Anna Beatrice Scott - tekhnasthai
This is a sum-up of a talk I attended at Øredev 2013. This year, I will create a separate post for each session, instead of having multiple sessions in each post.
After getting my goodiebag (containing a copy of xkcd volume 0!) and watching a fun intro about why we are here and why the theme of the year is The Arts, it was time for Anna to kick-start Øredev 2013.
Being a dancer, professor and writer, Anna was asked to bring some sunlight with her from California (trope alert!), to this dark part of the world. Instead, she brought quirky moves, where she twisted and moved like a reptilian shape shifter, to music streaming out of her unplugged laptop.
Eventually, a guy came up on stage and plugged in the computer, sending music out into the room and restoring order and balance to the universe.
Anna then talked about art. Has art been hijacked? Today, anyone can be an artist. What is the definition of art? What does the dictionary say? She went through all definitions available, while mixing it up with more music, never-ending “everybody please stand” orders, to which everyone naturally obeyed…who says no to a guest from AMERICA? Jesus!
The big theme of Anna’s keynote was disruptance, where she dissected change. It was interesting, and she had some nice one-liners (The problem with keeping your head down, is that you’re stuck navel gazing), but all this jumping back and forth between art, disruptance, dancing, art, disruptance, change, moving, bending etc. was impossible to take seriously. I found it embarrassingly bad and would dare to claim that no Swede would ever step up on stage, doing what Anna did…
…and quite frankly, I’m glad that we don’t. This juvenile admiration for all things American has to stop.
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