ostZONE – Workshops, talks with contemporary witnesses and city walks to accompany the exhibition Revolutionary Romances – Global Art Histories in the GDR at the Albertinum

What was everyday life like for contract workers or international students in the GDR? How do artists express themselves in repressive systems?

The contract workers, international trainees and students who arrived during the GDR era are living here in the second and third generation. Their history and present are not present. This is where ostZONE comes in: we offer space for questions and joint remembrance – different life paths in GDR history come into conversation. The Albertinum becomes a place of encounter!

Workshop “Mail-Art – Letters as Art”

with Marí Emily Bohley and Julia Eberth

The term Mail-Art was coined in 1971 by the art critic Jean-Marc Poinsot. Its origins lie in the environment of Fluxus, Pop Art and the New York art scene. As a social and political medium, however, mail art was a means of resistance, especially in the dictatorships of Latin America and Eastern Europe. At the end of the 1970s, a number of artists in Dresden also took up the mail art movement, which brought the State Security Service onto the scene and systematically attempted to monitor the actors involved.

In the workshop, we will learn about the history of this art form as well as practical and creative ways of designing letters. In the weeks between the course days, we will send each other so-called “art by post”. The results can be presented in the epilogue room of the exhibition.

The course leaders have a long and fruitful collaboration in the field of art education. Marí Emily Bohley (BA Calligraphy and Bookbinding) lives and works as a freelance artist in Dresden. Julia Eberth (MA Communication and Media Studies) works as an editor in Dresden.

Come by!

In the ostZONE we ask and remember together. In an exchange between generations and cultures about the past and present, we want to get to know and share experiences: intergenerational and intercultural, from former contract workers (e.g. from Vietnam or Mozambique), from people who have moved here since 1989 (e.g. from Libya or Mexico), from people from Dresden with and without a GDR background.

The project ostZONE is a cooperation with the ethnologist Dr. Verena Böll and Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden (SKD).
(Foto: © SKD / Iona Dutz, 04.11.2024 – Workshop “Mail-Art – Letters as Art” with Marí Emily Bohley & Julia Eberth)