[The Scorpion Snuff Box]

The exhibition starts from the novel “Scorpion” (Der Skorpion), published during the interwar period by the Romanian-German writer Anna Elisabet Weirauch (1887-1970).

Through “The Scorpion Snuff Box – a visual journey into a queer novel,” we envision a journey through the ideas of the novel, in which the author offers a subjective exploration formulated through the surrealist method of objective chance in a “lesbian” universe.

The curatorial journey imagined among the ideas of the novel “Scorpion” (Der Skorpion), published during the interwar period by the Romanian-German writer Anna Elisabet Weirauch (1887–1970), proposes a subjective exploration, at times inspired by the method of objective chance, into a “lesbian” universe from different times and places. This universe is expanded and updated on multiple levels with nuances from our contemporary days. Objective chance was developed by surrealists in the 1920s and 1930s as a creative method based on the seemingly random encounter with an external cause whose emotional impact is so powerful that it generates intense passion. In the case of this exhibition, the passion for “Scorpion,” the first bildungsroman in the history of literature that follows the development of a cisgender lesbian in Berlin in the 1920s, was cultivated through friendship with lesbian activists Suzette Robichon and Traude Bührmann.

The exhibition “Tabachera cu scorpion – a visual journey into a queer novel” proposes a revisiting of this history in a queer-surrealist dialogue with contemporary art, placing the queer experience on a historical continuum. The documentary section includes fragments of history preserved in the Spinnboden Lesbian Archive collection in Berlin. Through these documents, the lesbian universe of Weimar-era Germany is introduced, a time of liberalization that transformed the city into a true queer capital, up until the rise of National Socialism and the outbreak of World War II.
 
by Valentina Iancu

[expo’s themes]

magical nature

sexuality

lesbian family

relationship with mother

pathlogy

the idyllic space

feminine identity

gender and sexuality

lesbian sexuality

 

feminine masculinity

affection

care

transgender femininity

[artists]

Maria Balea

Traude Bührmann

Mimi Ciora

Diana Matilda Crișan

Ramona Dima & Simona Dumitriu

Georgiana Dobre & Kjersti Vetterstad

Katja Lee Eliad

Yishay Garbasz

Daniela Groza

Tirdad Hashemi & Soufia Erfanian

Mia Imani Harrison

Alexandra Ivanciu

Anastasia Manole

Hortensia Mi Kafchin

Marta Mattioli

Stefania Meșteriuc

Marta Orlando

Ileana Pașcalău

Elvisey Pisică

Iulia Pordea

Orka

Clémentine Roy

Sophie Utikal

[visit the exhibition in digital format]

You can view the exhibition in digital format here.
 
We wanted to make more than just an exhibition out of Tabachera cu Scorpion. We wanted it to be a hub over the weeks it was open, where people interested in lesbian culture and art could get to know artists/activists through their art and discussions with Suzette Robichon and Traude Bührmann, and through the screening of the film Orlando My Political Biography, a movie that would raise them questions.
 
The digital version of the exhibition is how we want to continue bringing lesbian culture and art into the awareness of as many people as possible

The event is part of the “Invisible Histories” project, funded with a grant of 489,592 RON from Iceland, Liechtenstein, and Norway through the EEA and Norway Grants.
 
The project is part of the National Cultural Program “Timișoara – European Capital of Culture in 2023” and is funded and organized in partnership with the Timișoara City through the Project Center.
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