Invitation: From crisis to war – one year later
The words gathered through the OPEN CALL_IN THE ERA OF WAR will be used by visual artist Danae Stratou in the creation of an art video which will be presented at the event titled “From Crisis to War: One Year Later”, organised by mέta | Centre for Postcapitalist Culture, on Wednesday 22 February 2023 at 19:00, at the Serafeio Athletic & Community Complex of the Municipality of Athens, Ehelidon &, 144 Piraeus Street, Athens 118 54.
ABOUT THIS OPEN CALL
As if the pandemic crisis, climate emergency, peripheral wars and forced migrations were not enough, big power antagonisms take a most acute form, distracting humanity from facing its most pressing challenges and putting it at risk even of a nuclear escalation. Rabid nationalism gets normalised, entire populations and cultures get “cancelled”, free speech and the right to information get all the more restricted, economic life becomes painfully uncertain for the many, new barriers are being erected, millions of refugees are again on the run.
ABOUT ΤΗΙS EVENT
“From Crisis to War: One Year Later”
Serafio of the Municipality of Athens (19 Echelidon & 144 Pireos St.)
Wednesday 22 February 2023, at 7 p.m.
One year after the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the reality of war is becoming entrenched on the international stage. And it is a war that is not only taking place locally, but in fact globally. A war whose origins go back a long way and whose conduct is based not only on military but also on political, informational and, above all, economic means.
It is not difficult to discern in this war the ‘metastasis’ of the capitalist crisis, in which we have been immersed for a decade and a half, rhe attempt to ‘escape’ violently from this crisis and to change, just as violently, the power balance within and between states.
The cost is of course being paid primarily by the peoples who have been experiencing the military conflict, but not only by them. The energy and inflation crisis, the new ‘sacrifices’ required of thε unpriviledged classes the deterioration of democracy and public debate are the imprint of war on our own societies. War is in a way the reality we are already living in. And that is without even taking into account the real possibility of the opening of ‘side fronts’ or the nightmare of a generalised confrontation, possibly nuclear, which is threatened as never since 1962.
While the conflict takes on a self-fuelled escalation dynamic, while statesmen and the vast majority of journalists indulge in bellicose discourse, with no obvious ‘exit strategy’, the virtual non-existence (at least compared to what existed up to the beginning of the century), of an international pacifist movement, the dominance of conformist
discourse and the embarrassment, if not the division, of the Left of all versions.
It is urgent that the debate be brought back into its full context. There is an urgent need to distance ourselves from the role of NATO or Kremlin applauder. There is an urgent need to revitalise the pacifist movement. There is an urgent need to bring the aspirations of the peoples back to the fore. There is an urgent need to create a new Non-
Aligned Movement and a more just international order. It is urgent to end the perpetuation of the war in Ukraine. At a time when such issues of principle are at stake, getting bogged down in petty politics does not suit us.
With this in mind,
Admission is free. Simultaneous interpretation will be provided.
