Best Intentions
A lecture-performance by INGLAM, curated by Elke Krasny, Art and Education.
Nora: The floor of the auditorium at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna is bordered all around by a swastika ornament.
Anja: Why on earth do we have to see swastikas here?
Julia: We find similar ornamentation in the floor mosaic of the Opéra Palais Garnier in Paris and in the Numismatic Museum in Athens. But any attempt to problematize this 19th-century motif is quickly dismissed, because a glance at the dates allows viewers to breathe a sigh of relief: The symbols do not date from 1933–1945 but from 1875, 1877, and 1879.
Anja: So it would be wrong to hastily accuse the symbol of anti-Semitism? No blame can be placed on them. Right?
Nora: With this performance, we’re tracing the emergence of this motif in Europe in the late 19th century: Where do all these swastika ornaments come from? What do they mean? And how did the Nazis come to use this symbol?
INGLAM is a lecture-performance group founded in 2022 at the HFBK Hamburg. As a form of art education research, it explores artistic, political, and theoretical questions through the spoken word, projected moving images, and sound collages.
The acronym INGLAM stands for “Inglourious Art Mediators” and references Quentin Tarantino’s film “Inglourious Basterds” (2012). In this sense, INGLAM sees itself as an anti-fascist statement: after all, it all began with radio spots intended to spread the message “Fight Antisemitism and Racism Together.” At the same time, INGLAM is all about glitter and disco. While reflecting on working conditions and discourses of devaluation, INGLAM demonstrates just how glamorous self-assertion in art mediation and art education can be. We embrace the glamour as well as the unglamorous tasks in the shadows of the institutional spotlight, which we use as spaces of freedom for art mediation and art education.
INGLAM consists of Anja Steidinger, Nora Sternfeld, and Julia Stolba