Work and Gender

The City of Women Association in collaboration with the Department of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology at the Faculty of Art in Ljubljana organizes a series of events in the form of lectures, discussions, interventions and workshops for both students and the broader public. The purpose of this collaboration is to promote the exchange of research knowledge, methodologies, approaches and tools in two different fields, art and science, and address the question of relations to a research subject.

Tea Hvala: Working on Gender

Wednesday, 25 May, 11.20 am, P1 lecture room at Dept. of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology (Zavetiška 5)

The first lecture, by Tea Hvala, entitled Working on Gender is related to her article published by Red Athena University Press (a publishing project by the Centre for Women’s Studies Zagreb and prominent post-Yugoslav feminist scholars) in the book Performative Gestures Political Moves (2014) as a follow-up to a homonymous symposium organised by City of Women at ZRC SAZU in 2010.

In her lecture, Tea Hvala will discuss the burlesque and cabaret performances produced in Ljubljana between 2011 and 2014: Cirkus Kabare (Circus Cabaret), Fem TV, Rdeči Kabaret (Red Cabaret), Cabaret Lounge Rouge, Image Snatchers and Somrak Bleščečih Sprevržencev (Twilight of the Glittery Perverts). She will focus on the group of performers that can, based on the conditions of production, qualify as protagonists of either the alternative or independent cultural scene. She will point out acts from individual performances to reveal the work required to perform specific femininities and masculinities. Hvala will investigate the main characteristics of contemporary Ljubljana-made burlesques and cabarets and their potential sources of inspiration, both historical and cultural, in relation to the latest discussions on the "new burlesque" in the USA and in western Europe.

The lecture will be introduced by the book's co-editor Dr Katja Kobolt who will present the premises and issues related to understanding of historisation and its ideological positioning. They fundamentally contribute to the reflection on the research and theory of performativity, performance, feminism, historisation and their political implications in and for the "continental post-socialist" condition.

Teja Reba: Made with Love

Thursday, 26 May, 11.20 am, P1 lecture room at Dept. of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology (Zavetiška 5)

Teja Reba will discuss the research related to the making of the homonymous performance that problematizes the role of a parent (and reproductive labour), mainly from the standpoint of the contemporary precarious working conditions of artistic activity which erase the division between work (social) and private life – their equalisation is no longer a subject of political declarativity but a necessity. Production has occupied the entire sphere of life, and in precarious working conditions production and reproduction are mixed. If the family sphere is integrated in work, can its products therefore be socially and economically valued? How much is a child worth? What is the economic value of giving birth? And what is the economic value generated by an artwork?

The presentation will include examples of other artworks and relations that the artist established in the process of performance-making.