Student projects — Sascha Alexandra Zaitseva

Die Brotskulptur – eine heldenfreie Begegnung

Als Reaktion auf die politischen Ereignisse im Februar 2022 haben wir einen Raum geschaffen der ohne Helden auskommt. Wir beschlossen eine Art von Feminismus zu leben der sich außerhalb des Ereignisvollen und Heldenhaften bewegt. Wir haben Räume gestaltet die Platz für Begegnungen und inspirierende Gedanken hatten, die frei von Gewalt und zweifelhaften Heldentum waren. Dabei ließen wir uns von dem Text von Ursula K Lequin “The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction” inspirieren. Wir haben Gefäße geformt und eine Brotskulptur erfunden, diese Erfindungen wurden ein Teil unseres Rituals im Hof der Universität der Angewandten Kunst in Wien. Platons Text — “Das Gastmahl” begleitete unser Handeln.

Sticky Fingers — Summer School 2022

A collaboration of the Social Design Studio (Brigitte Felderer / University of Applied Arts Vienna) with the ENUTC-Project “TRUSTMAKING: Young creators and responsibilities for the new green transition” and the Ceramics Studio of the University of Applied Arts Vienna

During the last two years city dwellers – especially youth – in particular yearned for being outside, for free expanses to move and be moved. The perception of open respectively public spaces in dense urban areas thoroughly changed with limited options of consumption. Urban qualities are not only evolving around possibilities to eat, drink and shop but rather around literally immaterial qualities which are transmitted by other people – of all generations –, by plants, by animals, by sensual experiences, by narratives, invisible systems, routines and rituals, rhythms, anchor points, by history and, of course, a prospect of an imaginable future. Urban structures are shaped by the interplay of their multiple layers. But layers opening up to qualities of “lieux infinis” (Encore Heureux) are adding to an atmosphere, to social density and cohesion, are communicating notions of in- as well as ex-clusion, of potentials and of unplanned possibilities of (urban) development and its infra-structure.

Wo ist die Innen*stadt? — (re)name the space

2021 student project — Lahmer/Van Houtert/Assinger/Goidinger/Stocker/Zaitseva

Wo ist die Innen*stadt? — (re)name the space
2021 student project — Lahmer/Van Houtert/Assinger/Goidinger/Stocker/Zaitseva
Elsa Plainacher Collective – named after a women, who was publically burned as a „witch“ in Vienna – carried out a participatory action in Seestadt. On Wangari-Maathai-Square, street signs with the names of female protagonists were made from the „Karlsplatz-clay“ that was excavated in the course of the construction of the Vienna subway in the 70this, and that was made available to the ceramic studio. As a feminist criticism of the male-dominated urban order, the signs were distributed in the city center.

Photos: Annalena Stocker/Sascha Alexandra Zaitseva

Wo ist die Innen*stadt?

Fluid ceramics — Keramik im Fluss

2021 — student project — as part of the course feminist philosophy and ceramics in action with Maria Bussmann and the students of the university of applied arts

2021 student project Zaitseva/Bussmann
Thinking, researching, philosophizing: feminist! In a new form we want to do both; form thoughts and form ideas, give space to intersection, networking, exploration. When Helene Cixous calls for an „Ecriture feminine“ in „The laugh of the Medusa“, or evokes Homeric epics and heroes in the tenderly painful description of her mother‘s dying („Ma Ho-mère est morte“), images can transform directly into SOUND and FORM. What emerges is nothing less than a claim to a new feminist sculpture. The work was done with Viennese clay from Karlsplatz, after which the molded material was returned to the Vienna River to dissolve.