Clare Butcher talk at Peppermint
Peppermint contains the office library of Lucius and Annemarie Burckhardt, who extolled 'strollology' > a ‘walking science' promoting walking through the landscape as a means of learning, e.g. who is planning the planning? someone in an office can't understand that / influenced by the peripatetic school of Athens > hence the choruses of documenta
the emphasis on disorientation with documenta draws attention to the surfaces of the map and highlight that there are many ways of getting to a certain location / there was an intent to produce a ‘map’ as a score or script rather than as a set of directions
calling guided tours of documenta “walks" (rather than “guided tours”) was an attempt at altering their rhetoric; similarly, guides within documenta form ‘the chorus’
the term for guide in german is führer, which was potentially problematic, however having to translate things into three languages brought all possibilities into the mix > variously, the chorus was known as ‘sirens’, ‘army’, ‘resourceful humans’
in ancient Greece, the ‘chorus’ comprised non-professional members in theatre acting as a kind of conduit between the actors and the public > this was though interesting in terms of power relations (e.g. who listens and who talks)
the 'middle voice’ (between passive and active) doesn't give a clear sense of who is the subject and what is the action > the chorus is in some way the middle voice between art works and the public
the chorus have become a political force, they'll arrange themselves and unionise > a symposium :)
Re: Greece, Adam Szymczyk was adamant that documenta was not about building bridges > IT IS NOT A DIPLOMATIC MISSION
Re: Narrowcast House ("narrow" as opposed to “broad”cast), it was wondered how radio could be used in “an inverse way” (i.e. radio is typically a one-way thing) > the space is used as place for conversation and education