Post-Capitalist Architecture TV, Part 1

Project Spotlight: On materiality and resource economy

Creating Indigenous Sovereignty Possible Futures
A video still from Post-Capitalist Architecture TV shows artist Joar Nango at right. Behind him, a video call with curator Candice Hopkins is protected on the back wall of the interior of his cargo van.

Post-Capitalist Architecture TV is a digital TV series featuring renowned Tromsø artists Joar Nango and director Ken Are Bongo introducing their home and local environment in Sápmi. They travel through snow-covered landscapes in their snowmobile and red sprinter van equipped with a mobile TV studio. Along the way, they meet guests for coffee over a campfire, including academic researchers, craftspeople and activists. They explore popular construction techniques for large-scale political power structures that form the basis of the social structure in the North. Nango and Bongo take viewers to the Post-Capitalist Architecture Universe (PCA-TV) and the ongoing study of architecture after the fall of capitalism.

Part 1: On materiality and resource economy

The first episode looks at the northern philosophy of self-sufficiency and what Nango calls “indigenuity”: an approach of resource economy and sustainability, working with on-site solutions, as part of Indigenous and Sàmi improvisational competences. Nango talks with curator Candice Hopkins (Carcross/Tagish First Nation, Canada), art-historian Elin Haugdal (The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø) and artist Elin Már Øyen Vister about material philosophy in Indigenous and local contexts.

A video still from Post-Capitalist Architecture TV shows artist Joar Nango at right. Behind him, a video call with curator Candice Hopkins is protected on the back wall of the interior of his cargo van.
Joar Nango and Ken Are Bongo, Post-Capitalist Architecture TV, Part 1: On materiality and resource economy (video still) (2020).

Om PCA-TV (Norsk)

Den anerkjente Tromsø-kunstneren Joar Nango og regissør Ken-Are Bongo har sin egen digitale TV-serie hvor de introduserer sitt hjem og nærmiljø i Sápmi. De reiser gjennom det arktiske landskap i Sápmi med et mobilt TV-studio i sin røde sprinter. Episodevis utforsker de alt fra folkelige byggeteknikk til storpolitiske maktstrukturer som ligger til grunn for samfunnsstrukturene og det bygde landskapet i nord. Nango & Bongo tar oss med til Postkapitalistisk arkitektur-universet (Pca-TV) og den prosjektet er en slags pågående undersøkelse av arkitekturen etter kapitalismens fall. På ferden møter vi et bredt knippe gjester over en bålkaffekopp i bilen eller over zoomsamtaler prosjektert på kveitemagesekkskjerm studio.  Alt fra akademiske forskere, håndverkere, jurister, kunstnere og aktivister er med som intervjuobjekter i serien.

Credit: The first three videos in the Post-Capitalist Architecture series were produced by Bergen Kunsthall as part of the official festival programme for the Bergen International Festival in May 2020. COURTESY THE ARTISTS. 

This story is part of the Norway Partner Spotlight. View more content from the Spotlight here.