Eroding Grounds #2 GHOSTSCAPES

OPENING RECEPTION 5 DECEMBER, 7.00 pm – 10.00 pm
An installation in the chapel features video essays on a loop and a series of photographs by artists and academics on ghost landscapes. The panel discussion will explore the question: Which ghosts from the past, present and an uncertain future manifest themselves in these shifting landscapes?

In 2026–2027, Extraleben will produce two theatre and dance projects under the title ‘Eroding Grounds’ and curate an art and discourse programme comprising three editions in collaboration with Kulturhaus Helferei. Each edition will feature various guest artistic contributions and host panel discussions with guests from the worlds of art, academia and activism. The aim is to understand our current crises as the culmination of various crises of exhaustion.

Welcome to the age of exhaustion!
Glaciers are eroding, bodies and minds are becoming exhausted, certainties are crumbling. Exhaustion and erosion are omnipresent. They manifest themselves in private life through rising numbers of burn-outs, in social and political life through the ‘erosion of democracies’, and in ecological terms through the exploitation of resources, the loss of landscapes and species extinction.
It is no coincidence that these states of exhaustion coincide with the climate crisis; indeed, we understand the climate catastrophe itself as the culmination of many individual crises of exhaustion. Value creation under capitalism can only be achieved through exhaustion: wage dumping, resource plundering, unpaid care work. This results in overburdened bodies, burnt-out minds, desolated landscapes and looming tipping points. Many people no longer believe that democratic societies can still find the right answers to the crises of our time. By 2026, three-quarters of the world’s population will be living in autocratically governed countries, and an increasing number of the remaining democracies are also at risk of sliding into authoritarianism. We speak of the ‘erosion of democracies’ when fundamental democratic values are being undermined and hollowed out from within. Authoritarian politics and far-right nationalist parties promise to return to former industrial greatness and hegemony by smashing climate protection and social justice – quite clearly and bluntly at the expense of the planet and of people. The environment, along with marginalised and vulnerable groups, are the losers of this petro-capitalism. Drill, baby, drill. The return to dominance and the ‘survival of the fittest’ leaves scorched earth in its wake. The disillusionment we feel seems itself to be part of the logic of exhaustion and political calculation: flood the zone with shit. Anyone stuck too deep in the shit won’t rise up. Resignation is spreading. Why should we even bother to stand up anymore? Even our visions of the future seem to be running dry in the face of our dwindling scope for action. We belong to the first post-war generation in the West that can no longer promise our children and future generations a ‘better’ future. The future is no longer a promise, but a threat.

With ERODING GROUNDS, we seek to understand exhaustion not as something that happens to occur frequently in our present day, but as a consequence of capitalist exploitation and policies of powerlessness. Our aim is to place personal, social and ecological narratives of loss within a collective space for negotiation. Art has the potential to engage with themes on a sensory level, to name things, to confront them and to make them visible. We regard exposing ourselves, together with the audience, to these frightening issues and finding forms of empowerment through storytelling as a strategy against powerlessness.