The East Side Freedom Library and FD13 invite you to Body Response: Artists and the Civil Disobedience Movement in Myanmar, a performance and discussion with artists Chaw Ei Thein and Moe Satt.

Register here to join the event on Zoom or watch it live streamed to ESFL’s Facebook page.

In February 2021, the military seized power in Myanmar (formerly Burma) in a coup. There have been popular protests, including strikes by trade unions and civil disobedience led by grassroots organizations. A multi-ethnic coalition has emerged within the resistance and immigrants to the U.S., especially our Karen neighbors, have been involved. Artists have been playing a leading role in the movement. Join us for an opportunity to witness and discuss some of this work.

Chaw Ei Thein (b. 1969, Yangon, Myanmar / lives and works Santa Fe, USA) has a multidisciplinary practice encompassing painting, installation and performance that thinks with the contradictions of her socio-political environment. She holds a degree in law from Rangoon University (1994), and was mentored in art from a young age by her father, artist Maung Muang Thein. She began participating in exhibitions and performance festivals in Myanmar and Southeast Asia in the mid-1990s. Chaw Ei Thein is the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships including Asian Cultural Council (ACC) and The International Studio and Curatorial Program (ISCP) (both New York City), and has exhibited her work at Asia House London (with Htein Lin) and Singapore Biennale (with Rich Steitmatter-Tran). Her artwork and voice can be found in numerous publications including Asian Art Now, Asian Art Achieve, Artforum, Art Asia Pacific, Yishu, C-Arts, The New York Times, and more.

Moe Satt (b. 1983, Yangon, Myanmar / lives and works Yangon) explores self, identity, embodiment and political resistance in a practice spanning performance, photography, sculpture, and video and sound installations. Moe Satt has held numerous residencies including at Para Site, Hong Kong (2013), Asian Cultural Council (2017), and Delphina Foundation, London (2019), and was shortlisted for the Hugo Boss Asian Art Prize (2015). Widely exhibited, group presentations include Busan Biennale (2012), A Journal of the Plaque Year, Kadist Art Foundation, San Francisco (2015), and Political Acts: Pioneers of performance art in Southeast Asia, Art Center Melbourne (2017). Recent solo exhibitions include If I Say It’s True Seven Times, Myanm/art, Yangon (2018) and Art Basel Hong Kong (Nova Contemporary) (2019). He founded Beyond Pressure International Performance Art Festival in Yangon, Myanmar in 2008.

The post-performance conversation will be led by Tun Myint Ph.D., who is an associate professor of Political Science at Carleton College, Minnesota. He was a student leader of the 1988 democracy movement in Myanmar and is a widely respected expert on the politics and society of the country. He served as a member of the Technical Advisory Team of the Federal Constitution Drafting Coordinating Committee. He is a co-founder of Mutual Aid Myanmar, founder and member of the editorial board of the Independent Journal of Burmese Scholarship, director of the Public Memory of Myanmar digital archive, and has contributed expert analysis on Burmese politics for media outlets, including PBS, Minnesota Public Radio, Radio Free Asia, CNN, and the BBC.

ESFL is pleased to be working with FD13, whose residency for the arts invites national and international multidisciplinary artists to Minnesota to create new, experimental work and present it live. Founded in 2016 as an itinerant program, FD13 foregrounds hospitality, collaboration, and experimentation, working closely with local partners from wide ranging fields of thought to craft individuated residences that provide artist fees, living and working space, and site-specific research and production support. Located on traditional, ancestral and contemporary lands of the Dakota and Anishanaabe, FD13 acknowledges Minnesota as Mni Sota Makoce, meaning Land Where the Water Reflects the Clouds in Dakota language. Visiting artists are invited to bring their ideas in relation with pasts, presents and futures specific to Minnesota’s human and more-than-human realms, conjuring dynamic relations amongst multiple audiences through both formal and informal talks, screenings, meals, performances, workshops, and more, culminating in a live event that brings each residency to a close.

Free and open to all