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The Post Collective, Collaborative Speculations

The Post Collective, Collaborative Speculations

The Post Collective is een platform voor co-creatie, co-leren en cultureel activisme door en voor vluchtelingen, asielzoekers, mensen zonder papieren en bondgenoten. De kern van hun werk is het creëren van alternatieven die verder gaan dan en ingaan tegen het dominante systeem van controle en uitsluiting waarmee vluchtelingen, asielzoekers en mensen zonder papieren te maken hebben. Het gaat ook om het creëren van een netwerk van zorg. Via kunst vinden ze fysieke, mentale en juridisch wettelijke ruimte om te creëren.

Elli Vassilou, lid van The Post Collective:

'The project was implemented from February 2020 to February 2021, the initial 3 months residency in Kunsthal Gent was expanded to one year because of the lockdown implications caused by COVID-19. Our weekly meetings at Kunsthal happend only online and all the physical workshops were cancelled and in November 2020, we managed to create an online practice workshop that led to the public event of 26 February 2021.

The original idea and the diversity of the workshop originally proposed got limited and the people who joined our meetings were limited to a pool of people who were already in our network. Mahammed Alimu is an alumnus of Open Design Course joined the collective and other Open Design Course alumni and refu interim members participated in some of the events where physicality was still permitted. Our online vocal practices became a coping mechanism and an opportunity to be together at COVID-19 times, it created a cross borders community of sound poets who explored the medium of online meeting environment in a playful way. It also created solidarity practices and people were able to express themselves and find solution and resources to get through COVID-19 times.

Some of the best moments were the online vocal practices, our lullaby to a new born, preforming outdoors in public places with people in different parts of Europe via our mobile phones, creating a poster to a BUY LOCAL exhibition, and the first lunch meeting with the public.

Some of the most punishing moments were losing space and the ability to connect in space, not being able to expand our community. The biggest challenge was the arrival of the lockdowns which made it impossible to continue most of our program but we succeed implementing and transform part of it. We learned adapting using social media as a mode for collaborative art making.'

Tips for future young artists

Maintain your sense of humor, be ready for the unexpected, know there might be a probability that your plans may not go according to your way so learn how to adapt.

One big tip was the moment we broke up into smaller groups during these meetings were very valuable and memorable moments.

 

The Post Collective is ontstaan uit de 'Open Design Course for Refugees and Asylum Seekers' aan de KASK School of Arts in Gent in 2018, toen enkele alumni en docenten besloten om verder samen te werken. Met het project 'Collaborative Speculations' ism Kunsthal Gent, RefuInterim, Open Design Course, Vooruit & Spin zijn ze laureaat van de 6e editie van Arts in Society Award.

Lees hier het artikel 'Ruimte voor kunst – case #9: The Post Collective, building spaces for change' van Kunstenpunt.