love letters as a form of research-based communication, in an installative setting, especially regarding Lamenza and Assandri’s ongoing research project TACTICS for a COLLECTIVE BODY at AP Arts, in which I act as an Advisor and Collaborator. The project is realized in cooperation with the research groups “Body and Material Reinvented” (RAFA) and “Creatie/Creation” (RCA). We focused on issues around authorship, material(ist) performativity, care and intimacy in participatory performance. The audience was invited to react, provoke and engage in our conversation.

The Soup Sessions at AP Arts ”are conceived as in-house research encounters. The main idea behind this initiative is for researchers to develop new insights sustaining their personal research practice and to tap into to the research capital which they are part of and contribute to by conducting their artistic research at the Academy.”

I’m pleased to announce that the postponed Soup Session at AP Arts (Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp (RAFA) and Royal Conservatoire Antwerp (RCA)) will take place on Monday 16 May 2022 at 7 PM (Belgian time) at the Wintertuin, RAFA, from 5:30 Pm to 7 PM! Renata Lamenza, Stefania Assandri and I will discuss challenges and possibilities of participatory performance practice and artistic research in an installative setting, especially regarding Lamenza and Assandri’s ongoing research project TACTICS for a COLLECTIVE BODY at AP Arts, in which I act as an Advisor and Collaborator. The project will be realized in cooperation with the research groups “Body and Material Reinvented” (RAFA) and “Creatie/Creation” (RCA). We’ll focus on issues around authorship, material(ist) performativity, care and intimacy in participatory performance. The audience is invited to react, provoke and engage in our conversation.

The Soup Sessions at AP Arts ”are conceived as in-house research encounters. The main idea behind this initiative is for researchers to develop new insights sustaining their personal research practice and to tap into to the research capital which they are part of and contribute to by conducting their artistic research at the Academy.”

 I really look forward to our creative collaboration and discussion!

Today 23 January 2022 is the 125th birthday of the famous Austrian architect and resistance activist during the WW2 Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky (1897-2000) — I and my team developed and realized our first major project EIN.KÜCHEN.BAU based on Schütte-Lihotzky’s “Frankfurt Kitchen” (1926) for the international Freischwimmer-Festival 2012-2013; the project was later also presented at the SOHO in Ottakring Festival Vienna in 2016.

EIN.KÜCHEN.BAU was a performance, an installation, a meeting point for the various aesthetic, social and political dimensions of the fitted kitchen. It brought together stories, histories and ideologies that underlie our contemporary understandings about cooking and household work.

With her “Frankfurt Kitchen” (1926), Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky laid the basis for all industrially produced fitted kitchens (in German: die Einbauküche). Her emancipatory aim was to render cooking as efficient as possible so as to allow the housewife of the twenties more free time for other things. In which ways has the fitted kitchen – both as a site and as a concept – contributed to our conceptions of the everyday, cosiness and, ultimately, our idea of the private sphere and freedom?

“For me it has always been fundamentally important, in my job and also outside of it, with every bit of influence I have, to contribute to creating a better world than the one that I was born into.” (Schütte-Lihotzky)

Informative short read about Schütte-Lihotzky in English:
Marcel Bois (transl. Julia Damphouse): “A Communist Designed Your Kitchen“, The Jacobin, 2020,

Here is the interview by the RBB Kulturradio Berlin-Brandenburg about EIN.KÜCHEN.BAU broadcast a few days before the premiere at Sophiensaele Berlin as part of the Freischwimmer-Festival 2012-2013 (sorry, in German only). You also hear thoughts of Luzie Stransky – dramaturge, my partner in life and work, and family member of Schütte-Lihotzky:

** I’m sorry to inform that the Soup (Safe) session + Creatie Session scheduled for tonight 10 January 2022 has to be postponed at a very short notice due to a Covid infection in the team — I let you know about the new date asap! **

I’m pleased to announce that I have been invited to the Soup (Safe) Session + Creatie Session at AP Arts (Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp (RAFA) and Royal Conservatoire Antwerp (RCA)) on Monday 10 January 2022 at 7 PM (Belgian time) as a guest speaker. 

Renata Lamenza, Stefania Assandri and I will discuss challenges and possibilities of participatory performance practice and artistic research, especially regarding Lamenza and Assandri’s ongoing research project TACTICS for a COLLECTIVE BODY at AP Arts, in which I act as an External Advisor. The project will be realized in cooperation with the research groups “Body and Material Reinvented” (RAFA) and “Creatie/Creation” (RCA).

These sessions at AP Arts ”are conceived as in-house research encounters. The main idea behind this initiative is for researchers to develop new insights sustaining their personal research practice and to tap into to the research capital which they are part of and contribute to by conducting their artistic research at the Academy.”

Due to Covid reasons, the session will be held entirely online on Microsoft Teams. For the link, please send an email to: researchergreaterthan1(at)ap.be.

 I really look forward to our discussion!

The last few weeks I and my students at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna have been extremely busy preparing a cooperation project with Schauspielhaus Wien, one of the most renowned theatres in Vienna — I am utmost happy that, despite the looming lockdown, our installation/artistic research laboratory “from nowhere to now-here” on the dimensions of resource and care in art practice could be realized as part of the Schauspielhaus/Hotel Autumn program and in the side program of the theatre conference “Überschreiten und Übereignen” organized by HTM Academy of Music and Theatre Felix Mendelsson-Bartholdy Leipzig, Schauspielhaus Wien and the Art and Education Programme of the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna on 19.-21.11.2021.
We had the unique opportunity to inhabit one of the Schauspielhaus/Hotel rooms; the spatial infrastructure of the whole theatre has temporarily been converted into a hotel providing spaces for over 50 different artists to experiment on site and to share their explorations with visitors.

On behalf of our project team I wish to warmly thank Lucie Ortmann, Tomas Schweigen and Andreas Fleck and the other great colleagues from Schauspielhaus Wien; Prof. Barbara Büscher (Leipzig) and Prof. Elke Krasny (Vienna), and all the visitors for their wonderful support and for making the project possible, even in the rather challenging circumstances!

More information in English and project documentation will be presented at the Virtual Gallery of the Institute for Education in the Arts in Spring 2022 — stay tuned!

First snapshots of “from nowhere to now-here” at Schauspielhaus Wien:

In the photo: Alice Gonzales-Martin, photo: Joonas Lahtinen

Installation view, photo: Joonas Lahtinen

Installation view, photo: Joonas Lahtinen

I’m pleased to announce that Miriam Laussegger and I have been invited to take part in the upcoming exhibition Earth and Water – Zemlja in Voda  of the new MUDS – Museo Dolina San Dorligo – Muse Dolina San Dorligo close to Trieste, Italy – we’ll present two of our out there images in public space 29 August – 05 September 2021. The exhibition is curated by Pablo Chiereghin as part of his residency at MUDS. More info to follow soon!

There will be a lot going on in the coming Autumn 2021 and Spring 2022 too, including e.g. an exciting artistic research laboratory with my students at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna in November, in cooperation with renowned partner organizations, and a public talk/research session in Antwerp as part of my activities as External Advisor in the practice-based research project TACTICS for a COLLECTIVE BODY at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp and Royal Conservatoire Antwerp in January 2021!

I wish you all a relaxing summer — stay tuned for news and updates!

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Laussegger/Lahtinen: out there, phase 1 (2019)

The yearly Diploma Exhibition of the graduates of the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna opens today 15 June at 2 PM! I have been in charge of the coordination and display of the final projects of the Institute for Education in the Arts (IKL) presented at Atelierhaus/Semperdepot, Léhargasse 8, 1060 Wien.

At the opening day, Sophia Hatwagner presents her artistic-curatorial project VAN art space – a mobile gallery in the back of a family van – in front of the Atelierhaus; VAN art space is part of the Diploma thesis that I supervised — hope to see you there!

Photo: (c) Sophia Hatwagner

DENK-RÄUME

Exhibition of video works by my students!
Wednesday 02 June 2021
12:00-18:00
@ Institute for Education in the Arts, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna
Karl-Schweighofer-Gasse 3, 1070 Wien, 3rd floor

**Welcome!!**

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Photo: Painted Lady Butterfly (Video installation) (c) Laura Raimo

After an intensive three-week teaching period at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, the next two months I will focus on exhibition planning and coordination – I’m in charge of the planning process of the annual Masters Diploma Exhibition (Abschlussarbeiten 2021) for the Institute for Education in the Arts (IKL) at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, scheduled for 15-25 June 2021 — for the third time. The artworks and projects of all graduates of the Academy will be presented both onsite at several premises of the Academy and at the new online platform Akbild Forum.

Together with my art students I will also plan and realize the one day student exhibition DENK-RÄUME that focuses on installations and video on 02 June 2021 at our institute – more info to follow soon.

I’m also honoured to continue my work as an External Advisor and collaborator in the artistic research project Tactics for a Collective Body at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts and the Royal Conservatoire Antwerpen in the form of dialogical interviews about participatory art and performance, starting in May – more info to follow soon!

Least but not least, my new website is finally underway – I’m not ready yet but getting there slowly… I hope to welcome you latest in July at the brand new www.joonaslahtinen.com !

Photo: Diploma Exhibition 2017, IKL at Säulenhalle, Semperdepot, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna