performingborders is a space for artistic research and creation, focused on notions and lived experiences of borders through international live art and performance practices.
Drawing from the knowledge shared by the contributors of the performingborders research-platform, performingbordersLIVE is a digital and live public programme of artist commissions, open calls, residencies, workshops, conversations, and events.
Curated by Alessandra Cianetti and Xavier de Sousa, performingbordersLIVE shares and supports experimental performative practices addressing notions and lived experiences of physical, cultural, juridical, racial, gendered, class, and everyday borders.
LADA’s director Lois Keidan was the very first interviewee of the platform, and LADA has been delighted to be a continued supporter of performingborders’ endeavours and explorations.
In 2020, performingbordersLIVE presented an online public programme of open calls, artist digital commissions, residencies, workshops, open conversations, and events, focusing on the exploration of experimental and exciting artistic practices happening within the UK Live Art sector around notions and lived experiences of physical, cultural, juridical, racial, gendered, class, and everyday borders.
Following a call for proposals, LADA collaborated with performingbordersLIVE to commission two digital conversations. The recipients of the commissions are the London-based performance artist and Chinese drag king Whiskey Chow, for a borderless digital conversation with US-based transmasculine artist Cassils about what art can do during and beyond global crises, and Sebastian Aguirre, Carolyn Defrin, Syowia Kyambi, and Elena Marchevska, for an open-ended series of digital discussions: a riot of short reflections on lived, precarious, migrant experience patched onto bigger discussions on feminism and care.
LADA and performingbordersLIVE commissioned a new performance to camera by the artist Tania El Khoury, and LADA supported and hosted the closing event Unbordering of performingbordersLIVE again this year, also including a performance to camera by Jade Montserrat and accompanying discussion with Chandra Frank; Collective Works, a workshop by Critical Interruptions, and There is no Time, an online discussion with performingbordersLIVE20 artists and writers in residence (Àníké Bello, Jade Foster, Istanbul Queer Art Collective, Jade Montserrat and The White Pube).
Watch Unbordering Documentation performingbordersLIVE20: full programme
In 2019 performingbordersLIVE presented a programme of events and artist commissions that sought to bring urgent conversations and extraordinary artistic practices happening within the UK experimental live art sector around notions of cultural, juridical, racial, gendered, class, physical, and everyday borders outside of the online realm with a programme of offline gatherings.
LADA co-commissioned two works for camera: Borderline Dialogue by Tara Fatehi Irani, and Moebius Stripping by Istanbul Queer Art Collective.
Watch the commissionsLADA also supported two commissions, programmed through open call, for digital conversations: All the Tea in China by Burong and Patrolling by Critical Interruptions.
LADA hosted Curating Borderless Spaces, a day of performances, commissioned premieres, talks, food, and provocations marking the culmination of the programme. Season Butler responded to the discussions and exchanges of the day through live writing and closed the event with a performative response to the day’s proceedings.
View Documentation of the 'Curating Borderless Spaces' presentationsLive Art UK: performingbordersLIVE | 2019
performingborders: Alessandra Cianetti & Xavier de Sousa on performingborders | LIVE 2019
LADA commissioned performingborders curator Alessandra Cianetti to compile and write this Study Room Guide exploring the notion of the border in relation to Live Art and the works of experimental artists, with a special focus on the current European situation and its multiple crises, in 2016.
performingborders hosts ongoing audio resources generated by its programmes and initiatives on a dedicated soundcloud page. These resources, which are added to frequently, are relevant to the issues and practices explored by the guide.
Read 'Performing Borders'Banner image credit:
performingbordersLIVE. Image by Mida design.
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