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Inter-PAGAN – network to research, discuss and perform indigeneity within contemporary art, music and new media in Northern Europe<\/a><\/p>\n On September 22nd during Autumn Equinox (when the night is equal to the day and astronomical autumn starts), Nida Art Colony of Vilnius Academy of Arts launches, together with 8 partners, the Inter-PAGAN network which transcribes as \u201cInter & Pan-disciplinary Arts & Grounded Anthropocene Network\u201d.<\/p>\n The network is one year of curatorial, artistic or cultural research and exchange between art and culture organisations from Baltic-Nordic countries, Poland and Scotland. Inter-PAGAN aims to develop shared understanding, competence in practice, research & pedagogy about where localized cultural heritage traditions meets contemporary art, music, new media, heritage-craft \u00a0& politics in Northern Europe. Partners will gather in physical & online meetings sharing local contextual research, peaking at Nida Art Colony\u2019s 8th Inter-Format Symposium in June 2018.<\/span><\/p>\n Recently questions of indigenous culture and beliefs are being widely interpreted and reconstructed, however there is little discussion with critical distance, to avoid slips into nationalism and \u201clocal\u201d culture superiority against multicultural world. Our focus is the contemporary-traditional Northern European relationships between people, their cultural practices, belief-systems, and the natural environment in which they are interdependent for survival. Among them are recent phenomenons like neopaganism, technopaganism, ethnofuturism, ecopaganism, neotribalism, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n Network facilitators Andrew Gryf Paterson (SCO\/FI\/LV) and Vytautas Michelkevi\u010dius (LT) with researchers Jurij Dobriakov (LT) and Jogint\u0117 Bu\u010dinskait\u0117 (LT) reveal questions which motivate them: \u201cHow do local cultural and traditional belief-systems – ones rooted in \u2018nature\u2019 and foraging-and\/or-agricultural societies, closely connected to seasonal changes, predictable astronomical & unpredictable climatic events and so on — relate to, inspire and limit emerging socio-cultural and political imaginations? Our partner locations are embedded in various histories and personal accessibility to land, with pre-Christian periods more or less far away in historical imagination, and agricultural or foraging traditions also more or less to hand culturally. It is argued we are living in an era of socio-economic stress at various levels, climate change\/breakdown, and some say an era of unknown horrors-to-come.What hopes and fears do cultural traditions evoke in times of crisis for the both leftist-liberal ecologically-minded folks, as well as the populist and right-wing political sphere of fundamentals and roots? Traditional practices, belief systems and signs are being appropriated, constructing a fictitious picture of civilizational clash and \u201ccrusades\u201d threatening traditional values and cultural norms.<\/span><\/p>\n This situation calls for a rigorous examination of the possible constructive role of traditional rooted knowledge in today\u2019s society, avoiding both \u2018new age\u2019 esotericism and regressive, reactionary xenophobia. What does it mean to be \u2018grounded\u2019 positively in the Anthropocentric (or post-Anthropocentric) era, where humans have direct affect on most of our eco-system, going beyond neo-folk re-constructions and uncritical idolisation? What can we learn from sculpture, dance or music, as well as inter- & transdisciplinary hybrid practices that reinterpret older ways of creating, making and doing into new forms? Can one\u2019s roots become universal, timeless and de-territorialized, but at the same time resist vague mysticism and lifestyle trends? What is perceived as \u2018authentic\u2019 among cultural convergences? What will the future generations consider \u2018folklore\u2019?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n The network seeks with a help of contemporary art, music and new media to rethink these questions also in the socio-political background of centenary of Baltic States independence and its restoration (reinstating) throughout 2017 and 2018.<\/span><\/p>\n The first physical meeting of the network is hosted by Lauska (LV) in Riga on 22-23rd of October, where the activity and research profile of each network member will be presented (see below).<\/span><\/p>\n The main network event is art festival and conference 8th\u00a0Inter-format Symposium<\/span><\/a>\u00a0(in Nida Art Colony) with a programme curated by Vytautas Michelkevi\u010dius, Andrew Gryf Paterson, Jurij Dobriakov and Jogint\u0117 Bu\u010dinskait\u0117. Most of the participants will be invited by symposium curators and partners, however later this year an open call for participation will be announced \u00a0as well. The symposium will bring partners\u2019 research into a discursive and performative platform.<\/span><\/p>\n The network is funded by Nordic-Baltic Mobility Programme for Culture and Lithuanian Council for Culture with the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture.<\/p>\n\n