Another bunch of exhibition photos added to our Flickr Set!

The 22^nd of June was the last day of HACK.Fem.EAST exhibition. The exhibition is concluded but the show will go on. For us, HACK.Fem.EAST is only a starting point, the beginning of a positive networking experience created by many artists and activists working in digital networks in Eastern Europe.

The artists and activists involved have successfully presented experimental and artistic practices of art and hacking where women play an important role. All together we have organized an important occasion for sharing ideas and projects, reflecting on contemporary issues and topics, working hard and having fun at the same time. We hope that this experience will be followed by many other collective events and exhibitions, platforms of sharing knowledge that again will constitute the basis for other meetings managed by women.

We would like to thank first of all the 48 artists and activists involved that have joined us in the developing of this collective project, the people that have collaborated for the creation of this experience with their skills, energy, passion – and time!, Stéphane Bauer and the staff of Kunstraum Kreuzberg /Bethanien and, last but not least, the Hauptstadtkulturfonds and the Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen for their fundamental support. The Exhibition is finished but this blog will go on, open for all women artists and hacktivists working in and outside the Eastern Countries that would like to share their experience with us. So, feel free to propose a post and stay tuned 🙂

Thank you,

Tatiana Bazzichelli and Gaia Novati

info(at)hackfemeast(dot)org

Here is a selection of international reviews of HACK.Fem.EAST.

The exhibition got a good review from Reet Varblane, a curator/writer from Estonia, who was in Berlin during the opening. Reet has written a short story for the Estonian Cultural weekly Sirp. She gives an overview of what took place, pointing out the network idea and talking about the stereotypes of Eastern European women, which were represented critically in the show. She also writes about Mare Tralla’s and Marina Grzinic’s works which look at wider phenomenons in the contemporary world.

Erika Katalina Pastzor wrote a short reflection about the HACK.Fem.EAST for tranzit.blog.hu, a fresh art info site in Hungary.

We also got a short review from the Swedish Daonk group and a good article/interview in the Italian Digicult Magazine.

In Berlin, we curated and edited a supplement of TAZ, die Tageszeitung, on 09.05.08, and we also got a review from Tim Ackermann, “Schön poliertes Glatteis” on 28.05.2008:

Kbm wrote a review in Tip Berlin, “Relaxte Trickser” on 29.05-11.06.08 and Zitty Berlin dedicated a Tagestipp to HACK.Fem.EAST in the week 08.05.08-21.05.08.

On the net, Marisa Olson wrote a review titled “The Next Network” for Rhizome News on June 4, 2008, and the online magazine Styles Report Berlin published this news the day of the opening.

Last but not least, the art blog We Make Money Not Art dedicated banner space to HACK.Fem.EAST in the week of 23.05.08-30.05.08.

Download mp3

The HumorWorks show was recored on HFE betwen 9 – 11th of May, with randomly selected artists and curators of the HumorWorks exhibition, Dunja Kukovec and Katja Kobolt.

Interviews include discusions on festival/exhbition related topics.

by Gaby Bila-Gunther

As the editor of the online anthology SEXFLIES that focused on writings from EASTERN European women artists & writers, I was very let down when one of the Romanian-born writers, four days after the opening of the HACK.Fem.EAST show, wanted to have her writing removed from the anthology. This writer is now living in England since two or so years. I was told to contact her by another Romanian artist as she mentioned that her writing will fit in with the theme of SEXFLIES.

(more…)

Download mp3

A conversation with Tatiana, who organized the exhibition together with Gaia Novati, about how they curated the exhibition, what the name hack.fem.east is telling us, what hacking has to do with sharing and a short impression of my cellphone ringtone ;-). (vd)

The video work Obsession by Grzinic and Smid, is presented as an installation that has as its central core the text by Natasa Velikonja, Ljubljana,  “Europe is boring”. The text is published in Reartikulacija, the (online) critical journal platform edited by Grzinic and 3 other members part of the art scene in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Read here the text in English: http://www.reartikulacija.org/lezbicni_bar/lezbicni_bar3_ENG.html

by Jasmina Tesanovic

Berlin rocks, and women in Berlin dance. Berlin is big, it’s dirty,
it’s wild multicultural and cheap. Artists and young people swarm
there to live on social help given by the government (after one year
of any work) and do something else with their individual lives and arts.

(more…)

Above are some more photos from the exhibition, including photos from the Walking-Apertivo yesterday.
You can find all our photos here, and more by Flickr user “Icia” here.

by Jasmina Tesanovic

Two technologies revolutionised the roles of twentieth-century women: contraception and computers. Pregnancy is no longer the natural state for a woman. With tech tools women are not the weaker sex. After saying that, the next question naturally is: do”women” still exist? It’s hard to trace the former boundaries of womanhood,physical and emotional, rational and spiritual. Those invisible restrictions have been replaced by more visible restrictions in human rights, in job discrimination.

(more…)