New Rituals of Healing
Performance and Summer Videoart Screening 2021
Nam June Paik (A Pas de Loup - Documentary of Performance), Alisi Telengut, Isaac Chong Wai, Horny Honey Dew, Marco Montiel-Soto, Markus Hanakam & Roswitha Schuller, Sara Sejin Chang (Sara van der Heide), Clemens Wilhelm & Jan Martinec
12.09.2021 at 19.30 -11:00 pm
St. Matthäus-Kirche, Berlin
Das Dritte Land, Matthäikirchplatz, Berlin
The summer video art screening “New Rituals of Healing” explores how rituals are contextualized as symbolic acts and sources of inspiration in various performative formats and how they are utilized across different cultures as catalysts for inner healing.
On July 20, 1990, Nam June Paik, a pioneer of video art who had been merging technology and spirituality through his artistic practices since the 1970s, performed “A Pas de Loup” in Seoul. This performance was conceived as a Korean shamanistic ritual known as “kut,” dedicated to Joseph Beuys. It fulfilled an appointment between the two artists who had intended to perform a shamanistic ritual together, which was no longer possible due to Beuys' passing. Four years after Beuys’ death, Paik completed the ritual alone. Paik took a bowl of uncooked rice and sprinkled some on a photo of Beuys. In addition to the typical elements of the “kut” – a table with food as an offering and an exorcism – he incorporated a broken piano, a violin, and 16 television casings to create a new “kut” meant to bring back the soul of Joseph Beuys.
Drawing on the central theme of this action, the participation of Berlin-based and international artists such as Isaac Chung Wai, Alisi Telengut, Sara Sejin Chang, Horny Honey Dew Kim, Markus Hanakam & Roswitha Schuller, Clemens Wilhelm & Jan Martinec, and Marco Montiel-Soto not only creates a posthumous international dialogue between Beuys and his student Nam June Paik, but also fosters a conversation between these two artists and a younger generation of artists. These contemporary artists critically engage with themes such as the environment, postcolonialism, society, and identity through rituals and shamanism. The program features artists who employ ritual acts as symbols and carriers of information to address conscious, unconscious, and suppressed fears, as well as societal repressions and prejudices. Reflecting the heightened fears and uncertainties brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change, the artists question to what extent rituals can act as catalysts: How is the younger generation of artists navigating the evolving relationship between humans and nature since the onset of the pandemic?
For the last time, the garden “Das Dritte Land” will be transformed into a stage, where artistic reflections will be presented through performance, video art, and video documentation, focusing on themes of rituals, shamanism, and healing. Next year, through the initiative of the Kunsthalle Erfurt, the artists’ garden will be relocated to Erfurt, where it will find a permanent home at the Petersberg Citadel.
