Very much looking forward to organizing the 4th edition of Klangteppich. Happening on June 2-3, 2022 in Berlin.
Jury member International cultural exchange programmes
I am proud to announce that I’m a newly appointed member of the jury for cultural exchange grants of the federal state of Berlin. Very much looking forward to working with such great colleagues.
Wired. Sound art project on telegraphy in Iran
Work and research grant from the Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Europe, for “new music and sound art”. My project is about telegraphy in Iran and the Prussian military. Research is being conducted to develop a collaborative sound art project for Klangteppich IV. Title image is from Goldsmid, Frederic John: Telegraph and Travel, London 1874
Klangteppich III
Proudly presenting the 3rd edition of Klangteppich. Festival for music of the Iranian diaspora.
Artist in residence: Hadi Bastani
Lineup and dates at klangteppich.berlin
Klangteppich III is funded by Musikfonds Neustart Kultur by means of the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, GEMA, the Federal Agency for Civic Education and the Department of Culture Steglitz-Zehlendorf.
Partner: Studentendorf Schlachtensee, Noiselab festival
Media Partner: berta.berlin, Blogrebellen, Noise a Noise/Tehran, Norient
Observations on Tajikistan. Culture
From October to December 2019 I stayed in Dushanbe/Tajikistan, supported by the Institute for Foreign Relations (ifa). I stuck to my writing practice there and did extensive research.
The texts are written from a personal perspective, not with a journalistic approach. The selection was edited in August 2020.
Cultural memory in Tajikistan is in a very vulnerable state. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the independence in 1992 and the end of the civil war in 1997, there is something like a state doctrine to consolidate a “national identity”. But what exactly this identity should contain, what historical backgrounds and traditions it can refer to, and how it should be carried to the outside world, seems to be completely up in the air and dependent on arbitrary decisions of the respective rulers. What should the many young people who were born in the 1990s onwards learn about their country?
Continue reading “Observations on Tajikistan. Culture”Observations on Tajikistan. Men – Women – Children
From October to December 2019 I stayed in Dushanbe/Tajikistan, supported by the Institute for Foreign Relations (ifa). I stuck to my writing practice there and did extensive research.
The texts are written from a personal perspective, not with a journalistic approach. The selection was edited in August 2020.
In offices
It would be euphemistic to talk of hardliners when referring to this mixture of stubbornness, open refusal of work, masked as hyperactivity, the reluctance to cooperate and the insistence on endlessly long chains of commands and stiff hierarchies.
Observations on Tajikistan. China – EU
From October to December 2019 I stayed in Dushanbe/Tajikistan, supported by the Institute for Foreign Relations (ifa). I stuck to my writing practice there and did extensive research.
The texts are written from a personal perspective, not with a journalistic approach. The selection was edited in August 2020.
I
In order to dig a little deeper into the nexus between political power and industry that unfolds against the backdrop of Tajikistan’s relations with China and with the EU, here’s a chronology of certain events in 2019:
Observations on Tajikistan. Dushanbe
From October to December 2019 I stayed in Dushanbe/Tajikistan, supported by the Institute for Foreign Relations (ifa). I stuck to my writing practice there and did extensive research.
The texts are written from a personal perspective, not with a journalistic approach. The selection was edited in August 2020.
The parks in Dushanbe are brightly lit in the evening, with colorful garlands, steles and LED installations. It would be obvious that all this stuff comes from China, but I don’t know exactly.
Lighting can be a form of surveillance and if the social pressure would not infiltrate emerging relationships already from the start, the lighting does the rest to prevent couples from romantic meetings in the shade.
Sam Prekop
Portrait Michael Griener
Radio broadcast for SWR about the drummer Michael Griener
https://www.swr.de/swr2/musik-jazz-und-pop/swr2-nowjazz-2020-04-10-100.html