ETALASE 2021
July 23-25, 2021
ETALASE 2021 is a space to circulate knowledge produced by women in the Indonesian archipelago, focusing on arts and culture with the spirit of crossing disciplinary, cultural, geographical, and generational boundaries. ETALASE is the initiative of Sekolah Pemikiran Perempuan (The School of Women’s Thought, SPP) in Jakarta, and in its third year, this festival is co-organized with Suar Asa Khatulistiwa (SAKA) Foundation based in Pontianak, West Kalimantan.
SPP started as a series of workshops on feminist arts practice and research initiated by the organizers of the Cipta Media Ekspresi, a grant for women artists, academics, and community activists in arts and culture. Since 2020, SPP became an independent initiative to create an intervention in the processes of knowledge production that have marginalized, invalidated, and erased women. SPP engages in acts of “epistemic disobedience” against the colonialist, capitalist, and heteropatriarchal system by underlining the roles of women in the archipelago—who, in the global context, are considered “Third World”/ Global South women – as essential subjects in knowledge creation. SPP focuses on disseminating and exchanging women’s knowledge through public lectures and workshops.
The first ETALASE festival was held in Yogyakarta in 2019. It consisted of exhibitions, performances, and discussions featuring the works of 40 grantees of Cipta Media Ekspresi in 2018-2019. The second festival in 2020, held virtually during the pandemic, featured CME alumni as well as other women artists, academics, and activists in the arts as well as experts in cultural studies, politics, sociology, and religion.
ETALASE 2021 (July 23-25, 2021) will also be held virtually, and it will showcase the following programs:
• “Riwayatmu, Puan” – Women in History program: Women tell stories of women writers and artists from the older generations as a way of interrogating historiography that excludes women.
• Panel discussion and talk shows: Forums on important discourses in art practices (ideas, access, working methods, collaboration) as well as larger socio-political issues that should be considered as part of feminist thinking and ethics.
• “Bongkar Kata”/ “Unpacking words”: Mini lectures that critically interrogate keywords or popular words circulating in public with a feminist perspective.
• Konser Ceramah/ “Concert Lectures”: A mixture of performance and lecture delivered by women musicians and performers.
This year Etalase presents one discussion forum in English with translation as a way of taking a more active role in the international solidarity networks. The main focus of the festival is still the exchange of knowledge in Bahasa Indonesia. The reason to prioritize Indonesian language is due to the limited access to knowledge produced by women in this language.
SAKA Foundation is the partner of SPP in organizing ETALASE 2021. SAKA is an organization focusing on diversity, peace, democracy, and human rights through education, research, policy analysis, and advocacy. As part of this collaboration, we are also exploring new directions of research on women’s knowledge and activities in arts and culture in West Kalimantan.
We hope that ETALASE could serve not only as a display of women’s work but also as a safe space for women to support and learn from one another.