Transmediale cancels Janez Jansa event

In summer 2007, three artists officially changed their name to Janez Jansa. The Signature event context for the Transmediale art event wanted to address the marking of the Holocaust memorials in Berlin in response to this years’ festival theme CONSPIRE, which seeks to, “question, subvert, undermine and bypass the unspoken rules, hidden codes of conduct and assumed truths entrenched within our information driven communication cultures and ideological belief structures.” The act of banning such a performance felt into the ground of what conspiracy really means and has suffered most definitely from an act of censorship.

Transmediale festival director Stephen Kovats has canceled the opening event of the artistic group Janez Jansa, Janez Jansa and Janez Jansa. Such most accurate reason for banning this performance should shed even more light on attaching signatures to public monuments as well as to artistic freedom of expression.

Their performance consisted in walking with a GPS device between the memorial corridor in Berlin, both virtually and physically marking the path of the murdered Jews in Berlin. Anticipating the opening of the Trandmediale and the impossibility to disclose officially their engagement, signature of memory and signature of freedom enter into controversy.

Click here to watch their their signature event context