

< CTM DISCOURSE > Music, Awareness & Solidarity for #Rojava

We will present our #Rojava project at CTM Festival at Kunsthaus Bethanien, Berlin, on 6 February 2016, 1:30 pm CET:

http://www.ctm-festival.de/festival2016/2016/02/06/ programme/event/femalepressure_rojava/:

In December 2015, female:pressure launched a campaign to raise awareness and generate a debate on issues around solidarity with resistance movement currently taking place in the cantons of #Rojava (western Kurdistan, located in northern Syria), where women participate on all levels of decision making and building a new society from scratch, with built-in social, racial and ethnic justice, religious freedom, ecological principles and gender equality. With a series of music, media and sound art to listen, dance and fight to, female pressure would like to offer love and strength to these women, men and children and spread a positive message in support of their efforts. female:pressure is an anarchistic open grass-root organisation founded in 1998, is an international network of over 1,600 female artists from 65 countries in the broader fields of electronic music and arts. At the CTM event Hevî who recently visited Rojava, will explain the background of the original struggle in the regions and share her thoughts on the role of art in this context. Ipek ipekcioglu will introduce her body of work and present her submission of a collaboration with Kurdish singer Sakina. We will listen to Sky Deep's submission featuring Hevî and she will present her work and thought process behind the piece. We will premier a video work by Olivia Louvel which deals with the women's militaristic struggle and attitudes. Antye Greie-Ripatti (AGF) and Annie Goh will lead the discussions and event. The discussion will be opened after 45 min and the aim is to discuss what we can learn from #Rojava, the role of art and music in the context of violent political struggle, how to show solidarity and create awareness using international networks such as female:pressure and the overall meaning of a campaign such as this. Panel participants: The pseudonym Hevî means "hope" in Kurdish. She is an activist who recently spent some time in Rojava. She sees art as a tool to transform feelings and experiences, only meaningful when inherently connected to resistance. The resistance in Kurdistan is art, in the sense of life. Hope is the other name for resistance. Hevî embodies the stateless democracy principle and therefore does not want to be identified by nationality. Ipek Ipekcioglu is a Berlin & Istanbul-based queer music producer, DJ and curator. She focuses on contemporary socio-political issues of everyday life, transporting them into her music. She is well-known for her collaborations with Kurdish musicians in Turkey and worldwide such as Aynur Dogan, Sivan Perwer, Sakina Teyna, Bajar, Adir Jam and Hogir Goregen. Ipek has a political agenda related to womyn, immigrant and queer issues. In all musical events she has curated and participated in, she maintains a principle of cultural diversity. Ipek has been invited to take part at the first international Music Festival in the autonomous canton South Kurdistan in Northern Iraq. Antye Greie-Ripatti, i.e. AGF:poemproducer, is a digital songwriter, sound composer, poet, curator, and educator. Born in East Germany, she has been living and working in Hailuoto, Finland since 2008. As active member of female.pressure she has initiated the VISIBILITY compaign, realized the Nergirls collection and mix and the "Solidarity & Awareness with Rojava" campaign. Sky Deep is a Producer, DJ, Musician and Live Performer. She has been producing music for more than 10 years. Now living in Berlin, she has lived half her life in NYC and Los Angeles. She has DJ'd and played live throughout the US and Europe. Additionally, her performances and tracks have been featured on VH1, NBC and UPN. In 2012, she launched Reveller Records from her Brooklyn apartment and has continued managing it in Berlin. Annie Goh is an artist, researcher and educator working primarily with sound, space, gender and electronic media and their social and cultural contexts. Currently based in London and Berlin, she is a lecturer at Berlin University of Arts and a PhD student at Goldsmiths University, London. She has guest curated at the discourse program of CTM Festival since 2013.