Artists, writers, composers and curators will be part of a new exchange programme that negotiates our different approaches to reflect on our "burden of history" through the means of art. How do different countries, whose histories have been marked by huge social upheavals and violence, deal with their pasts? With the resulting trauma and its different perceptions of different generations? In which way is the future informed by the past and how do artists and curators experience the processes of transformation, of shifting identities, of trauma and reconciliation? Will there be common experiences that we all share despite our different cultural codices and historical asynchronicity. What connects us and what does separate us? This project uses the long term experience of the Sylt Foundation.' s intercultural and interdisciplinary work to engage artists and curators in an ongoing dialogue through their work to collect new interinternationally relevant knowledge and open doors for new ideas and new contexts.

The Sylt Foundation is inviting artists from seven countries into this exchange programme to offer the possibility of travel to different places where they will meet international colleagues, learn, compare, exchange and thus reflect the results in their works. This exchange programme is a work in progress over the course of five years and will be supported by publications, public discussions and
through the foundation's website. Social media will be part of the conversation. The publication of a book presenting the results of the programme will be an important part of the programme.

All the artists we are working with have dealt with the topics of shifting social parameters and identities and will work together and meet each other several times during the time of this programme. The countries involved are chosen because of their relevant transformations and the quality of the artists involved.

This programme will take place in Cambodia, Chile, Cuba, Germany, Haiti, Myanmar and South Africa.               

curator: Indra Wussow and the participating artists

concept paper (pdf):