Promise No Promises!

A two-day meeting among artists and practitioners to pose questions on the position of women in the arts, moderated by Quinn Latimer and Chus Martinez, this symposium inaugurates a long-term research collaboration with Instituto Susch / Art Stations Foundation CH and the Art Institute in Basel.

Is there any beginning that can proceed without questions? We don’t think so. And yet: Should the queries concern gender, the question of women, and transgender issues? Should questions of masculinity also be asked? And are these general enquiries similar to those queries that follow us to work, within (and without) the arts? Are practical questions relevant, those that redefine our thinking on the matter? Are old and new feminist concerns—arising from a spectrum of feminisms—adequate to cover the entire spectrum of questions that we may need to ask? Are these queries an exercise we may desire as well as a protocol we may embark on to test the “equality health” of specific (professional and personal) situations? Do you think you can avoid having to deal with all these issues? Are you afraid of talking? Does the sound of your own voice give you pleasure or make you wince? How much money do you want to earn? Do you think your career will continue to rise in the near future? Are you afraid of your own desires? Is it better to remain mute or to disclose your ambition, even if, many times, you seem to not find the words to express it?

Promise No Promises! began with a short performance, an impulse or “input” of sorts, performed by Natasha Sadr on the first day; Quinn Latimer offered this “input” on the second, and Chus Martinez offered it sometime (and somewhere) in the middle. The two days of the symposium oscillated between the multiple questions and answers we ask and receive, as well as those testimonies and additional queries and demands of all the participants and the audience, including new questions that were being generated in real time. This was a symposium with the aim to perform all those relevant matters to a specific context (at once geographic and emotional, professional and personal), and to those forming a community, to those missing more care... The answers we receive may revolve around the circumstances of the place, Switzerland, where many of the guests come from or work, but they may not remain there long, since artists do not only practice in “their” place. Indeed, our aim is not to represent age or place or medium, but to place certain artists in conversation with each other, and with the attendant audience, so as to start a process of inquiry into gender, power, language, and artistic practice that will continue in the form of similar meetings, seminars, research, publications, exhibitions, and a podcast series, to come.
The symposium was part of the Women’s Center for Excellency at Instituto Susch, a joint venture with Grażyna Kulczyk and Art Stations Foundation CH.