Pre-enactment workshop at MASS Alexandria

From the 28th of March to the 6th of April 2012, we gave a workshop at MASS Alexandria, Egypt, in collaboration with Elke Uitentuis. During this workshop, we focused on the concept of pre-enactment. The unstable transition period Egypt is in right now causes a lot of uncertainty, but also openings for new images of the future. This future could be the one we hope for, or its opposite, a dystopian vision of what is to come. The question is how we, as artists, can contribute to the development of a certain shared vision, a horizon to strive for. By enacting future scenarios in the present, the current politics of our daily lives will be put into another perspective. The goal of pre-enacting is to draw parallels and stimulate discussion on the proposals presented.

We asked the students to develop an intervention in public space, a pre-enactment of the future. The students were stimulated to look for the political in everyday life, and challenged to involve people or communities in the production of their scenarios. They could use any medium: performance, film, photography, a décor etc. But it is the people they chose to work with that, to some extent, defined the course of their scenarios and its outcome. Working collaboratively, in small groups, was an important part of this exercise, because it obliged the students to try to agree on a common agenda, reproducing, on a small scale, the difficult and precarious process of democratic governance.

With: Khouloud Ahmed, Esraa Aly, Doaa Amen, Amna Badawy, Salma Badawy, Eman Elnaggar, Nourhan Elsaied, Walid Elsawi, Sondos Emam, Ahmed Essam, Khaled Galal, Eman Hamdy, Faten Eldisoky, Mark Lotfy, Hagar Masoud, Farida Refaat, Nourine Shenawy, Amir Youssef Tadross
.