Gegen\Dokumentation
Conference

The counter\documentary (das Gegen\Dokumentarische) is a response to the provocation inherent in the notion of the documentary (das Dokumentarische). The provocation we are addressing lies in the claim or desire to capture, represent, and control ‘reality’. Ever since documentary practices are used, there have also been interventions against them. For us, the notion of the counter\documentary delineates a deliberately strategic attempt to antithetically sharpen and politicize the understanding of documentary media, operations, institutions, poetics, aesthetics, ways of writing, and modes of representation.

During the conference we want to discuss what the counter\documentary can be or should be in different contexts by proceeding from both academic and artistic stances. The authority of the documentary intervenes in areas of conflict like identity, politics and history by constituting realities. Therefore, it also touches upon questions of gender, nationality, racism and propaganda. Every act of documentation produces an outside or other. The notion of the counter-documentary is instrumental to address and describe different aspects of this antagonistic moment.

We will offer a simultaneous translation from German to English for all German presentations during the conference (except for the panel discussion on Thursday).

PROGRAMME

THURSDAY \ 08.11.2018

14:00 – 14:30 Welcome

14:30 – 16:00 SLOT 1
Lisa Gitelman (New York)
Time Travel, Or, Four Reasons Why PDFs Are Everywhere
Rupert Gaderer (Bochum)
Pierre Rivière: Eine Fallgeschichte des Gegendokumentarischen

16:00 – 16:30 Coffee break

16:30 – 18:00 SLOT 2
Laliv Melamed (Frankfurt a. M.)
A NonReport. Operative Images and the Politics of the Secret
Sebastian Köthe (Berlin)
»Images Of Poor Quality.« Die Aneignung
geheimdienstlicher Bilder in You Don’t Like The Truth

18:00 – 18:30 Reception

18:30 – 20:00 Panel discussion (in German)
Friedrich Balke (Bochum)
Astrid Deuber-Mankowsky (Bochum)
Julika Griem (Essen)
Dietmar Kammerer (Marburg)
Alexandra Schneider (Mainz)
Renate Wöhrer (Berlin)

FRIDAY \ 09.11.2018

9:30 – 11:00 SLOT 3
Peter Rehberg (Berlin)
Beyond Orientalism and Police Surveillance: The Opaqueness of Male Forms in the Photographs of George Awde
Rembert Hüser (Frankfurt a. M.)
7 Wolken für G20

11:00 – 11:30 Coffee break

11:30 – 13:00 SLOT 4
Markus Kügle (Mannheim)
Über Dokumentationen als Argumentationen – Die dokumentarische Tricktechnik von Teheran Tabu als Katachrese
Simone Dotto (Udine) \\ Francesco Federici (Venedig)
Resounding Ruins: Making History through Sonic Documents in Contemporary Arts

13:00 – 14:30 Lunch break

14:30 – 16:00 SLOT 5
Patricia Prieto-Blanco (Brighton) \\ Tanja Kovačič (Galway)
The counter documentary through Resilience, (Post-)Memory and Affordances
Julia Reich (Düsseldorf)
Was bleibt, wenn nichts bleibt? Zur (gegen)dokumentarischen Praxis bei Tino Sehgal

16:00 – 16:30 Coffee break

16:30 – 18:00 SLOT 6
Simon Zeisberg (Berlin)
Von Stalingrad zum Sternenkampf. Alexander Kluges Lernprozesse mit tödlichem Ausgang (1973/2000) als Gegen-Dokumentation des Kalten Kriegs
Jens Schröter (Bonn)
Die Gegen/Dokumentation von Verhältnissen

18:15 – 20:00 FILM PERFORMANCE
cinéma copains (Berlin)
A Random Walk?

ab 20:30 Conference Dinner (speakers only)

SATURDAY \ 10.11.2018

10:00 – 11:30 SLOT 7
Cecilia Valenti (Berlin)
Gegenermitteln: Konträre Geschichtsschreibung im militanten Dokumentarfilm
Lutz Koepnick (Nashville)
Records in Motion: Documenting the Real in Multi-Screen Environments

11:30 – 12:00 Coffee break

12:00 – 13:30 KEYNOTE
Eyal Weizman (London)
Counter-Investigations

13:30 End of the conference