MG+MSUM

Tadej Pogačar & The P.A.R.A.S.I.T.E. Museum of Contemporary Art: CODE:RED, 2001
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AMBIENCE XVII

Tadej Pogačar &  The P.A.R.A.S.I.T.E. Museum of Contemporary Art

1960, Ljubljana, Yugoslavia, now Slovenia

 

CODE:RED

I. World Congress of Sex Workers and New Parasitism, 2001

collaboration project, public action

video, 21' 32'', archival materials

Courtesy of the artist

 

CODE:RED is a multidisciplinary, collaborative project which discusses and researches informal economy models, self-organization, global sex work,and global trafficking. It was initiated in 1999–2000 by Tadej Pogačar and the P.A.R.A.S.I.T.E. Museum of Contemporary Art. CODE:RED takes place within and outside the art context and encompasses various forms of joint operation with experts, scientists, and activist groups. It focuses on the topic of selforganizationof marginal groups and communities which take place outside the dominant social, economic, and political frameworks.

 

CODE:RED activities range from research, activation,and self-help to public manifestations, actions, and exhibitions. The first public manifestation of the CODE:RED project was the I. World Congress of Sex Workers and New Parasitism, which took place from June 6 to 8, 2001 as part of the 49th Venice Biennial. In a public space in the Giardini, a tent (the Prostitute Pavilion, Padiglione delle Prostitute) was erected. The congress, conceived as a creative framework for connections, exchange, and information, emerged as a consequence of the artist’s longterm co-operation with Comitato per I Diritti Civili delle Prostitute from Pordenone, one of the leading organizations for the protection of sex workers in Italy. The participating activists and groups from Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, Taiwan, USA, Australia, Germany, and Italy, presented current strategies in the fight for the civil rights of sex workers. Their emphasis was on the principles of organization, education, self-help, and protection. This was created through conversations, video projects, exhibitions, documentary publications, performances, activist street theater, and appearances, among others. Congress finished with The Red Umbrellas March, which publicly proclaimed solidarity with sex workers and outlined points in the suppressed and forgotten geography of the city, the geography of the social history of sex workers, from the famous Venetian courtesans Veronica Franco and Gaspara Stampa to the present day.