a calling, a celebration

The performance program expands the exhibition displays, queering the stability of the biennial format by playing with ephemeral and durational rhythms of presentation. Because of its bodily, celebratory and intensified features, performance programs design places of communal experimentation, instances of possibility where social formations can emerge and be rehearsed in shared manners.

The opening performance program is organised in two successive moments: day-time and night-time. The day program, a calling, serves as a welcome device, introducing key narratives of the biennial and concentrating attention towards a ceremonial and liminal moment of the opening-as-event. The nocturnal program a celebration is a social gathering. It echoes the night as a haven of various others and manifests the biennial’s celebratory embrace towards the unknown.

– João Laia, Curator Göteborg International Biennial for Contemporary Art 2023

The performance program, a calling, a celebration, took place during the opening of forms of the surrounding futures September 16, 2023.