Cem A.: Crit Club
Crit Club is a contextual performance conceived by Cem A., also known as @freeze_magazine, that holds space for playful disagreements by inviting guests to debate impossible art-related questions.
Participants in this performative panel are Nikola Bojić, Bettina Freimann, Fette Sans, Abbas Zahedi, and moderator is Cem A.
Convened in a debate format, speakers are asked to navigate uncharted territories through roleplay and quick thinking, asking them to take a side on an intentionally unrealistic question: is technology good for the arts?
Cem A. is an artist with a background in anthropology. He is known for running the art meme page @freeze_magazine and for his site-specific installations. His work explores themes such as virality and performativity, often through collaborative projects.Cem A.’s selected solo exhibitions and installations include Louisiana Museum, Barbican Centre, ZKM Karlsruhe, Berlinische Galerie, Künstlerhaus Bethanien and Museum Wiesbaden. His work was also included in documenta fifteen, Istanbul Modern, Mudam Luxembourg, Klima Biennale Vienna and 14. Biennial of Young Artists, Museum of Contemporary Art Skopje. He has held lectures at Royal College of Art London, HEAD Geneva, HDK Valand and Universität der Künste Berlin.
Bettina Freimann is an independent curator and the project manager of the 9th Triennial of Photography Hamburg 2026. As co-curator of the artspace Âme Nue, she has realized numerous exhibitions in Hamburg featuring international and local artists and photographers between 2016-2021. Among them were Moshtari Hilal, Robin Hinsch, Joséfa Ntjam, Lu Yang, Tabita Rezaire, Buhlebezwe Siwani, Lorna Simpson, Hoda Tawakol, and Ye Funa. Since 2021, she has been working as an independent curator and has realized solo shows for photographers Claudius Schulze Traces of Fragility and Parisa Azadi Ordinary Grief as part of the 8th Triennial of Photography Hamburg 2022. She was part of the curatorial team of the ClimateArtFest 2022, curated the performance Seeing / Unseeing with Isaac Chong Wai and the group show Clear River, Calm Sea as part of CHINA TIME 2022 and the group show In Our Hands featuring works by AVAH Collective, Ursula Biemann, and Rami Hara at Fotofestiwal Lodz.
https://www.instagram.com/bettina.freimann/
Nikola Bojić, PhD, is an artist and researcher exploring space, technology, and the futures. His projects have been shown internationally, including at the Triennale di Milano, Venice and Taipei Biennials, Moderna Museet, ZKM, and Kunsthalle Baden-Baden. He was a visiting lecturer at ACT / MIT and currently works as an assistant professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb. He holds a postgraduate MA from Harvard GSD, and his dissertation deals with the production of space.
Abbas Zahedi (b. 1984, London, UK), studied medicine at University College London, before completing his MA at Central Saint Martins in 2019. Abbas blends contemporary philosophy, poetics, and social dynamics with performative and new-media modes. Selected exhibitions include: Holding a Heart in Artifice, Nottingham Contemporary (2023); Metatopia 10013, Anonymous Gallery, New York (2022); The London Open 2022, Whitechapel Gallery, London (2022); Postwar Modern, Barbican, London (2022); Testament, Goldsmiths CCA, London (2022); Temporary Compositions, Gallery 31 Somerset House, London (2021); Yarmonics 2021, Great Yarmoth, UK (2021); D.E.VALUATION, Mécènes du Sud, Montpellier (2021); 11 & 1, Belmacz, London (2021). Abbas is an associate lecturer at the Royal College of Art (London), as well as teaching at universities across the UK and abroad.
Fette Sans has a conceptual and interdisciplinary practice that includes the production of images, writing, performances, online gestures, film-making, discussions, and installations. In 2021, she wrote, directed, and performed in the 45-minute film AGIRLICA. It premiered in the BrotFabrik kino as part of her solo exhibition at Neun Kelche in Berlin. It won the prizes for best smartphone film at the 2022 Mykonos Film Festival and for best experimental film at ARFF Paris. In 2017, she staged a 5-month-long performance in a room of the Hotel Zoo Berlin where she lived, at no cost, during the entire time. This extensive project brought forth a series of videos, books and objects. Her ongoing performative work The bitter ends of (the technologies of tenderness) was performed at HAUS (Vienna), during Organ Vida (Zagreb), and at the festival Montag Modus (Alte Münze, Berlin). She has been giving lectures at the Volksbühne in Berlin, at the Bauhaus University, and during the Istanbul Biennial. She has been the recipient of grants from Stiftung Kunstfonds, Akademie der Künst, and Kunststiftung NRW. Next year, she will take part in a 3-month-long residency at Malt Air in Denmark to develop a new film.
