“The Royal Road to the (sub)Conscious is a four-week course dedicated to the ritual of “soft head-banging” and the practice of improvisation and adaptability as life tools in times of precarity. In contrast to the violent head-banging associated with death metal music, “soft head-banging” instead appropriates the gesture and transforms it by emphasizing bodily care. In the guided process of the workshop students are encouraged to amplify their movements and express their personal intentions with clarity to the furthest reaches of their capabilities and imagination.

The interdisciplinary online course will introduce practical tools and material methods to support a diverse studio practice. Exercises will be divided into four-weekly cycles that will progress over time, and will include: writing, collage, drawing, notation techniques, and ‘tea cups’—an exercise from the Chinese martial arts Bagua, a system for practicing a circular sequence of movements for managing multiple opponents at once. The process-oriented course is intended to reference durcharbeiten (a process of working through, by means of labor)—a method used in psychoanalysis whereby a person learns to accept elements of the unconscious to free themselves from a compulsion to repeat.” (Text & image by courtesy of Emma Waltraud Howes; photo: Archaic Remnants, 2020, photo collage)

Min. seats: 5 | Max. seats: 20 | Language: English