being-with-one-another

There are many ways of being-with-one-another, many ways of sharing a particular time and space. The experience of mutuality generated by these ways of sharing is of public domain and produce relationships between people giving meaning to this interaction.

SITAC XI reflected on the notion of community. The word-phrase that entitled this edition comes from the idea developed by French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy in his book Être singulier pluriel (Being Singular Plural, 1969), and works here as a trigger to approach different relations and associations between social and cultural phenomena, and artistic practices. In general, Nancy’s thinking inscribes within the Twentieth and Twenty-first Century philosophical discussions of the “being”. His essays are devoted to separate ‘singular’ from the individuality, and the politics of being autonomous. According to Nancy, “… The being has no meaning, but the “being itself”, the phenomenon of “being” is meaning that is in turn its own circulation –and we are this circulation.”

Using this word/phrase and all that it entails as a starting point, the symposium was divided into three days during which various discussion panels and presentations are to act as axis / nucleus / constellations / biomes / trajectories/ families / clues / islands / choreographies attempting to answer specific questions.

Proving Ground 1 + 1 = 11

Plataforma Arte-Educación (PAE) offered Proving Ground 1 + 1 = 11, as a basis for critical reflection and speculation in the forthcoming edition of SITAC XI, aiming to achieve greater depth in the symposium's theoretical discussions, reviewing specific case studies, activating, thinking processes in the art practices, and sharing experiences with leading actors in different fields of knowledge, as well as with other persons who might be interested in contemporary art theory. Our title for this format was derived from a new naming of "holding together" -which is a central theme in SITAC XI, reviving the views of the French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy-, a call for a horizontal and transverse space where experimentation and testing may take place, a site where dialogue and conviviality may crack individual, logical reasoning in order to bring forth collective thinking.

Proving Ground 1: In what sense is the art experience an experience of the "common"?

Thursday August 22nd. Moderator: Emiliano Valdés

Proving Ground 2

Under what circumstances does the art experience become a resistance-dissent experience?

Friday August 23rd. Moderator: Daniel Montero

Proving Ground 3

What are the epistemological implications of being-with-one-another for artistic experience?

Saturday, August 24th. Moderators: Plataforma Arte Educación. Chief Guest Relator: David Gutiérrez