If the body is the site of performance, how do we perform with it, and what for? Performativity is an act of power. It holds both the pleasure of representing and the pain of being misread. In societies that treat competition as a value, performativity gets constrained into rivalry. In those moments, we witness the production of ableism; an invented norm, and the pursuit of the body stopping being a body and turning itself to an ideal, taking over the accessibility to gyms, offices, schools, supermarkets, boutiques, and beds. No wonder why we* feel forced to enter the exhibitionist arena and fight for our bodies to be sources of pride and market standardization. Strong muscular structures that bend, jump, squat and lift create the body politic of our normativity and the cultural industry that dictates the imposition of that very ableism we don’t want to pronounce as part of ourselves.
Switch off your IG, step outside the arena for a moment, and instead of weaponizing each other’s vulnerabilities, un-normalize bodies. In this issue on Sports and Dis*ability, we try our best to articulate why ableism is an ancient losing game, by broadening the scope of divergences, spectrums, and prisms that are often matters of structurally ignored inspirations. We wish to be conscious of the stages we create for others to perform, live, experience pleasure and dream on, as well as the barriers we put on the way to each other’s freedom, even though we keep on looking for the best of ourselves, in ourselves, like feeding an addiction.
By making our performances accessible and mutually shared, we break the loop of performativity as it currently exists; not bent down by the weight of golden medals, nor reduced to dysfunctional objects by repressive social schemes. In this issue we consciously avoid ultimateness and subconsciously long for timelessness; but here is once again, an invitation to you, dear readers, to stay still, withdraw, chill, and consider who directs our choreography and assigns the roles. To do nothing is, in this context, not a hedonistic privilege; it is a daily step against internalized neoliberal exploitation. It is a process of discomfort that will allow us to recognize the pain of others that is inflicted by structures that anesthetize, disable, mass produce and discard our bodily disposition. May learn how to care for the different, to cease the war between extro- and introverts, to stop labeling people, be the thread that tangles us together and dismantles the false hierarchy of abilities. Gently.
With artworks by Galli, Leila Hekmat, Charlie Fitz, Margaret Raspé, Jimmy Robert, Kristina Schmidt, Khadija Saye
With contributions from Entrar Afuera, Asset Arrest, Hanna Bargheer, Bless, Saverio Cantoni, Anelise Chen, Evelina Esquivel, Kenny Fries, Elisa Fuenzalida, Anisha Gupta Müller + simo_tier, Lamisse Hamouda, Daniel Horneber, Johanna Hedva, Bart van der Heide, Juliet Jaques, Amelie Jakubek, Ira Konyukhova, Nicole Kramm, Rebecca Layton, Dalia Maini, Thais Luksic, Ido Nahari, Nicole, María Inés Plaza Lazo, Ruby Rebelde, Sickness Affinity Group - Fran Breden and Inga Zimprich, Kuba Szreder, Jeppe Ugelvig, Oscar Vinter and Charlie Fitz, Johanna Weiß, Eric Wohlstadter, Dani Zelko, Huda Zikry, Rico Zyrrano.
Imprint
Reflektor Monde gUG (haftungsbeschränkt)
Lynarstrasse 38, 13353 Berlin
M: hey@artsoftheworkingclass.org
T: +49 176 802 883 67
Founders / Publishers / Editors /
Verantwortlicher i.S.d § 18 Abs. 2 MStV
María Ines Plaza Lazo, Pauł Sochacki
Managing Editors: Dalia Maini, Ido Nahari
Contributing Editors: Elisa Fuenzalida, Amelie Jakubek, Ira Konyukhova
Leichte Sprache: Capito Berlin and text for the exhibition "Queering the Crip, Cripping the Queer" (2. September 2022 — 30. January 2023) at Schwules Museum Berlin.
Design: Till Sperle
Online Design: Giorgia Belotti
Translation and Proofreading: Eliza Levinson, Anne Waak, Huda Zikry
Druck
Druckzentrum Osnabrück GmbH & Co. KG, Osnabrück, DE Alle Vertriebs- und Kund*innenanfragen an die Verlagsadresse.
