der Zweck heiligt die Mittel (the end justifies the means), 2021 / video performance / sonicexplorers / Künstlerforum Bonn / performer: Ali Hashemlou, Kathrin Lambert, Kaveh Sattari, Mehdi Behbudi, Lorenz Pasch / duration: 10 min (variable) / material: smartphones


A group of performers is set into an unpredictable motion with the following rules: “Gather in a circle. Film the person to your left-hand side. Keep filming this person until the performance is over.”
What particularly interested me about this work was that the actors improvised their movements, creating the strangest poses. And yet these poses did not look funny at all. They had a function. And as just that, they were a byproduct of something else.


I developed this work during the residency sonicexplorers. It began in 2019 in Teheran, Iran, and ended in 2021 at the Künstlerforum Bonn in Germany. During the time of the residency, I was specifically concerned with the mode of production within the context of a residency. A commitment to a format that influences the way you live, blurs the uneven borders between private and public life even more. This unpredictability, or loss of control between these two spaces, was at the core of my investigations. One particular aspect was the permanent presence of a cameraman. While we had discussions, walked around, or ate some food, there was someone nearby, always looking for the best angle to shoot his pictures. At some point, we sat in a circle for a discussion while he just moved with his camera right in its middle. It was practically impossible to ignore his presence.