Blog - Queering the Collections

Lecture Joel Sanders about gender-neutral toilets and ‘non-compliant bodies’

The lecture of Joel Sanders about gender-neutral toilets and ‘non-compliant bodies’, is also known as project ‘Stalled!’, developed in cooperation with artist Susan Stryker.

‘Non-Compliant Bodies’ will explore the evolution of his thinking about the design consequences of an urgent social justice issue: the creation of inclusive public and private spaces that accommodate people of different ages, genders and abilities considered out of the cultural mainstream.

Non-Compliant Bodies: Social Equity and Public Space – 05.23.2017 from Center for Architecture on Vimeo.

More information about Queering Architecture and the project Stalled you can find here.

Call for collaboration – Smart Culture Application

Greetings colleagues,

I’m Eliza Steinbock Assistant Professor of Cultural Analysis at Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society. My research is broadly on transgender cultural production, with a book on trans cinema and affect called Shimmering Images, a Veni on trans portraiture practices in South Africa, Germany and Canada, and a Vidi application (in review) on activating the archives of transgender heritage through digitalization and artistic engagement.

I’m writing to invite you to consider joining in a Smart Culture grant application aimed at the creative industries, due on 5 Feb 2019. If you are keen to be involved, I’ll have a partner meeting on Friday 14 December, 2-5pm, location in Amsterdam TBA. You are being reached because I see great potential in collaborating together to make a mutually enriching project. After participating recently in a Smart Culture Working Conference as workshop leader on “Art & Inclusion: Queer Community” I feel very encouraged that this kind of project with a consortium of experts on queer art and heritage stands a good chance of being funded.

This call is demand driven by the private and public sector, and also aims at creating networks and strengthening them within the creative sector. The knowledge base between HBO and WO is also encouraged to consolidate through joint research proposals. For instance, this application could be joint between Leiden University and the Reinwardt Academie, with myself as the main applicant on behalf of a consortia represented by partners such as ARIAS, members of Queering the Collections such as IHLIA and the van Abbe Museum, the International Institute for Social History, and the If I Can’t Dance arts organization, amongst others. Additionally, the call specifically requests a focus on the role of the “maker” within the chain from creation to production to reception.

For these reasons and with this blend of potential partners, I would like to propose working together on the topic of gender and sexual diversity heritage and the way it’s existence, definition, and preservation has potentially specialized archival demands on the institution.

How should we understand these demands from material and visual culture and how to best respond to them and the communities from which they come from and which they continue to shape and inform as points of identification? Increasingly artists are invited in to create space within heritage sites to reflect on archival collections’ structures of inclusion and exclusion and to critically articulate or expose absences, missing materials and voices. But artists also generate new documents and add to archives. In what ways do these artistic actions allow for transgender and queer sensibilities to be detected or embedded within the process of collection, from selection, procurement, documentation, search functions and metadata, onto the presentation of material and visual culture? Who could be determined as the maker here? Is the “maker” of such sensibilities and insight an assemblage of the material and visual heritage object, together with specialists of the collection, together with artistic researchers?

I would like to apply for 1 and maybe 2 PhD positions, with research to be conducted at the van Abbe (on cruising the museum) and at IHLIA (on transgender heritage). I have scouted these potential PhDs.

Other possible activities/material costs could involve workshops on experimental and action-oriented methods drawing from artistic researchers, and a performative symposium on centering transgender and queer sensibilities. My hope would be that the project’s funding and organization would facilitate the ongoing skills sharing and research generated within the partners of the Queering the collectives network, the ARIAS initiative of Artists & Archives meetings, and to create a platform for fostering experimental, artistic and action-oriented research into archives. Please share your wishes and dreams!

At this point, I am interested to talk to researchers/platforms/institutions who can take up one of the following roles within this project:

I’m looking for up to two co-applicants who are permanent or temporary throughout the duration of the project at a Dutch University or University of Applied Sciences.
Looking for ‘private and public funders’ in cash and ‘in kind’: This project requires 10% of its budget (500.000) matched by private funding amounting to 50.000 EUR, 5% in kind (promise to put in hours, equipment, etc) and 5% in cash. It can be covered by, for example 5 partners, or just one. A ‘private partij’ does not need to be a company. It could also be a ZZP’er, a design agency, and even a museum or a gallery (if they have a ‘ANBI’ status).
Looking for public partners’, who can bring in their expertise in finding the right forms of exhibiting, showing and giving visibility to this research, and who can co-host and co-curate the workshops and ‘performative symposium’ envisioned in this project.
Looking for ‘community advisors’ – who endorse the project and will give feedback during our midterm moment, and possibility other roles.

Obviously I’m working here on a short deadline; so if you have questions or concerns, please feel free to reach out by telephone: 0617190031.

Benno Premsela in het Stadsarchief Amsterdam

Op Coming Out Dag, ieder jaar op 11 oktober, plaatste het Stadsarchief Amsterdam in 2018 een artikel over Benno Premsela. Er wordt ook even stilgestaan bij de expositie ‘Show Yourself, Benno Premsela 1920-1997’ van het Stadsarchief in 2008.

Over Benno Premsela

Benno werd op 4 mei 1920 geboren als jongste in het gezin van Bernard en Rosalie Premsela, een vrijzinnig joods, socialistisch gezin. Bernard Premsela was seksuoloog en opende in 1931 het eerste Nederlandse consultatiebureau voor seksuele problemen en geboortebeperking. Ook kreeg hij in die jaren bekendheid met een serie causerieën voor de Vara-radio.

Kort na de februaristaking wist Premsela onder te duiken. Tijdens zijn onderduik maakte Benno leren damestassen. Behalve tassen maken viel er weinig anders te doen dan schrijven om zijn handschrift te verbeteren, bridgen en lezen. Na de oorlog ging Premsela op de meubelafdeling van de Bijenkorf werken. Naast zijn werk als ontwerper hield Premsela zich ook als binnenhuisarchitect bezig met ruimtelijke vormgeving. Bekend is de boekhandel van zijn broer Robert Premsela, door Benno Premsela in 1945 ontworpen.

Premsela genoot een grote bekendheid als voorvechter van homo-emancipatie. In 1947 werd hij lid van het COC. In tegenstelling tot wat toen gebruikelijk was, gebruikte hij geen schuilnaam maar zijn echte naam.

Dit komt uit de inleiding van de beschrijving van het archief van Benno Premsela. Meer lezen? Ga naar de site van het Stadsarchief.

Words Matter

Last Thursday the Research Center for Material Culture published their (unfunished) guide ‘Words Matter’ at the Tropenmuseum. We were pleased to see Queering the Collections is mentioned in an essay by Eliza Steinbock.

The Tropenmuseum hosted both an afternoon event with pitches and workshops by heritage-, museum- and archive professionals on how they deal with the constantly changing social historical context of words, as an evening event where the guide was officially presented.

The guide focuses on words and phrases used in colonial and ethnographic museums. The Research Center for Material Culture invites everyone for critical feedback and is open for discussion on all the words used.

The Christopher Street Liberation Day March

On June 28, 1970, one year after the Stonewall uprising, the Christopher Street Liberation Day March stepped off from its starting point at Washington Place, between Sheridan Square and Sixth Avenue in Greenwich Village.

Learn more about this important day and place in history.

Photo: Christopher Street Liberation Day March, entering Central Park, June 28, 1970. Photo by Michael Evans via The New York Times.

Foto uit archief scheepstimmerman

Dit brieffragment komt uit de collectie van persoonlijke documenten van een homoseksuele scheepstimmerman die een reis maakte aan boord van de ‘Johan van Oldenbarnevelt’ van de Stoomvaart-Maatschappij ‘Nederland’ (SMN), in 1959/60. Op de foto staat niet de man in kwestie.

Na zijn overlijden in 2008 ontving het Maritiem Museum Rotterdam (een deel van) zijn persoonlijk archief dat onder andere bestaat uit zijn verslag De reis om de wereld in 80 dagen met de Johan van Oldenbarnevelt. Dit bevat niet alleen zijn aantekeningen, de tekst van speeches die hij hield en zijn brieven die hij verstuurde aan zijn familie, maar daarin is ook beeldmateriaal te vinden: vakantiekiekjes en natuurlijk foto’s van de werkzaamheden en zijn vrijetijdsbesteding aan boord. Dit allemaal afgewisseld met commentaar en prentbriefkaarten.

Een paar van zijn foto’s zijn gebruikt voor een film van ongeveer vijftien minuten over zeelieden die allemaal op hun eigen wijze vertellen over hun ‘lustervaringen’. De makers, Saskia Boddeke en haar partner de regisseur Peter Greenaway, interviewden hiervoor zeelui van vroeger en nu, mannen en vrouwen, homo’s en hetero’s en zeelui in technische en civiele beroepen.

De film is onderdeel van de tentoonstelling Sex & The Sea die is ontwikkeld door het Maritiem Museum Rotterdam

In verband met de privacy wordt de naam van de scheepstimmerman niet vermeld.

Brieffragment homoseksuele scheepstimmerman

De film is onderdeel van de tentoonstelling Sex & The Sea die is ontwikkeld door het Maritiem Museum Rotterdam.

In verband met de privacy wordt de naam van de scheepstimmerman niet vermeld.

Network meeting Queering the Collections @Van Abbe Museum

Participants:
Daniel Neugebauer (DN – Van Abbe Museum), Marleen Hartjes (MH – Van Abbe Museum / Studio-i), Celeste * (C – intern MH), Machteld Jurriaans (MJ – City Archives A’dam / IHLIA), Danielle Kuijten (DK – Imagine IC), Hannah Oosterhout (HO – Reinwardt student / Fries Museum Leeuwarden), Mirjam Sneeuwloper (MS – Amsterdam Museum), Olle Lundin (OL – Van Abbe Museum), Geralda Jurriaans (GJ - Allard Pierson Museum), Sam * (S – Reinwardt student), Henri Sandront (HS – Stedelijk Museum), Lonneke van de Hoonaard (LH – IHLIA), Anne * (A – Master Gender Studies), Alice Venir (AV – Queer Residency Project), Charles Esche (CE – Van Abbe Museum). 

Report: M. Jurriaans, on the basis of the minutes by K. Schram

Introduction

The meeting at the Van Abbe Museum on the 14th of March 2018, was called into life to establish continuity for the network and to not lose momentum. In the previous network-meeting (Tropenmuseum, 17/11/2017), the participants spoke about visions and goals for the network. Now the same visions and goals needed to be pinpointed and turned into a sustainable reality.

Our host was the Van Abbe Museum (VAM) with Daniel Neugebauer as moderator. Unfortunately, this was also DN’s farewell-meeting since he was hitched by Berlin.

DN gave us a warm welcome and an introduction to the current visions of the VAM. Their director, CE, has encouraged the museum-employees to actively engage in the field of queering. Decolonization of museum-practices is also one of the priorities of the museum for 2018-2020. The museum is challenged into being deviant, using the term deviant in the broadest sense including both mental and physical deviancies of visitors, employees, practices and research. The staff has responded in great enthusiastic manners to this challenge. DN’s ended his introduction with giving thanks to the Queering the Collections network and emphasizing the importance of this network, by giving examples of current LGBTI-violence in the news (the hatred against the Suit Supply campaign and the killing of Orlando Boldewijn).

The meeting was continued by a quick introduction-round of all the participants. In this round the participants told the others quickly either what they are doing already, are planning on doing, or explicitly are not doing around queering.

MH spoke about Studio-I: a platform for an inclusive culture within museums where the know-how is shared. DK works on filling gaps in collections and archives. She also noted that an exhibition is not an end-destination, but rather a starting point to collect more. MS started with queering, without naming it so, back in 2013/2014. She investigates ways to give a proper representation of all communities at the Amsterdam Museum. OL is the coordinator Queer Constituency at the VAM and fights both with as against the museum. GJ expressed how the APM is currently not invested with queering and she is looking for ways to introduce the museum to a more inclusive vision. HS organizes public events for the SM from a LGBTQI angle.

LH, director of IHLIA, spoke only later about her plans around the 40th jubilee of IHLIA and CE, director of VAM, expressed his feelings on how we are all partially queer and in some way part of a minority. He spoke about that we need to remind ourselves that queering is not a vast concept and that we consistently need to construct, deconstruct and reconstruct our ideas on queering and inclusiveness. Next to the work field professionals, there were enthusiastic students and interns present that all have a focus on the research and theoretical framework of queering.

Continuity

Tour

MJ gave a short recap of last meeting where there was a lot of talking about plans, but nothing became really concrete yet. The network needs leadership, someone that pulls it all together and makes sure the network doesn’t lose momentum. However, who has time to take up that role? For now, it looks like we will all carry the load partially.

At the last meeting the participants spoke about expanding outside of Amsterdam and to become more intersectional. If museums need to be inclusive in an active manner, so does the network. The first step outside of the Amsterdam-bubble was the visit to the VAM, and the start of the ‘tour du QtC network’.

To keep this going, MJ asked for three future locations for the next nine months. DK invited us all to come mid-June to IIC, when they will have opened a new exhibition on resistance in Amsterdam Zuidoost. HS followed with an invitation for in October. MS wanted to know dates, so she could plan a network-outing to a different city, as a third location for December/January. MJ will keep in touch, to see if per network-meeting certain themes should be discussed.

Agenda

1. Imagine IC – Mid June
2. Stedelijk Museum – End of September/beginning of October
3. Organized by Amsterdam Museum on a different location – December 2018/January 2019

Toolkit

MJ continued the conversation with bringing up the toolkit, as proposed during the previous meeting. Our network is about sharing knowledge, finding inspiration, collecting what institutions do around queering and finding out why institutions are not interested in queering and how to change that.

In the previous meeting Riemer Knoop opted for a Queering Toolkit. We know there is a major blind spot at both large and small institutions/museums. How can we challenge that? And if we want to bring a Queering Toolkit to life; what should this include? It is clear that museums need something physical to work with, like a reader, a game, a booklet or a workshop.

Currently, multiple people are brainstorming separately from each other on toolkits and frameworks. These researches need to be brought together, to see what toolkit might work the best for QtC. Also, it was noted that lots of Reinwardt students are researching queering, however all separately from one another which is perhaps something that needs to change. Internationally, there are lots of researches and projects/processes around queering that needs to be collected.

A workgroup, formed out of professionals and students, should come together to make an inventory of all the current research around toolkits and to then distill to a few options. Next to that, the participants were all asked to pitch ideas for toolkits and send it to KS.

Workgroup

1. Kevin Schram
2. Machteld Jurriaans
3. Rose Loogman (intern IHLIA)
4. Marleen Hartjes
5. Sam * (Reinwardt student)

To do

Email Kevin Schram, queering@ihlia.nl, with ideas/pitches/inventories for the Toolkit.

MH suggested that Studio-I could work as a resource for QtC, since they collect best practices from museums around inclusiveness. Queering processes will also be collected, and museums can present their projects and processes.

Expanding the network

To move outside of the Amsterdam Bubble and to become more intersectional, the participants are all asked to invite a ‘museum-buddy’ to the next meeting from a museum, preferably outside of Amsterdam.

Another thing that was noted, was that the current participants were happy with these meetings to find out what everyone is doing around this topic. Someone needs to take initiative to collect these processes, also when we are not meeting one another. These could be collected for Studio-I but also for IHLIA. With showing what kind of processes exist at the ‘competitors’, the network will also stand stronger when inviting new museums to the network.

A first step for new museums to the network, LH stated, would be for them to create a series of events around Pride. However, to represent the complete society should be an all around the year obligation, and not during a time when it is an ‘hot topic’. Also, as Wayne Modest in the previous meeting stated, the network should possibly expand their vision on queering by including to ‘rethink the concept of gender’. This could perhaps appeal to new institutions as well.

To do

Bring a buddy

Presentations

LH gave a short talk about the 40th jubilee of IHLIA and her vision to have an exhibition mid October 2018 at the ObA. The exhibition will also travel outside of Amsterdam at different archives and libraries within the country. IHLIA wants to critically reflect on their own history of activism and research the movement, knowing very well LGBTQI activism has not been and is not always intersectional.

IHLIA is also looking for partners for collecting stories and objects for the exhibition. For this they are also teaming up with Imagine IC.

AV spoke about the Artist in Residency/Queer Residency, made possible by a donation from the Vrienden en Vriendinnen van de Schorerstichting, where they hope to include three artists that connect or are from the trans* and intersex communities. Research points will be ‘why am I here?’, ‘what is my relation to the collection’, ‘who benefits by my presence?’. The works will be presented in September, together with a conference.

OL and DN spoke about the Queer Reading Group and how queer-themes are discussed within the museums and how it then is shaped into the collection presentation. They took us to collection where questions were pitched to re-shape the way you look at collections and the way you look at your own ideas.

Recap to do list

1. Mark the dates (when they are released) for the upcoming QtC meetings.
2. Bring a buddy to these meetings.
3. Email your ideas/sources around museums toolkits, specifically around LGBTQI to queering@ihlia.nl