katalog-overlapping voices - Ritesinstitute

“throuGh LanGuaGe” in Vienna
a COllaBOraTiON BETWEEN parrHESia, ZOCHrOT aND
urSula HOFBauEr
“Through Language” in vienna is a public art project, a visual dictionary and
site-specific glossary alternating between arabic, German and Hebrew.
The project was carried out in two places in israel – in Jerusalem and in Jaffa
– employing arabic and Hebrew transcriptions and translations. it was a response
to the widespread practice of israeli extremists who erase the arabic
language from street signs, using stickers or spray paint, and to the state
practices of palestinian cultural oppression through marginalizing and under-privileging
arabic, an official language in israel. The arabic words constitute
keys to stories, memories, hopes and fears, that are for the most part
heard only inside private homes, without having a presence in the public
sphere or its discourse. The idea is to allow arabic a presence in our public
life. We would like to promote the cultural presence of the palestinian citizens
of israel, the native people and culture upon whose destruction our state
is built, and to express our wish to become culturally integrated in the middle
East.
Giving the arabic and the Hebrew languages appearance in the public sphere
in Europe may evoke questions relating to the presence of our cultures within
Europe.
We hope to question tendencies of the Western world, in the past and in the
present, to perceive the arabic and Hebrew languages and culture as threats
and thus refer to the constant uprising of xenophobia and anti-Semitism in
Europe. The project “Through language” also proposes language and culture
as an arena for listening and engaging in dialogue with the other. “augarten
Stadt” in vienna was not chosen by chance; as “verlorene insel (lost island)”
it was the main scene of Jewish displacement in 1938 – and as a site of new
migration, it is the space of current conflicts between populism, xenophobia
and muslim self-assertion.
“Through Language” was first presented in august 2006, in the framework of
the exhibition “Neighborhood Works” (Curated by the Sala-manca group), in
the German Colony neighborhood of Jerusalem. The project’s second presentation
was in Jaffa, where it was curated by the “ayam” artist group, with
the support of the Tel aviv-Jaffa municipality’s Culture & arts Division, Department
of arts; The israeli Center for Digital art, Holon; and The New israel
Fund.
Parrhesia is a group of educators, social activists and artists (from the fields
of graphic and industrial design, cinema, photography, video and fine art)
who are engaged in israel’s civil society. The group collaborates with organizations
for social change and community activists – in addition to working independently
in the public sphere.
Zochrot [“remembering”] is a group of israeli citizens working to raise awareness
of the Nakba, the palestinian catastrophe of 1948. Zochrot endeavors
to make the history of the Nakba accessible to the israeli public, so as to engage
Jews and palestinians in an open recounting of their painful common
history. Zochrot hopes that by bringing the Nakba into Hebrew, the language
spoken by the Jewish majority in israel, they can make a qualitative change
in the political discourse of this region. acknowledging the past is the first
step in taking responsibility for its consequences. This must include equal
rights for all the peoples of this land, including the right of palestinians to return
to their homes.
Parrhesia and Zochrot are engaged in an ongoing process of collaboration –
the publication of Sedek, a magazine about the ongoing Nakba. its first two
issues can be viewed in the following links: http://parrhesia.org/sedek2.pdf,
http://www.parrhesia.org/sedek.pdf
We thank aktionsradius Wien at Gaussplatz (www.aktionsradius.at) for a lot
of valuable information, their hospitality and straightforward support.
about the ConfLiCt
The entire city is scared. Different departments of the municipality have different
fears. Street administration for example is afraid that pedestrians could stumble.
Some inhabitants of the 20th district are afraid that a planned mosque could
bring too much traffic into the neighbourhood. Some of them are also afraid of
turning into strangers in their own country. The district’s administration is afraid
that people living in the area could not understand everything happening in their
streets. That art could irritate, even unsettle someone.
a group of Jewish and palestinian artists from israel is planning to apply writings
in arab and Hebrew in vienna’s public spaces. The streets of the Brigittenau
district are to show a street dictionary, a site-specific glossary. The
opportunity to enjoy the beauty of the arabic and Hebrew languages will be
offered to the inhabitants and the visitors of a museum of modern art. On
sidewalks and in shop windows of local merchants, everyday items will be labelled.
Translation and phonetics in German included. “What is it good for?”,
the Egyptian Deli asks me, and i answer: “So that we finally learn not only to
spell Holocaust and Jihad in these languages, but also tomato, ice cream and
phone box.” “Okay”, says the grocer and wants the word for ice cream to be
written on his window. “in arabic they say gelati” he adds, and that he thinks
it is about peace somehow. He is one of the few i meet in preparation for the
project who is not frightened. The seamstress a few doors down the street
has an uncanny feeling about writings in front of her door. “i know the austrians
by now” she says, and: “i have experienced too much”. She left her
hometown in former Yugoslavia, when her house was under heavy bombardment.
i understand that her economic survival is at risk. She could lose her
austrian customers. and when she points at the arab writing in my map and
says that she is muslim, i also understand that she fears to be mistaken for
someone wearing the headscarf as a signal.
The owner of a house, whose facade we would like to use, asks for different
languages. Tibetan for example, that would be a current conflict. One should
not always get caught in the historical. i think that it is a good idea, but a
completely different project also. Some others wish for different words to be
used, like peace, friendship or love. Everyone is pro universal peace. But how
to achieve that? a local politician explains it to me: “We in austria have fortunately
found a way to keep the peace between the many ethnic groups living
here. Not all the peoples in the world are able to do so.” The perception
of the israeli-palestinian conflict as an ethnic squabble in the next neighbourhood
astonishes me. For some ten minutes i want to get out of here. On one
hand, because my allergy to the proverbial conflict avoidance of the viennese,
which i believed i’d healed, is returning. On the other hand, because
it is exhausting to watch how efforts are made to bring all conflicts to vanishing
point, over and over again – and in the end it seems a big surprise that
the very same conflicts are resurrected sooner or later, like ghosts out of their
graves in a horror movie. What’s responsible for this, we ask ourselves with
friends over a cup of coffee. Where does this conflict avoidance come from?
“metternich”, i say. i could add “the austrian social partnership”, or “high
mountains”, but the truth is: it is an open question.
On the level of signs it is only the arabic that scares people. They hardly recognise
the Hebrew in our sketches for the writings, it stays apart, marginal.
Hebrew is what the house owner with sympathies for Tibet called “the historic”.
it still exists in micro-elements in some parts of the public in the second
district, but it does not cross the threshold of everyday attention any more. it
is the past, the long ago, the deceased that has no more meaning. The arab
signs stand for the topical, ongoing conflict, the newsworthy, for the mosque
built on the Dammstrasse in the 20th district, for the fear of alienation and
unsolved problems. The citizens’ committee against the mosque expresses
their fear of “noise pollution, vehicle emissions, dirt contamination and a lack
of parking space” due to the amount of people expected to visit the mosque.
The racist attribution of noise and dirt to migrants is highly problematic. Yet
i understand the wish to be heard with one’s concerns by politics and by po-
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