[spectre] Latitude on Air: Unsettling Power Relations /June 4-7 / 88, 4 FM Berlin & 90, 7 FM Potsdam

[Diana McCarty]

Latitude on Air: Unsettling Power Relations
June 4-7 2020 /  88,4 FM Berlin & 90,7 FM Potsdam
10:00-06:00

Goethe-Institut, in cooperation with reboot.fm and the Radio Netzwerk
Berlin (Cashmere Radio, Savvy Funk, wearebornfree! Empowerment Radio
a.o.) is producing Latitude on Air: Unsettling Power Relations, a four
day experimental transversal radio, that both transcends and explores
locality with live terrestrial broadcasts from Max Fish at Kunsthaus
ACUD in Berlin. In an attempt to manifest healthy new forms of
sociality, the public is welcome to bring their own radios and tune in
at Volkspark am Weinberg, directly across from the venue.

"I do however, worry very much about the consequences of good intentions."

These words by Okwui Enwezor echo James Baldwin’s notable statement
that “The road to hell is paved with good intentions”. With them, the
two writers meaningfully ponder the asymmetric engagement between
“North” and “South”, particularly between Europe and Africa, and in
doing so, draw bold thoughts about the practice and the intentions of
institutions who intend to ‘support’ the ‘development’ of non-Western
economies, culture and art. Problematising the missions, intentions
and the work of such institutions, Enwezor questioned whether their
projects should not be understood as “projects of patronage rather
than projects of exchange”, thus prompting an interrogation of what he
called the Western “paradigm of developmentalism”.

The Berlin broadcast iteration of the Goethe-Institut conference
Latitude tackles these cogitations, and becomes an occasion to reflect
on the possibility of finding new ways to “explore and negotiate a new
kind of paradigm based on mutual interest in terms of exchange”.  One
that goes beyond what Enwezor calls a “tribute economy”, to which
people receiving support have to contribute and respond with
gratitude. The radio program refracts these asymmetries around a)
restitution and repair, b) institutionalised discriminations, c)
extractivism and inequality, and, in keeping with forced issues of the
day, a forth node is unfolded with d) decolonizing the infrastructures
of the internet.

How complicit are we in this asymmetrical game? To what extent might
we together formulate tactics to exercise substantial infrastructural
change? In what ways can geographies of counterinsurgency engage with
existing power structures? How do we articulate, listen and create the
conditions to be heard?

In taking to the airwaves, we propose crafting potent responses to
these queries, to navigate and inhabit the (im)possibility of
encounters between parallel lines through acoustic interventions that
can be amplified across Berlin’s airwaves and around the globe.

The radio programming is curated by Diana McCarty of reboot.fm, Elena
Agudio of SAVVY Contemporary and Marc-André Schmachtel, Judith
Schulde, Nepomuk Zettl and Georg Milz of the Goethe-Institut and
hosted by Natascha Anahita Nassir-Shahnian.

Technical Support and Production: Noémie Cayron, Guido Plonski & Pit Schultz.
Studio & Social Media: Sabrina Bader, András Körtvélyesi, Tore
Guldbransen and Nora Schäferhenrich.