An introduction to the history of art on the web through the critical lens of Flatness. We will discuss key political questions of embodiment and disembodiment in relation to digital expression along with practical insights into curating and presenting work online.

This workshop will appeal to those with an active interest in achieving in social justice and alternative forms of encountering art online to the main social media channels and institutional platforms.

Using Flatness as a case study we will consider often overlooked histories of the web and the cultural specificities of the online for interacting with networked artworks as well as discussing related questions of audiences, professionalism and solidarity. For example, what kind of experiences can be created online compared to physical galleries? Who might feel addressed and what kind of work might manifest in this context?

As well as discourses around the digital, Shama will share practical advice on developing website projects and building audiences for your work.

Live since 2013, Flatness is a long-running project curated by Shama Khanna offering artists and audiences a space for creativity away from structurally unjust institutions and market-led forces of the web.

This long-term research and commissioning platform for artists’ moving image and network culture decentres hegemonic narratives from the margins of the online. Flatness presents a porous context for artworks to be shared as part of a genuinely networked culture.

Flatness values artistic experimentation and embodied, durational experiences of art on the web. It is curated from the perspective of a queer Brown sick womxn with the aim of uplifting practices which similarly aim to dismantle intersectional oppression.

“… Yet the curation of a durational space for art on the web over the course of several years now begins to feel significant, harnessing this ephemeral and devalued space to fill it with extraordinary forms of being in the world. Supplementing a heritage of diasporic resourcefulness. Curating in the margins as a way of practicing accountability when the news constantly tests our nerves.

The idea of flatness has always felt grounding for me, trusting the intuition in one’s body when mustering strength against divisive forces. To quote Moten and Harney, who write about fugitivity as a mode of living together, which ‘cannot be shared as a model but as an instance’, spaces for desire and dreaming must be made and unmade every day to fortify against hate. My body overrode my efforts to work without love. I now dedicate my work to seizing the means of somatic recovery and encouraging a shamelessness around incapacity. To replacing a value system based on constant incentives to produce with an imperative to hold oneself, and each other, close.”

– Excerpt from ‘State of the Union’ by Shama Khanna commissioned for the exhibition ‘Thirteen Ways of Looking’ curated by Sylvia Theuri, available to read in full on flatness.eu.

BURSARY PLACES FOR PRACTITIONERS OF COLOUR
In conjunction with Shama Khanna, CAMP are offering two bursary places for practitioners of colour (POC) working as artists, makers or creatives for this session.

Criteria and how to apply
There are two bursary (free) places available for POC living in Devon and Cornwall; non-members of CAMP are welcome to apply. Email info@camp-plymouth.org with ‘Rethinking the Social Bursary’ in the subject line. Bursary places are available on a first come first served basis, and if you have any questions, please also email CAMP.

ACCESS INFORMATION
This workshop will take place on Zoom, using video & audio, and the workshop leader will ask you to participate throughout (either by voice or text chat). You are very welcome to bring a support worker with you to the session (just let us know by email after you book so we can share the Zoom link with them too). There is live on screen captioning.

Please let us know if you have any access needs by 22 January 2021, via info@camp-plymouth.org, so we can make arrangements