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Transcending borders and connecting global imaginaries

by Lindi Mngxitama

Playing at the Antigel Festival for SHAP SHAP has always been a dream of mine, especially after watching videos of FAKA’s performances there over the years. It was probably due to the nature of COVID-19 making electronic music more accessible globally, and me choosing to focus on promoting myself globally — because there wasn't an option of shows and stuff like that during lockdown — that made the opportunity to be able to play a festival like this possible. Overall, it was an awesome experience, and although it was virtual it still felt like I was on a global stage amongst some really great artists.

Says producer and Roses are Red record label founder Rose Bonica speaking about SHAP SHAP’s annual programme at Antigel Festival, but more specifically, speaking about the 6th edition of WHAT’S UP?. Creatively connecting people and using physical and digital stages to take action against global inequalities and discrimination, this year’s Antigel Festival found itself evolving in form and having to adapt in its possibilities of engagement due to the pandemic all of the world has been — and is still currently living through — in all of our varying and intersecting realities across the globe. “Over the last years ANTiGEL Festival has grown to become one of the largest cultural events in Geneva. By bringing artistic experience to parts of the city that are detached from this kind of engagement, the festival aims to be a reminder of the importance of making spaces for arts and culture”, remaining committed to this mission even within the setting of our current pandemic dystopian reality. This year’s ANTIGEL X SHAP SHAP WHAT’S UP? programme was curated in collaboration with Johannesburg's own Cuss Group, DJ, artist and self-named proud eurolatina Anita Kirppis (Geneva-San Salvador), Maïté Chénière AKA DJ Mighty (Geneva) and BATEKOO (Rio de Janeiro).

A non-profit organisation founded in 2015, SHAP SHAP is invested in taking action against global inequalities, racial and gender discriminations through artistic cultural projects. The festival’s curatorial and creative methodology is one rooted in collaboration — with both artists and scholars, to contribute to: “1) strengthening the artistic, social, political and economic status of emerging and off-the-grid artists from the Global South and from minorities who need support to emerge locally and internationally 2) facilitating international mobility 3) raising awareness on inequalities and discriminations 4) fostering dialogues”. The program at Grand Central STREAM Antigel 2021 unfolded over a course of 23 days from February 5th - 27. Self-named as eurolatina in a move towards the search for a better understanding of her identity because as Anita expresses:

I left my country very young (El Salvador) to come to Europe. A that time I was still searching to understand my identity as I was defined as a Salvadorian immigrant in Europe but when I was coming back to see my family every year I felt [like a] ‘foreigner’ in my own country. In a constant back and forth in every part of my life, even in my art studies I was lost. Nowadays, half of my life it has been built in Europe with codes, cultural and political references that I’ve mixed up with my Salvadorian background. I think that I’m finally embracing this richness and the complexity of this multiple identity and I’m more aware to reflect this on my dj sets. Kirppis’ Central America What’s Up, kicked off the festivities and in our conversation reflecting on the experience she shares that: Being part of this project, it was like I found allies who do things with careness and understanding about the issues that me or any other artist coming from the Global South could encounter during their career. Having this structure [that] backups and defends your positions, your ideas and your projects, is like a deep breath of clean and fresh air coming from the pacific ocean.

The artists who made up Kirppis’ segment included the collective Ghetto Witchez and musician El irreal Veintiuno. Speaking to first time participant El irreal Veintiuno — whose musical practice is rooted in capturing the sounds of his country — about his experience, especially within the festival’s 2021 virtual form, he shares:

It has definitely been a new experience and what we are living [through] with this pandemic, was not an impediment [on] the experience of connecting with people from all over the world. Through a screen [it became] possible, you know it is curious how between countries there are giant walls, and with the help of technology you can put an end to those walls. It is simply magical, although to be honest, I like to think about the fact of being there physically with people dancing, enjoying and feeling each song you are playing. I hope at some point in life it is possible.

For Ghetto Witchez’ REBURRA, the festival helped her reconnect with her creative side which had been suffering from a pandemic induced lull as she expresses:

Personally it was a positively challenging experience, it helped me wake up my creative side and shake off lots of heavy feelings I had bottled up during most of 2020. In El Salvador the quarantine restrictions were specially hard during the first months of the pandemic. So, most of us where just locked in our houses scared for our lives and listening to the president’s long misinformed press conferences. It was hard, my heart and mind where not that well recovered from the quarantine experience and there where moments I just wanted to go back in time. So I decided to make our participation in SHAP SHAP’s programme at Antigel festival an excuse to revisit this Salvadoran fantasy land I’ve created in mind and heart — [to] revisit all those feel good and pretty things that connect me with my country. All the footage we added to the set visuals and the intros are part of a well know Salvadoran cultural phenomenon or landmark from my generation’s childhood, that have a special place in my mind and heart. This way, we made of our participation a way of healing my reality at the time and I really appreciated that. It was a bright spot during dark days.

Week two which was curated by Mzansi’s own Cuss Group, under the programme segment South Africa, What’s Up started off on February 12th. Not their first #me at the rodeo — 2021 marks Cuss Group’s 5th year participating in the festival, however, this #me bringing along new home grown talent and first #me festival participants to fill their segment. Rose Bonica — “your favourite producers’ favourite producer” and X14. As mentioned before part of SHAP SHAP’s intention and focus is “strengthening the artistic, social, political and economic status of emerging and off-the-grid artists from the Global South and from minorities who need support to emerge locally and internationally and facilitating international mobility”. This in-turn creates space and opportunity for dialogue and cultural/artistic exchange that is able to imagine beyond the limitations of the nation state and its borders. Speaking about the value of this work and intention Rose shares:

I mean, it's extremely valuable. I live in a country where the arts, especially underground electronic music, is barely funded so these kinds of opportunities are truly valuable. And being able to perform on a global and diverse stage is such a great opportunity for any artists with the added financial stability that the festival offers, I honestly couldn't think of anything better. The experience also pushed her where her own creative methodology and confidence are concerned, revealed as she expresses that she found it really difficult: to translate my live performances into a virtual space and the whole process of filming and editing the performances together often feels draining. My self-confidence generally takes quite a big dip and before the stream starts I feel like it's just all going to be a big flop. My experience with SHAP SHAP was really reassuring. And for the first time since I started doing any type of virtual streams I went into it feeling a little more confident, and feeling like I was a part of something.

X14 — also a first time participant — expresses having no expectations as he went into the festival, however, feeling robbed of his first international trip due to COVID-19 travel restrictions, sharing some more he states “my journey as X14 has allowed me to get proximate to artists whose work I really admire, one of [them] being Naledi Chai. I told her about it and she immediately hit me with the vision for what you saw... she helped me communicate something raw and beautiful”.

Friday February 19 ushered in week three curated in collaboration with Afro Futurist DJ, founding member of the House of Butch Xtra and artist Maïté Chénière. The first time I engaged with Chénière’s work was through their first solo exhibition, Octavial Scape, which mapped different modes of refusal and resistance in the forms of music, popular culture, academia and storytelling against the backdrop of the Atlantic — a central site of subjugation in the Transatlantic slave trade and node among a global community. Like Cuss Group, this was not Maïté’s first time participating in the festival either, having have been part of it before as both collaborating curator and participant (DJ). Roles which require one to show up in/from a particular way. I ask them about how the experience of those two roles matched up, and which may have been more challenging to which they respond:

There is always this duality in my practice, artist/DJ and curator. It’s been a journey to find balance between those two and it's a constant work in progress. In the context of An-gel, I guess the most challenging for me was to curate. I proposed a line up within SHAP SHAP's program, within Grand Central's program, within An-gel's program. It's a lot of circles to navigate and sometimes you risk losing touch with the core intent. I find it hard to imagine that working within such a collaborative and far reaching way — especially within the framework of challenges presented by COVID-19 — wouldn’t affect/effect ones own relationship with their artistic practice. Asking Maïté about this they express that: When I arrived in Geneva I noticed a gaping hole in the night scene. What brought me to Dj-ing is that I was tired of looking for myself in those white spaces. Then I began hosting the Archipelagogo Club events dedicated to celebrating club culture and its originators; queer people of colour. These are trans-disciplinary events fostering artistic creation and community at a local level but also with international artists. Through the SHAP SHAP residency I got to meet artists from South Africa: Moonchild Sanelly, GYRE, Angel Ho, Griffit Vigo, Desire, DJ Candi, CUSS group. And we produced music in Johannesburg together with Bone Black and Dokta Spizee (The Good Dokta). This opened all kinds of places in me and brought the realisation in my flesh of the necessity to shift from the western gaze as an active practice.

The final week — week four curated in collaboration with BATEKOO. Speaking to Mauricio Bahia Sacramento aka FreshPrincedabahia — ceo/founder and creative director at BATEKOO — I learn that their own approach to their sonic craft is rooted in taking “cultural trips in the musicalities produced in the peripheries of Brazil and the world”, a mode of research which as he expresses “has always been present in my life as a dj and as a creator, I needed to do this analysis when creating BATEKOO, for example”. For BATEKOO, the festival’s 2021 virtual form also spoke to “the moment of transition” he thinks we are currently in as he shares, “I think we are going through a moment of transformation, and we will always take positive balances out of it. I believe that in the future we will use more internet tools to spread information, entertainment and learning”. Cultural happenings like this are imperative as “it is very important that today the cultural class and large companies look for ways to reframe the present and help each other in a 360 way”. If anything SHAP SHAP program at Grand Central Antigel was a creative manifestation of the fact — to quote Anita Kirppis — that “the boundaries are [being] pushed, [and] the forces are changing”.

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KIERA FELIPPE BRAZIL, WHAT’S UP? FESTIVAL ANTIGEL GENEVA 2021 GRAND CENTRAL STREAM Curated by SHAP SHAP in collaboration with BATEKOO

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FRESHPRINCEDABAHIA  BRAZIL, WHAT’S UP? FESTIVAL ANTIGEL GENEVA 2021 GRAND CENTRAL STREAM Curated by SHAP SHAP in collaboration with BATEKOO

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MIGHTY (SWITZERLAND) GENEVA, WHAT’S UP? FESTIVAL ANTIGEL GENEVA 2021 GRAND CENTRAL STREAM Curated by SHAP SHAP in collaboration with Maïté Chénière

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I-VYE (SWITZERLAND) GENEVA, WHAT’S UP? FESTIVAL ANTIGEL GENEVA 2021 GRAND CENTRAL STREAM Curated by SHAP SHAP in collaboration with Maïté Chénière

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VEN3MO (SWITZERLAND) GENEVA, WHAT’S UP? FESTIVAL ANTIGEL GENEVA 2021 GRAND CENTRAL STREAM Curated by SHAP SHAP in collaboration with Maïté Chénière

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X14 (SOUTH AFRICA) SOUTH AFRICA, WHAT’S UP? FESTIVAL ANTIGEL GENEVA 2021 GRAND CENTRAL STREAM Curated by SHAP SHAP in collaboration with CUSS

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ROSE BONICA (SOUTH AFRICA) SOUTH AFRICA, WHAT’S UP? FESTIVAL ANTIGEL GENEVA 2021 GRAND CENTRAL STREAM Curated by SHAP SHAP in collaboration with CUSS

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ANITA KIRPPIS (EL SALVADOR-SWITZERLAND) CENTRAL AMERICA, WHAT’S UP? FESTIVAL ANTIGEL GENEVA 2021 GRAND CENTRAL STREAM Curated by SHAP SHAP in collaboration with ANITA KIRPPIS

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EL IRREAL VEINTIUNO (MEXICO) CENTRAL AMERICA, WHAT’S UP? FESTIVAL ANTIGEL GENEVA 2021 GRAND CENTRAL STREAM Curated by SHAP SHAP in collaboration with ANITA KIRPPIS

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GHETTO WITCHEZ (EL SALVADOR) CENTRAL AMERICA, WHAT’S UP? FESTIVAL ANTIGEL GENEVA 2021 GRAND CENTRAL STREAM Curated by SHAP SHAP in collaboration with ANITA KIRPPIS

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GLOBAL SOUTH WOMEN’S FORUM ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT 2020 DJ SETS BY ANITA KIRPPIS AND MIGHTY

Curated by SHAP SHAP  https://gswf.iwraw-ap.org

By participating in GSWF, SHAP SHAP aims at promoting culture as a tool to transform societies sustainably, in addition to the international human rights framework on which NGOs, institutions and civil society can rely to take action for global justice. SHAP SHAP contributes to empowering the artistic, social, political and economic status of emerging and off-grid artists from the Global South (living in Africa and Latin America, from the diaspora, Afro-Latino descendants in Geneva) and from minorities who need support to emerge locally and internationally. Supporting the production of creative works by female artists, LGBTQIA artists and artists from minorities from the Global South and facilitating their international mobility help them to benefit from a global visibility and to gain economic resources, autonomy and social protection. Enabling a multiplicity of narratives and representations on stages and in the medias at a large scale also fully participates in fostering dialogues and raising awareness on inequalities and discriminations as to advocate for equality, diversity and more inclusive societies. The session is an introduction by SHAP SHAP on the role of culture in advancing women and LGBTQIA’s rights and gender equality, followed by two 40-minute DJ sets by artists Mighty and Anita Kirppis.

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The Racism of International Relations Lecture by Mohammad-Mahmoud Ould Mohamedou, Professor of International History, The Graduate Institute, Geneva

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DJ Candii Africa, What’s up? @ Festival Antigel 2020   © Simon Muñoz

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OHCHR Veronica Birga’s speech for Egyptian artist Aya Tarek’s Omar Al-Sharif mural inauguration

version FR en bas de page

I am honoured to be here today on behalf of the UN Human Rights Office, which has its premises just around the corner, at the Palais Wilson. Those of us working and living in the neighbourhood are fortunate to have been given this gift by Aya Tarek.

Art explores the most intimate aspects of human nature, beyond labels and assumptions, surfacing the complexities of reality and reminding us that while we are all different and unique, we are united in our common desire for happiness.  This is also the message of the human rights project. A project of respect for the dignity of all individuals, regardless of the categories in which we place them and of the circumstances in which they live. A project that protects the right to be creative, confronting and even subversive, to break out dogma and empower people to be who they are.

As we celebrate the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration for Human Rights, we must remember that the main obstacles to the realization of human rights continue to be prejudice and bigotry, on which privilege and exclusion are built. Art plays an important role in making people feel directly concerned with the struggle to overcome bias, hatred and discrimination. For all these reasons we feel particularly privileged to be here today.

At a time when rising conservatism of all kinds tries to impose very rigid conceptions of what the role of women and men should be, we are also particularly pleased to be celebrating the work of a young female artist who- through her work- challenges rigid and fixed concepts of identity.  In the UN Human Rights Office we have been devoting increasing attention to the pernicious impact of gender stereotypes, which often interacts with other stereotypes about age, class, nationality, religion and shape social norms which serve to control and confine women and girls.

Though each woman and each girl is different, sweeping assumptions and expectations about what their place is and what their needs are still unite them in their experience of discrimination – be it in the workplace, where they continue to be paid less and harassed, in the family, where they suffer unacceptable levels of violence and coercion, or in the public space, where their participation continues to be opposed. Aya’s work and the work of many talented young female artists like her, is a great reminder that no girl, or boy, should be constrained by societies’ expectations about what is “proper” or “good” for them and that when that happens, we unleash enormous talents from which the entire world can benefit.

The Universal Declaration on Human Rights states that all human beings are born free and equal, in dignity and rights, without distinction of any kind. Please join the efforts to make this vision a reality and stand up for human rights.

VERONICA BIRGA Chief, Women’s rights and Gender section at Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) 

Inauguration of Egyptian artist Aya Tarek’s Omar Al-Sharif mural Geneva, February 3 2018

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C’est un honneur d'être présente aujourd'hui au nom du Haut-Commissariat des Nations Unies aux droits humaines, dont les locaux se trouvent juste au coin de la rue, au Palais Wilson. Ceux et celles d'entre nous qui travaillent et vivent dans le quartier ont la chance d'avoir reçu ce cadeau d'Aya Tarek.

L'art explore les aspects les plus intimes de la nature humaine, au-delà des étiquettes et des hypothèses, faisant surgir les complexités de la réalité et nous rappelant que nous sommes tous différents et uniques, mais unis dans notre désir commun de bonheur. C'est aussi le message que porte le projet des droits humains. Un projet de respect de la dignité de tous les individus, indépendamment des catégories dans lesquelles nous les plaçons et des circonstances dans lesquelles ils ou elles vivent. Un projet qui protège le droit d'être créatif, provocateur et même subversif, de sortir du dogme et de permettre aux gens d'être ce qu'ils sont.

Alors que nous célébrons le 70ème anniversaire de la Déclaration universelle des droits humaines, nous devons garder à l'esprit que les principaux obstacles à la réalisation des droits humains demeurent les préjugés et le sectarisme, sur lesquels se fondent le privilège et l'exclusion. L'art joue un rôle important pour amener les gens à se sentir directement concernés par la lutte contre les préjugés, la haine et la discrimination. Pour toutes ces raisons, nous sommes particulièrement privilégiés d'être ici aujourd'hui.

À une époque où la montée du conservatisme, dans toutes ses expressions, cherche à imposer des conceptions très rigides de ce que devrait être le rôle des femmes et des hommes, nous sommes particulièrement heureux de célébrer le travail d'une jeune femme artiste qui, par son travail, défie les concepts figés de l'identité. Au sein du Haut-Commissariat des droits humaines des Nations Unies, nous avons porté une attention grandissante à l'impact pernicieux des stéréotypes sexistes, qui interagissent souvent avec d'autres stéréotypes relatifs à l'âge, la classe sociale, la nationalité, la religion et définissent des normes sociales qui contrôlent et confinent les femmes et les filles.

Bien que chaque femme et chaque fille soit différente, les suppositions et les attentes sur leur place et leurs besoins les unissent toujours dans leurs expériences de discrimination - que ce soit sur le lieu de travail, où elles continuent d'être moins payées et harcelées, au sein de la famille, où elles subissent des niveaux inacceptables de violence et de coercition, ou dans l'espace public, où leur participation continue d'être contestée. Le travail d'Aya Tarek et le travail de nombreuses jeunes femmes artistes talentueuses comme elle, est un grand rappel qu'aucune fille ou garçon ne devrait être contraint par les attentes des sociétés sur ce qui est « bon » ou « approprié » pour elle ou pour lui. Lorsque ces contraintes disparaissent, nous libérons d'énormes talents dont le monde entier peut bénéficier.

La Déclaration universelle des droits humaines stipule que tous les êtres humains naissent libres et égaux, en dignité et en droits, sans distinction d'aucune sorte. Joignez-vous aux efforts pour faire de cette vision une réalité et défendre les droits de l’homme.

VERONICA BIRGA Cheffe de la section Droits des femmes et genre au Haut-Commissariat des Nations Unies aux droits de l’homme

Inauguration de la fresque murale Omar Al-Sharif de l’artiste égyptienne Aya Tarek Genève, 3 février 2018

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070 Shake Festival Antigel 2020 © Thibaut Fuks

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Dans le cadre du Festival Antigel et du programme AFRICA, WHAT’S UP? réalisé par SHAP SHAP en partenariat avec le TU-Théâtre de l’Usine, la Coalition suisse pour la diversité culturelle a présenté les résultats de l’enquête NO VISA FOR ARTISTS qui porte sur les refus ou les retards au niveau des demandes de visas pour les acteurs culturels. Cette documentation va servir de base au dialogue entre la Coalition suisse et le Secrétariat d’État aux migrations SEM. Afin de mettre en perspective ces résultats, nous avons invité Robin Stünzi, chercheur en études des migrations de l’université de Neuchâtel, à questionner les mythes et lieux communs autour de la « crise migratoire » mais il a finalement dirigé sa recherche sur les visas comme outil de discrimination et reflet des inégalités globales.