lumbung calling: Regeneration by Jumana Emil Abboud

The seven-part conversation series lumbung calling launches documenta fifteen’s Public Program, activated under the title Meydan. Each edition of the series is dedicated to one of the lumbung values: Local Anchor, Humor, Independence, Generosity, Transparency, Sufficiency, and Regeneration. The format dives deeper into the background of the artistic concept for documenta fifteen and illuminates the idea of lumbung from many different angles. Through conversations with a variety of guests, lumbung calling will explore the rich meaning of lumbung across multiple disciplines, points of view, and contexts within an artistic framing.

lumbung calling takes place on the first Saturday of every month over seven sessions, from April to October 2021. It is hosted by the artist Jumana Emil Abboud and ruangrupa member Mirwan Andan.

The seventh edition of lumbung calling focuses on Regeneration. Within the framework of documenta fifteen, regeneration is explored as a way of living and organizing oneself and communities in opposition to extractive practices. This approach also includes generating time and space for mutual support and reflection. It centers care—often made invisible—as a vital part of political activism, enabling the incorporation of many viewpoints within a larger ecosystem.

This edition of lumbung calling imagines regeneration as an act of making kin with our predecessors and future generations. It also examines regeneration as a means of valuing material resources as something to be shared and reused rather than accumulated. Moroccan philosopher Arafat Sadallah looks at the conditions and legacies of revolutions, as well as intergenerational ties in his work with Siwa plateforme in Redeyef, Tunisia. Artists Gulnara Kasmalieva and Muratbek Djumaliev address the afterlives of perestroika in the context of Kyrgyzstan and how young generations continue narratives of resistance and history-making while forming new ones.

Guests and Hosts

Arafat Sadallah is a Moroccan researcher in philosophy based in France. His research approaches the concept of representation in Arab art and thought and the possibility of translating representation’s aesthetic and cognitive modalities between worlds and cultures. Sadallah is a curator and member of Siwa plateforme, a space for artistic and civic experimentation which tries to nurture and inhabit many spaces, such as L’Economat at Redeyef, in the south of Tunisia, and to set up an alternative network for thinking, creating, and translating. Sadallah is also a member of Exilé.e.s, a collective of artists and researchers working on questions of exile and alienation.

Gulnara Kasmalieva and Muratbek Djumaliev are an artistic duo based in Bishkek. They accessed international ideas when studying in Russia during the period of perestroika (1985–91). Returning to Bishkek, they experimented with video and photography to create unprecedented representations of Kyrgyzstan’s passage to independence and the impact of Soviet-era legacies on life and identity. Kasmalieva and Djumaliev are active as curators and leaders, with a mission to stimulate the next generation. They founded a school for young Bishkek artists, operating through ArtEast, a non-profit art center they also established. They have curated regional and international exhibitions, taught courses in contemporary theory and practice, organized workshops, and provided networking and launched collaborations to connect young artists with other artists, curators, and critics in different contexts. Their most recent project is the establishment of an art residency in a remote village in Kyrgyzstan focused on eco-building, permaculture, and the collaboration of artists and activists with the local community. This activity is reflected on the platform beuysonoff.com.

Jumana Emil Abboud is an artist whose creative interests lie in oral histories, personal and collective stories, and mythologies, particularly folk tales and their sites of being and unbeing. Abboud uses storytelling, performative elements, and workshop methodologies in her artistic practice to investigate our relationship to time and place, to the human and non-human, exploring tools of memory, attachment, and dispossession amid the challenge for continuity within political, ecological, and cultural struggles. Her work has been shown at The Jerusalem Show (2018); Sharjah Biennial (2017); BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead (2016); Biennale di Venezia (2015); and Istanbul Biennale (2009), among many others. She has participated in art residencies, including Sakiya – Art/Science/Agriculture, Ramallah; Delfina Foundation, London; Arts Initiative Tokyo; and Gästeatelier Krone, Aarau. Abboud is currently pursuing a practice-led PhD at the Slade School of Fine Art, University College London.

Mirwan Andan is a member of ruangrupa, Artistic Direction of documenta fifteen.

Undine Schäfer is a sign interpreter based in Göttingen.

Directions