TRADING ZONES is a series of events that sheds light on such common visual practices, problems and perspectives and asks how artistic research and ethnography can work together. The screenings, lectures and workshops are closely related to research projects currently being pursued at various ZHdK departments.
The question what is art and what ethnography is becoming obsolete. At the very latest when the camera comes into play. Artists explore different social formations, ways of acting, forms of knowledge and material cultures. Based on research, their work involves interviews and classical field research, for instance. On the other hand, ethnography is relying increasingly on sensual and visual practices — also with a view to art. For text-based forms of generating and imparting knowledge alone cannot adequately depict social reality. A shared field opens up at this border zone. It holds a potential — for explorations, experiments and reflections — that has not yet been exhausted.
Artistic and ethnographic work finds a common field where the camera is no longer merely an instrument of research (ethnography) or a visual medium (art).
Namely where photographic or cinematic images themselves become the sensory bearers of knowledge — knowledge that cannot easily be verbalised. Sometimes capturing plots or sequences of action with the camera requires technical precision. Sometimes fictional and documentary visual elements or objects begin to tell their own travel stories.