LIGNA (EDITION I)
The free radio group LIGNA consists of the media theorists and radio artists Ole Frahm, Michael Hüners and Torsten Michelsen, working in the broadcast station Freies Sender Kombinat, a free, non-commercial, local radio station in Hamburg. The group produces projects that think about the politics and potential of radio space. Their perspective is an optimistic one; that radio is one of the only free spaces left at a time our world is increasingly controlled by private concerns and the notion of public space and spontaneous gathering are becoming more and more threatened. They will explore these specific issues in relation to public space in 's-Hertogenbosch.
Since 2002 LIGNA is developing concepts of how radio can intervene in public and often controlled spaces. These Radio Ballets are about collecting a public through radio, through a live transmission the group, in effect, generates a gathering and reclaims the public space.
LIGNA about Den Bosch
The first step of their project is to consider the present situation in the town in which they work, the radio group visit the city and research both its history and its current situation before they decide how to intervene there. As LIGNA explains:
"The inner city of Den Bosch is a fortress to defend normality. It's inhabitants are eager to keep out everything, that might stir up the picture of a nice late medieval city: noise, traffic and modern architecture. They are successful: even the poorer inhabitants of the quarters around the inner city don't visit very often. Constantly the inhabitants of Den Bosch repeat the big trauma of their history: the fight against the invasion of the Other, the protestant troupes, in 1629 - the end of the great time of the city. But nowadays it's not only the visible strangers, that threaten everyday life.
Indeed, the menace is much more uncanny; it is invisible: you cannot smell it, you cannot see it, you can't even hear it, if you are not equipped with special devices. It is radio. No fortress wall can stop radio waves from dispersing everywhere. Radio listeners look like everybody else - but they are different: with their antenna they are connected to the uncanny publicity of the ether.
They are part of a constellation of listeners, that does not appear, until it shows effects: certain gestures, that are not normal, a behavior, that is slightly different from the rest. Radio opens space for difference and questions the rules, that constitute every day life normality. LIGNA invites everybody, to participate in an exploration of this strange space, that the radio waves will open in the heart of Den Bosch".
