Hyperunionisation

HYPERUNIONISATION is an international online platform aiming to foster a transnational network of groups, institutions and organisations focused on the rights of cultural workers in Europe and worldwide. The project is produced by AWI and has been supported by the European Cultural Foundation.

HYPERUNIONISATION aims at creating dialogue and mutual support between these entities, implementing effective solidarity practices for those presently in need, and activating a common learning process to analyse and share tools of ethical, political and legal nature that can help cultural workers to survive the contemporary crisis and in the long term. 

The HYPERUNIONISATION section on the website www.artworkersitalia.it, will host HYPERMATES, an ever evolving list—eeking to grow into a network—of the organisations working towards the defence of cultural workers’ rights in Europe and beyond. 

Within the frame of HYPERUNIONISATION, AWI will host the “HOW TO” ROUNDTABLES, a series of three online conversations among Italian, European and international art workers groups that are engaged in pushing for structural changes, applying political pressure in the cultural realm, and developing specific tools and strategies for institutional negotiation. 

The roundtables HOW TO STRIKE, HOW TO INSTITUTE and HOW TO GET PAID invite these organisations to dialogue among each other and with academics, legal experts, and other institutions. Through sharing urgencies and experiences, the goal is to strategise effective plans to pursue common objectives on a continental scale. Each “HOW TO” roundtable aims at being pragmatic in nature, reflecting upon one specific theme or tool, and bringing to light positive case studies that can potentially be implemented in different countries and contexts. 

If you would like to submit your organisation to HYPERMATES please get in touch at [email protected] 

The roundtables will be broadcast via Zoom and YouTube and archived on AWI’s website. The outcomes of the dialogues will be collected in three detailed reports published on the online platform cheFare, agency for cultural transformation, media partner of the project. The guests of the roundtables will be announced soon. 

Stay tuned! 

PROGRAM

5 December at 4pm CET
HOW TO STRIKE
Moderated by Vincenzo Estremo [AWI]
Zoom link 

The first roundtable intends to investigate the common genealogy of work in the present medialised world, sharing tactics of self-organization and strategies of legitimisation concerning different categories of workers. In the face of the flexibility, “platformisation”, and parceling out of interpersonal relations that have redefined contemporary work, art and art workers pose themselves as interested observers trying to understand what active role they can play in a wider panorama of social movements. The roundtable intends to bring into dialogue the experiences of gig workers with the attempts to organise and protest in the artistic field. From

an intersectional point of view and using the protests held internationally by riders as a starting point, the roundtable aims to establish a transversal community based on dialogue and the sharing of tools of protests and struggles. “HOW TO STRIKE” wishes to intercept and publicly share a common will of all workers in redefining the terms and conditions of a new and more ethical statute of labour.

The first roundtable takes place on the “Giornata del Contemporaneo”, a yearly occasion promoted by AMACI – Associazione dei Musei d’Arte Contemporanea Italiani to celebrate contemporary art in Italy. 

12 December at 6pm CET
HOW TO INSTITUTE
Moderated by Justin Randolph Thompson [AWI]
Zoom link 

The second roundtable will focus on the creation of new institutions as a strategy for the centering of values that are dismissed by canons and master narratives and as a tactic for fostering an alternative to access and integration into pre-existing structures. Thinking about pluralised historical narratives, alternative forms of education and the activist role of mediation from within cultural institutions, the conversation reflects upon geo-political gatekeeping and transnational conversations rooted in local realities. How can we create models and templates for the change we want to see? How can we re-calibrate the value attributed to cultural workers and to marginalized communities through forms of institution building? What are the limitations to the infiltration of institutions in order to promote radical change from within? 

19 December at 4pm CET
HOW TO GET PAID
Moderated by Ilaria Conti [AWI]
Zoom link 

The third roundtable of HYPERUNIONISATION focuses on how to develop collective tools that guarantee the fair remuneration of art workers’ material and non-material labour. The conversation will discuss the models currently used in European and non-European contexts and translatable strategies to be applied within the Italian system. By considering how to design successful systems of compensation, ensure their implementation across public and private organizations, and address the diverse needs of art workers, the roundtable will also problematise the remuneration tools that AWI is currently developing, which include compensation charts and contractual models to be used by workers and institutions nation-wide.