29.05.2022 –, Welcome Sprache: English
the Brethren of purity is a mysterious group of scholars that's speculated to be founded between the 9-10 century in present day Iraq. Their importance stems from the ideas they expressed through their anonymous letters that were opposing to their social and political environment at the time.
To me the significance of the brethren stems from the fact that it was ahead of its time, which is easily observed through the letters they exchanged amongst themselves and through which they tackled political, philosophical and existential issues from a different perspective, which was punishable by law back then. Many of the topics they discussed and theories the proposed were later taken and developed by scholars from all over the world, especially in Europe.
What also interests me is the form of community they created, which still holds influence till this day. a community driven on reflection, criticism, philosophy and based on tolerance and openness.
Using a text talking about the brethren and excerpts from their own letters I will start a conversation with you tackling the topic of western orientalism which depicted the east in a specific way neglecting the influence of such contributions to the human civilisation, and the Eurocentric view that puts Europe in the center when it comes to academic or scientific theories on political and social causes, ending the lecture with a view on the idea of a community and what it meant for the brethren and what it means to us now in those dire times.
Najwa Ahmed (1989): Is a conceptual, visual, land artist and a writer. born, born in Palestine and based in Berlin since 2 years, after what seems like an endless odyssey in the asylum process. Through their theater work "not mine and other stories” with KAAI studios in Brussels, they tackled issues of displacement and white saviourism, while in "where do we land now?” With Transfo/Collect they worked with collective memory as home to people from refugee/migration backgrounds. In their short films such as "Ready-made bodies", "silence" and "Zehra on the roof” they worked with queer identity politics and the consumption culture of bodies. While In their land art they delve into the changing but rooted connection in between nature and humans, a connection that’s being endangered due to our human ego, power lust and idiocy.
But In their writing and performance such as "the watermelon resistance”, "how dance moves my gender euphoria” Najwa takes a personal step within and revisits the preconditioning they went through in regards to their sexual identity and queerness, sometimes only to reflect and sometimes to deconstruct.