Lecture-Film-Performance/ Video and Video Installation, 2016

(…) Notes about an audiotape index. 1962-80

In 2012, in Mersin, I find in my grandparents’ closet a notebook with the title “Gani Bilir. Ses Alma Rehberi” (Gani Bilir. Audio Tape Index). Written underneath the title in my grandfather’s careful handwriting is the date 1967, 1969, 1971, 1972, and 1982. On the documented audio tapes there are moments of everyday life in Germany: voices of the daughters and their grandchildren, the family at lunch, telephone conversations between Turkey and Germany, news reports and music from both countries. And the radio reports about his daughter Semra Ertan setting fire to herself. When I last took a portion of my grandparents’ documents with me to Vienna, I had the uncanny feeling that I was taking something away from them, that I was destroying the order of their personal archive.

1 Nolu 15lik Band, kırmızı uç 3–4 / 33–38 metre:
Yabancı diyorlar nereye baksam (Türkiyeme bir ben dönemiyorum)
Volume 1, Part 15, red end 3-4, meter 33-38:
Wherever I am, I am foreign (Only I can never return to my homeland Turkey) (1982)

2 Nolu Band, kırmızı uç 1–2, metre 6–13:
Ellerin vatanı bize yurd oldu. (1967)
Volume 2, red line 1-2, meter 6-13:
Foreigners home turns into our home. (1967)

„Whose research is it ? Who owns it? Whose interests does it serve? Who will benefit from it ? Who has designed its questions and framed it s scope? Who will carry it out ? Who will write it up? How will its result s be disseminated? While there are many researchers who can handle such questions with integrity there are many more who cannot, or who approach these questions with some cynicism, as if they are a test merely of political correctness.“

Smith, Linda Tuhiwai (1999): Decolonizing Methodologies Research and Indigenous Peoples. London: Zed Books Ltd

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Die Lecture-Film-Performance wurde im Tanzquartier Wien im Januar 2016, uraufgeführt und ist Teil einer Auseinandersetzung über das persönliche Erinnerungsarchiv von Gani Bilir, der in den 1960er Jahren als sog. „Gastarbeiter“ aus der Türkei nach Deutschland kam. Die Performance im TQ besteht aus einem Video, Bühnenelementen im Raum (das Publikum sitzt herum), eine rot-grüne Beleuchtung (Bezug zu Farben im Archiv) und einen Text, der zum Film als Voice-Over, live performt wurde.

Text: Nachdenken über das Archiv. Notizen zu Ses Alma Rehberi. Zeitschrift „Stimme“ Initiative für
Minderheiten. In: Menschenrechte. Editor Gamze Ongan, Wien Nr. 96 2015

Photos by Ana Paula Franco (c) 2016: Lecture-Film-Performance at Tanzquartier Vienna, January 2016
Link: Lecture-Film-Performance at Tanzquartier Vienna TQ January 2016

 Friendly supported by kültür gemma! and City of Vienna (Stadt Wien)