Noah's Ark - The Eight Great Moral Imperatives

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Kybernein Institute (KI) presents a hybrid cultural format incorporating event, exhibition, and performance at the Teater Tribunalen in Stockholm.

 

”I believe in governments that are small in size and scope. I believe in
economic freedom, personal freedom. I believe in entrepreneurship,
independent minded thinkers. I believe in individualism and a whole
lot of other things…” quote by Johan Ingerö

Noah’s Ark – The Eight Great Moral Imperatives was a performance-based event Kybernein
Institute hosted at Teater Tribunalen in Stockholm. The project aim was to
construct a space for conflict between different institutional frameworks and belief systems. The
institutions involved have each formed different strategies, methods and approaches to cultural
production in our society. I wanted to create a space where these systems would meet, in a set-up
that was different from the environment/context that they are used to perform in.

This project is an example of a performance-based event, designed to destabilize narratives. The event aimed to construct a space for a socio-political conflict between different institutional frameworks and belief systems. The institutions involved were The Seasteading Institute, Timbro (political think tank, SWE), Teater Tribunalen, Kybernein Insitute, Pontio Innovation (Bangor University, GBR), Infontology (digitalization impact think tank, SWE). The invited guests were: Stureakademin (academy of ideology, politics and policymaking, SWE), KTH Architecture/Technology, Södertörn University, Boy’s Don’t Cry (design agency, SWE), Konstfack University, Connecting Spaces (transdisciplinary art space, HK), Center for Arts, Business & Culture (Stockholm School of Economics), artists and art institutions.

The event was centered on The Seasteading Institute project, a real-life case study for extraterritorial
and extra-governmental business and living environments, currently in development by a group of
scientists and investors based in different parts of the world, and headquartered in California, US. TSI is not only a technological innovation, but also a new political and governmental system, based on the principles of mobility, competition and technological innovation. TSI is founded by two entrepreneurs, Patri Friedman (grandson to Milton Friedman) and Peter Thiel (co-founder of PayPal), who together have created a vision for a new society. They offer an ideological answer, and a practical solution, to today’s main concerns: poverty, diseases, war, climate change, nutrition, health. TSI is a sophisticated construction for cultural and ideological production that produces a narrative about the world and the future, aiming for social change. TSI is a think tank; it conducts research for a new living model, politics and policymaking. This new social floating platform would become a place for experimenting with new governmental structures, totally detached from the political systems we have today.

The project Noah’s Ark – The Eight Great Moral Imperatives is an attempt to explore a system of how Neoliberalism can be built from scratch, and how it redefines the democratic governmental structure according to its principles.

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The construction of the event was not using the ordinary ques of a theatre play or an art performance, nor was it an ordinary setting for a panel discussion. Both the invited speakers, and the audience, didn't know how to read the situation, which became clear when the invited speakers started to doubt their own statements and beliefs. One of the speakers that had been very enthusiastic about the Seasteading project was confronted by the other two speakers on stage, and something interesting happened. He could not really answer their questions, he made very vague attempts to argue for his position, but he failed. After the event he said that this had never happened to him before, not even when he had been interviewed by journalists during his career within politics.

 

The construction of the event also effected the audience, who loudly protested against the speakers messages, some even left the room. Two members from the audience aggressively shouted and forbid one of the speakers to make his statements, and said that she becomes 'sick' by being in the same space as him. Even if he only presented his own political and ideological opinion. And a man from the audience stands up and criticize why women is not represented on stage, and that he was deeply disappointed that there was three men on stage.

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When changing the construction and format of the event, the rigid construction of rhetoric and our preconceptions that surrounds an ideological belief or institutional framework where destabilized. The whole space was made into a zone of uncertainty – the relationship between form and content (context and expectations) made it volatile, and created a strain between what was presented and how to understand its intentions.
 

The classical Greeks valued the power of spoken word, and it was their main method of communication and storytelling. The theatre had an important function in Ancient Greek, it was a place where you learned about the virtues and values that are important in society. Teater Tribunalen is a political strategy using a cultural format to spread knowledge about the leftist narrative. They have published a statement presented on their website:” We want to expose, criticize and judge political and economic power, and inspire to commitment and action.”

 

The Teater Tribunalen, The Seasteading Institute and Timbro, are all institutional frameworks using methods connected to culture to producing stories with an ideological message. They act within different areas in our society (art, economics and politics), but how distinct are the borders between them, and what strategy is best to affect and change society? To investigate and reveal strategies and methods for social change is what Kybernein Institute will continue to explore in future projects.