A FIVE-DAY GUEST APPEARANCE IN THE MAIN FOYER OF THE CITY THEATRE
As the first public event and official launch of the art project ROTVÄLTA / performance, the artist invites an interested public to five early summer evenings in the Main Foyer of the Gothenburg City Theatre in June 2025. Each evening, she will host two different “performances.” These are conversations with individuals who have formal knowledge of the historical, social, and political ideas that have shaped the city and the site. After each conversation, the audience is given time to participate, expand on, or challenge what has been said.
TIME: June 15–19, 2024
17:00–21:30
Doors open at 16:00
PLACE: Gothenburg City Theatre, Main Foyer
The event will be in Swedish. Tickets can be bought from the Stadsteatern box-office from the 15th of May. The cost covers only a light meal served during the break between the two conversations.
PRELIMINARY PROGRAM:
Sunday 15/6:
- Senior lecturer at the Institute for Film and Literature at Linnaeus University, Erik Florin Persson, will show excerpts from propaganda films commissioned by the City of Gothenburg between 1930 and 2015. These films reflect the gradual development of the Swedish welfare state. But they also reveal how the Gothenburg municipality continuously constructs a self-image of the city to influence various target audiences.
- Architectural historian and heritage consultant at Thyrén Architects, Stina Hagelqvist, “reads” Götaplatsen for us: she identifies the various components that make up the site and explains how they connect this square to entirely different places and ideas of a city. We will also discuss the power dynamics and social relations of the planning phase that may have shaped the form of the plaza.
Monday 16/6:
- Historians from the Department of Historical Studies at the University of Gothenburg, Lars Nyström and Erik Hallberg, add nuances to some of the urban legends about Gothenburg that have long shaped the city’s self-image - such as "The Gate to the West," "The Economic Miracle of Sweden." They offer an expanded view of Gothenburg’s role and DNA, when seen from an economic, geo-strategic, and regional perspective, and currently as a “Second City” of Sweden.
- Head of Urban Development at the West Sweden Chamber of Commerce, Christina Heikel, will give us the imagery of a future Gothenburg, a target image among West Swedish business leaders and industries envisioning contemporary Gothenburg. We will discuss how these target images relate to issues such as the effects of climate change or social sustainability.
Tuesday 17/6:
- Curator and Head of Archives and Library at the Hasselblad Foundation, Andreas Hagström, will unfold why and how institutions for art were given such a prominent placement at Götaplatsen. What was the role intended for artists? How was the reach of the Art Gallery influenced by the location at Götaplatsen? What does Götaplatsen mean for the city’s current art scene?
- Senior Adviser MFA Photography at HDK-Valand, the University of Gothenburg, and visual artist, Annika von Hausswolff, shares her perspectives on the role of the punk movement in Gothenburg’s art and cultural life—and in her own practice. We will also discuss aspects of Gothenburg that can make it logical for artists to move away from the city—and then, just as logical, to return.
Wednesday 18/6:
- Historian at the Department of Historical Studies at the University of Gothenburg, Jan Christensen, addresses various systemic economic, social, and power-related divides that have characterised Gothenburg since it was founded. We also discuss if and how these divides also have produced a general ambivalent relationship towards people from other cultures.
- Sociologist, Associate Lecturer, and researcher at the School of Education, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Halmstad University, Majsa Allelin, will relate the development of the Swedish welfare state and the transformations associated with the turn toward market adaptation, to introduce how this shift affects the scope for action and the everyday life of youth living in socially vulnerable neighbourhoods today.
Thursday 19/6:
- Cultural analyst, rave researcher, and organiser of both the underground club Draupner and the gaming party Tidsvåg, Elisabeth Tegner, discusses the music scene for rock, synth, house, and techno in Gothenburg from the late 1960s to the 1990s—and the role of Götaplatsen during this period.
- Social anthropologist, author, and musician Anna Gavanas shares her perspective on Gothenburg as a cultural environment, informed by her books on electronic dance music history as well as her experiences as a researcher living abroad in the Netherlands, the UK, and the USA. We also talk about the culture brought to Gothenburg through labour immigration, concluding with examples from the Greek rebetiko tradition that Anna herself carries forward.
