Civil Defense/Sivilforsvaret
Act 3: The Commission for the Good Solutions/Kommisjonen for de Gode Løsningene
The National Theater in Bergen, 2022
Foto: Guttorm Glomsås
sivilforsvaret_katalog_15.4.23.pdf |
Documentary of the stage performance:
The project was supported by: The Municipality in Bergen, Peace Foundation and International Women League of Peace and Freedom.
Who is entitled to talk about security policy?
Artists, activists and free thinkers are not known to be invited to the table where defense and foreign policy are developed. The world sets a record for military spending for the 7th year in a row. This, despite a pandemic and increasingly acute consequences of climate change. The commission consists of professionals with different educations, positions and approaches to security policy than what we are normally familiar with. This is an exercise in training the thought of another world. Like a UN General Assembly, seven women take the stage. Quite in its place, as long as fixed worldviews chain us to a conventional and nuclear armament spiral. Thinking beyond established worldviews and helping to create new horizons is an abstract and challenging work, which requires a sober exercise in deeper reflection. The theater room will challenge the commission members as well as the audience.
The Commission For The Good Solutions members : Fakhra Salimi, Amineh Kakabaveh, Marielle Leraand, Kari Jegerstedt, Elsa Kvamme, Vibeke Koehler and Shelmith Øseth. The artist Gitte Sætre put together this event on behalf of herself, Kunsthall 3,14 and the Antiwar-Initiative. The Commission for the Good Solutions had premiere at The National Theatre in Bergen on the day of the funeral of queen Elizabeth II,
It was a act of practicing a world without imperialism and a world beyond war. A match to practice humanity. The universe knows that humans are best trained to turn their backs against each other and make shameless demands. The seven women are fighting human nature not on the battlefield, not on social media. We are among the magical walls of the theatre. Poking into our collective consciousness and system of defense, as well as into our imagination. As an artist I invite different thinkers, as well as the audience, to join a commission of good solutions and into the currency of fantasy, stretching out our hand until we touch the first letter of F; the future that has not yet acquired its language. Who is entitled to talk about security policy?
Artists, activists, and free thinkers are not known to be invited to the table where defense and foreign policies are developed. That's why I put one together.
The Commission incorporates professionals with other educations, positions, and approaches to security policy. Like a UN General Assembly, seven women went on stage.
Thinking beyond established world-views and creating new horizons is an abstract and challenging work that requires a sober exercise in more profound reflection. The theatre room challenges its members as well as its audience. In the same way as the UN, the Commission will function as a creative normative space, which precisely enables consensus, a basis for social morality and international law.
Short bio of the members of the Commission for the Good Solutions:
The most controversial Swedish politician since Olof Palme, Amineh Kakabaveh. She is originally from Kurdistan and became world famous when she threatened to overthrow the Swedish government if they accepted Turkey's demand for the extradition of Kurds in Sweden in exchange for Swedish NATO membership. Kakabaveh represents freedom from our mimetic culture.
Author and filmmaker Elsa Kvamme. Elsa Kvamme has made 10 documentaries and she started the company SALT. Her work often look at the Second World War, the Holocaust, and the trauma the victims lived with afterward. Kvamme represents the power of narrative.
Head of the Mira Centre and human rights advocate, Fakhra Salimi. The Mira centre works to improve the living conditions of minority women and girls in Norway, and Salimi represents the people who must pay the price for Europe's security policy.
Opposition politician (Red) and anti-war activist Marielle Leraand, who resigned from SV for their support of Norway's war in Libya in 2011. Leraand represents people wanting to give UN Covenant a chance to work.
Head of Department for Women's and Gender Research at UiB, Kari Jegerstedt. Jegersted is particularly interested in, among other things, postcolonialism, queer theory, and South African literature and represents a feminist pedagogy.
Author and managing director of Bærekraftig Liv Norge, Vibeke Koehler, represents what lies beyond today's capitalism.
Dancer Shelmith Øseth represents human nature and the body's potential.