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Into safe space politics ’The art projects I was involved in or initiating were always close to forms of activism‘ – Swiss artist Marc Hunziker in conversation with Agnieszka Sural. Holding self-organised parties and combining art into a party format has become your thing. How did it all start? The teachers from the Zurich University of Arts, where I studied, provided me with a big space. Instead of using it as a production studio, Chantal Kaufmann, Rafał Skoczek and I turned it into a bar. We called it the Pool Bar. Once a week for almost two years, the whole city came to the art school for our parties and events. The money we raised was used to finance our art space in a squat – Up State. To us, this strategy was a parasitic form of self-organisation. We were then invited to hold shows at various institutions, where we also started to adapt that strategy. So in the end, parties weren‘t our artistic practice, nor did we create an ‘art as a party‘ format. Instead we used institutional frameworks to generate resources, and then redistributed those into our network. Were you living in the squat too? Yes, I have been living in squats for the last ten years. What is your artistic practice? Can you tell a bit about the various activities you are involved in? I carried out simple interventions in art spaces, changing the social functions and the influence that space can have on a person‘s
perception and behaviour. It‘s hard for me to talk about that at the moment as I am rather bored of art as an individual, studio practice. I also co-run a self-organised art and social space in a squat in Zurich called Up State. In historical origin, squatting and occupying abandoned buildings is a political act. It is not my artistic practice. The art projects I was involved in or initiating were always close to forms of activism. Last semester, I started to study philosophy and history at the University of Zurich, so sometimes I am also a student. Together with Nicola Kazimir, I am co-curating the label Gentrified Underground. And here in Warsaw I am on an artist-inresidency programme, I am being paid for that so I am an artist. What have you done during your sixmonth residency in Warsaw? The programme I am on is considered a research residency where I don‘t have to produce any end product. This is a very comfortable situation, a highly privileged one on one hand, and an absolutely crucial one when it comes to questions of extending the concept of art production. I have used the time for reading and writing. I have also enjoyed my stay here, with friends that visited me and people I have met in Warsaw. At the end of August, there is a second edition of the To Be Real project at the Ujazdowski Castle. You have been working on it together with the visual artist Zuzanna Czebatul and the DJ collective Syntetyk. What is the concept? It is difficult to talk about it in detail at this point. The curators of the project, Michał Grzegorzek and Mateusz Szymanówka, are bringing people together at the Ujazdowski Castle to explore the potential of rave and its
