ZEITGEIST19 Curated Podcast

Episode Summary:

The first episode of our novel season The New Leviathan, that is grounded in many conversations capturing this moment of history, with its focal point on the relationship between individuals and technologies, is an intimate chat with three curators of the E-WERK Luckenwalde — Helen Turner, Adriana Tranca and Katharina Worf. The all women curatorial team of the world’s first renewable energy art institution is taking our co-founder and curator Farah Piriye on a journey to a small town 30 miles south of Berlin, in the former East Germany, where this functioning Kunststrom power station that explores ecological and socio- cultural practices is located. As the art world today faces a host of challenges, from monument removal to calls for repatriation, and rethinking museum model hierarchies, the ladies tell us how they envision an art space of the future. While Katharina Worf is introducing us to the concept of slow curating and Adriana Tranca explains how very attentive the audience is to what modern culture has to offer, the artistic director of E-WERK Helen Turner states that one of the fundamental roles of a curator in today’s troubled world is to make contemporary art accessible to the local community.

About E-WERK LUCKENWALDE:

E-WERK Luckenwalde is located in a former coal power station built in 1913, ceasing production in 1989 after the fall of the Berlin wall. Located 30 minutes south of Berlin, E-WERK Luckenwalde is jointly directed by artist Pablo Wendel and curator Helen Turner. In 2017, the art collective Performance Electrics GmbH led by Pablo Wendel acquired the former brown-coal power station with the vision to reanimate it as a sustainable Kunststrom (art power) Kraftwerk to feed power into the national grid by burning locally sources waste wood chips to make electricity, and function as a

large scale contemporary art centre. As part of POWER NIGHT in 2019, Performance.

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Hosts: Farah Piriye, ZEITGEIST19 Foundation

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Episode Summary:

In this episode our co-founder Elizabeth Zhivkova meets Cora Sheibani - a Swiss-born, London-based jewellery designer and a core member of GemX socio-club. A dialogue between two jewellery enthusiasts and creators, a gaze into the future of jewellery design through the lens of sustainability and ethical sourcing, one of the biggest challenges in the sector nowadays. Totally devoid of cliches, Cora's one-off unique jewels transcendent our expectations unfolding a story to be told. Going down memory lane, she shares about her influences behind her practice and her view on the functionality and the role of jewellery in our contemporary lives; on how to preserve the tradition in the 21st Century. Cora encourages the listeners to be conscious, be bold, stay true to themselves, meanwhile giving some precious insightful tips on starting off an independent business in the field.

'Her jewellery does not hanker after an image of more or less aggressive richness. What Cora Sheibani designs is not really 'jewellery' but rather a sophisticated suggestion.' Ettore Sottsass

The Speaker:

Cora Sheibani is a Swiss-born and London-based jewellery designer. From an early age Cora benefitted from an environment dedicated to contemporary art and design. She received an Art History degree from New York University in June 2001 and the following summer she completed a degree in geology from the GIA in London. In December 2002 she launched her eponymous jewellery label. She started out by making small groups of work and individual pieces, each unique. Aside from showing her designs in private viewings by appointment, Cora Sheibani showcases her pieces at special exhibitions trough all over the world. Cora is a core member of GemX - a private social club and a global community for jewellery enthusiasts, mentors and collaborators.

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Hosts: Elizabeth Zhivkova, ZEITGEIST19 Foundation & NOIR CATCHER Fine Jewellery

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Episode Summary:

In this episode we are interviewing Scottish artist Katie Paterson, on the occasion of the biggest iteration to date of Future Library project in Oslo, and one of her most political works to date, Requiem, which opened in Edinburgh in April. Katie explains: “I’ve always made artworks that deal with nature and time and climate, but this is the first that isn’t afraid to be political and confrontational... It is both celebratory and mythical, and yet it is also the saddest work I’ve ever made, mourning life lost and expressing a dystopian vision.” Making a quiet and gestural artwork, Katie refers to herself as a whispering activist, calling for awareness of distance with nature. Requiem tells the birth and life of our planet in a single object – an object that uses dust gathered from material dating from pre-solar times to those of the present. Katie’s visionary project Future Library is one of the best examples of how artist can contribute to global crisis. “A forest has been planted in Norway, which will supply paper for a special anthology of books to be printed in 100 years time. Between now and then, one writer every year will contribute a text, with the writings held in trust, unread and unpublished, until the year 2114. The manuscripts will be held in a specially designed room in the new public library, Oslo.”

“The crisis is not imminent; the crisis is here” George Monbiot

The Speaker:

Katie Paterson was born in Glasgow in 1981. She studied at Edinburgh College of Art and the Slade School of Art, London, and is widely regarded as one of the leading artists of her generation working at the nexus of art and science. Recent and upcoming projects include solo exhibitions at the Scottish Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh; Turner Contemporary, Margate; NYLO, Reykjavik, and in June 2022 at Galleri F15 in Moss, Norway. Also in June, her 100-year artwork Future Library will celebrate the contributions of the last 3 writers to be commissioned and the opening of the Future Library room in the new Deichman Library in Oslo. A major new outdoor commission Mirage, for Apple’s headquarters at Cupertino in California, will be unveiled later this year. Katie Paterson has been represented by Ingleby since 2010.

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Hosts: Farah Piriye, ZEITGEIST19 Foundation

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Episode Summary:

In today’s episode we are diving into the inspiring world of Dr. Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg. Named "One to Watch" by the Financial Times and voted a Future 50 by Icon Magazine, this Cambridge University and Royal College of Art graduate makes artworks that explore our fraught relationships with nature and technology. Through artworks, writing, and curatorial projects, Ginsberg’s work explores subjects as diverse as artificial intelligence, synthetic biology, conservation, and evolution, as she investigates the human impulse to “better” the world. In this candid conversation we ask Daisy about her ongoing one of a kind interspecies artwork entitled Pollinator Pathmaker that transforms how we see gardens and who we make them for. This conscious art project will come into full bloom for the first time this May at the Eden Project, Cornwall. Further public Pollinator Pathmaker gardens will be planted this year in other locations globally including the Serpentine in London. Meanwhile, anyone in Northern Europe will be able to plant their own garden at home, as well as globally by creating a garden plan at pollinator.art, supported by the Google Arts and Culture Lab.

The Speaker:

Dr. Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg is an artist examining our fraught relationships with nature and technology. Through artworks, writing, and curatorial projects, Ginsberg’s work explores subjects as diverse as artificial intelligence, synthetic biology, conservation, and evolution, as she investigates the human impulse to “better” the world. Ginsberg spent over ten years experimentally engaging with the field of synthetic biology, developing new roles for artists and designers. She is lead author of Synthetic Aesthetics: Investigating Synthetic Biology’s Designs on Nature (MIT Press, 2014), and in 2017 completed Better, her PhD by practice, at London’s Royal College of Art (RCA), interrogating how powerful dreams of “better” futures shape the things that get designed. Ginsberg won the World Technology Award for design in 2011, the London Design Medal for Emerging Talent in 2012, and the Dezeen Changemaker Award 2019. Her work has twice been nominated for Designs of the Year (2011, 2015), with Designing for the Sixth Extinction described as “romantic, dangerous... and everything else that inspires us to change and question the world”. Ginsberg exhibits internationally, including at MoMA New York, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, the National Museum of China, the Centre Pompidou, and the Royal Academy, and her work is held in museum and private collections. Talks include TEDGlobal, PopTech, Design Indaba, and the New Yorker TechFest. Daisy is a resident at Somerset House Studios, London.

Follow Alexandra's journey on Instagram

Hosts: Elizabeth Zhivkova & Farah Piriye, ZEITGEIST19 Foundation

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Episode Summary:

’Freedom is not a secret. It’s practice’, says our next guest speaker Alexis Pauline Gumbs, “a Queer Black Troublemaker and Black Feminist… whose work in this lifetime is to facilitate infinite, unstoppable ancestral love in practice.” In this intimate and candid conversation we dive into the poetical worlds of philosophy, Black feminism, and the concepts of mothering and daughtering with an invisible labor based behind the two. Today we ask Alexis her thoughts about the current state of ‘Apocalypse’, a never ending Healing, the legacy of one of the most powerful individuals of modernity Audre Lorde and Afro Caribbean culture. Alexis introduces us to eco-feminism and how her work contributes to the global conversation on environmentalism and climate change. Alexis’s writings have inspired international artists to create dance works, installation work, paintings, divination practices, operas, quilts and more.

The Speaker:

Alexis Pauline Gumbs` work is grounded in a community building ethic. As a co-founder member of UBUNTU A Women of Colour Survivor-Led Coalition to End Gendered Violence, Warrior Healers Organizing Trust and Earthseed Land Collective in Durham, NC, a member of the first visioning council of Kindred Southern Healing Justice Network and a participant in Southerners on New Ground, Allied Media Projects, Black Women’s Blueprint and the International Black Youth Summit for more than a decade she brings a passion for the issues that impact oppressed communities and an intimate knowledge of the resilience of movements led by Black, indigenous, working class women and queer people of colour. Her writings in key movement periodicals such as Make/Shift, Left Turn, The Abolitionist, Ms. Magazine, and the collections Abolition Now, The Revolution Starts at Home, Dear Sister and the Transformative Justice Reader have offered clarity and inspiration to generations of activists.Her book Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals is a series of meditations based on the increasingly relevant lessons of marine mammals in a world with a rising ocean levels.

Follow Alexis's journey on Instagram

Hosts: Elizabeth Zhivkova & Farah Piriye, ZEITGEIST19 Foundation

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Help us to continue our mission and to develop our podcast: Donate

Episode Summary:

Preventing genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity is an ongoing process that requires sustained effort over time to build the resilience of societies to atrocity crimes. In today’s episode we meet Jocelyn Getgen Kestenbaum, an Associate Professor of Clinical Law at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, to speak about her focus on human rights, public health, and atrocity prevention, slavery and the slave trade, indigenous rights, and human rights violations against minority groups. We discuss Russia’s attack on Ukraine, how human rights violations and mass atrocities can be prevented, as well as the current displacement of the vulnerable Ukrainian population, what the United Nations calls the fastest-growing refugee crisis in Europe since World War II.

We continue to hope for the return of peace and stand in solidarity with the people of Ukraine and the citizens of Russia who will bear the cost of its government’s lawlessness.

The Speaker:

Jocelyn Getgen is an Associate Professor of Clinical Law at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law where she directs the Benjamin B. Ferencz Human Rights and Atrocity Prevention Clinic and the Cardozo Law Institute in Holocaust and Human Rights (CLIHHR). Her scholarship focuses on human rights, public health, and atrocity prevention, especially related to preventing and responding to sexual and gender-based crimes, slavery and the slave trade, indigenous rights, and human rights violations against minority groups. She holds a J.D. from Cornell Law School and an MPH from the John Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health.

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Hosts: Elizabeth Zhivkova & Farah Piriye, ZEITGEIST19 Foundation

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Episode Summary:

This February we have the honour to meet one of India's best conservation and environmental journalists Swati Thiyagarajan. Swati delves into what makes a good documentary film, tells us more about her role in the Oscar-wining documentary My Octopus Teacher and shares the most urgent pressing issues related to biodiversity loss. We merge with her to the wild and the wilderness, to community based models of fighting the challenges of the environment and the human spirit. Swati offers a glimpse into the ecological philosophy guiding her efforts in conservation and raising awareness and encourages us to remember that we are born wild and where there is life, there is hope.

Our goal is to inspire the next generation of students, researchers and professionals interested in and committed to environmental consciousness-raising. We hope our listeners are able to pause from stressful workflows, take a break from distractions, and enjoy the conversation.

The Speaker:

Swati Thiyagarajan is one of India’s top conservation and environmental journalists. She was the environment editor at NDTV; her show ‘Born Wild’ ran successfully for over 15 years on the channel. Swati is an associate producer and production manager of My Octopus Teacher winner of the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature at the 93rd Academy Awards. Her book, Born Wild, chronicles her experiences in the wilds of India and Africa. Her documentary film The Animal Communicator had a theatrical release in Cape Town, where she currently works at the Sea Change Project for the conservation of the Great African Sea forest. She is a two-time winner of the Ramnath Goenka Award for excellence in environmental journalism, and the Carl Zeiss Award for her reporting on wildlife conservation.

Follow Swati's journey on Instagram

Hosts: Elizabeth Zhivkova & Farah Piriye, ZEITGEIST19 Foundation

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Episode Summary:

In this episode our co-founder Elizabeth speaks with Svein Tveitdal - a climate expert and activist, former UN Environmental Director and founder of Klima2020. The conversation raises a red alert on the environmental catastrophe and encourages a better more eco-responsible future. Mr. Tveitdal shares effective and quick ways of tackling climate change and his thoughts on the strong role and impact of young people on environmental policy. “If we had listened to scientists 30 years ago, we wouldn't have had a big problem like we have now,” says Svein Tveitdal.

The Speaker:

Svein Tveitdal is a Norwegian climate change activist, a former director of the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) and a present director of the climate change consultancy Klima2020. Tveitdal founded Klima2020 to share advice with companies and local authorities who want to implement environmentally-responsible changes with the objective to "bridge the gap between climate science, policy makers and the general public.”

Follow Svein Tveitdal's journey on Twitter

Hosts: Elizabeth Zhivkova, ZEITGEIST19 Foundation

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Help us to continue our mission and to develop our podcast: Donate

Episode Summary:

The current episode is co-hosted with Simon Butler, an artist, curator and founder of MigrateArt, an art charity that helps those impacted by the biggest humanitarian crisis of our time. In the current episode we meet a Myanmar-born graffiti artist Bart Was Not Here, who creates a body of work full of escapism and dry humour by mixing text and imagery from Burmese and global pop culture. In this candid conversation we talk about Bart’s artistic journey from discovering graffiti, to experiencing anti-muslim hatred, and being forced to leave the country, as Bart shares with us his thoughts on the harsh reality of Myanmar and the misrepresentation of Burmese culture globally.

The Speaker:

Bart Was Not Here, born on 19.2.1996 in Yangon, Burma, is a visual artist working with paintings, illustrations, murals, and sculptures based in Paris. He started painting graffiti on the streets of Yangon under the alias “Bart Was Not Here” when he was in 8th grade and he graduated high school in 2011-2012. He committed to painting graffiti and street art with his crew R.O.A.R after high school and went to Lasalle College of the Arts in Singapore in 2014. He got a Fine Arts Diploma from Lasalle in 2018. As a graffiti artist he participated in a great number of group exhibitions in Burma as well as overseas. He debuted his solo exhibition titled God Complex at Myanm/art gallery in 2019. He has showcased his paintings in Saatchi Gallery as well as The Secretariat Building in Myanmar. His artworks are usually figurative with vibrant colored patterns and humorous text serving as punchlines. He is interested in world-building and storytelling within his art as he is inspired by the likes of Hieronymous Bosch, David Lynch, Neil Gaiman, and Jean “Moebius” Giraud. Kyaw Moe Khine is open to working with different concepts in his art but he loves working in the areas of myth, religion, icons, pop culture, and satire. He also believes humour can be used as a weapon in art. He’s in the middle of his art residency at Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris.

The Co-Host:

Simon Butleris a curator, social entrepreneur and artist based in London. He founded Migrate Artin 2016 after visiting the Calais Jungle refugee camp in France for the first time. This poignant experience inspired him to use his years of experience in the art world to help those impacted by the biggest humanitarian crisis of our time. To date, Migrate Art has raised over £550,000, helped thousands of people across Europe and the Middle East and worked with some of the world's leading artists including Anish Kapoor, Mona Hatoum, Antony Gormley, Rachel Whiteread and Raqib Shaw.

Host: Farah Piriye, ZEITGEIST19 Foundation

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Episode Summary:

With the start of our new season we have the pleasure to meet the legendary American experimental theatre stage director, playwright and visual artist - Robert (Bob) Wilson just after turning 80, during his directing of Shakespeare's The Tempest at Sofia's National Theatre. Wilson tell us why 'speaking' Shakespeare is different, what makes a great actor and how he merges his senses with various shapes of expression, hearing the space and silence. He shares about his inspiring community driven initiative The Watermill Center and his hopes and vision for a fair and equal future and freedom of creation.

The Speaker:

Robert Wilson (born Oct. 4, 1941, Waco, Texas, U.S.) is an American avant-garde theatre stage director and playwright who has been described by The New York Times as "the world's foremost vanguard 'theatre artist.' Wilson is best known for his collaboration with Philip Glass and Lucinda Childs on Einstein on the Beach, and his collaborations with talented artists amongst which Tom Waits, Marina Abramovic, Lou Reed and Lady Gaga. In 1992, Wilson established The Watermill Center, functioning as a 'laboratory of inspiration and performance' in Long Island, New York.

Follow Bob Wilson's journey on Instagram

Hosts: Elizabeth Zhivkova & Farah Piriye, ZEITGEIST19 Foundation

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Help us to continue our mission and to develop our podcast: Donate