Alex Blum

SISTER SONGS will return to Amsterdam this week at Oude Kerk for a special Pride edition of the music series Silence: Friday August 2, 8'00 – 9'00 by caring curation of Julia Visser. It's early, yes, but the light is so, so beautiful, and the surrounding city is quiet. There are tickets via link in bio – if you want a guest list, please DM me <3 SISTER SONGS are what we’ve been chanting for years: small melodies you can hum along to attune to your kin and extend your situated life onto some other’s body. SISTER SONGS start long before the first note is heard and last longer than the final one. They’re heart work. 💖🤍🩵💖🤍🩵💖🤍🩵 Working from a methodology of sistering informed by trans feminism, we think of ‘gender’ through affinity by asking: Which bodies are we socialized with, rather than: What body are we socialized as? SISTER SONGS propose etudes for transitory vocal cords to help them breathe free from the fixed binaries of the ear. SISTER SONGS play out in your listening, dear witness, so we rely on your generosity to help us install a soft wedge into the sonic dimension of the gender binary. Because SISTER SONGS are a celebration of all our sisters––both the ones we have and the ones to come––as a political alliance of the monsters from under our bed, gathered to hum us to sleep and calm us, when tension rises and our voices tremble. By alex blum and Katrine Grarup Elbo. Advised by Maria Gabriela Iasparra and Bruno Listopad. Scenography by Lou J. Seidel (@loujelena ) Costumes by Dasha Golova (@darsha_golova ) Makeup by Horatcio Vlijter Trailer by Gergely Ofner (@gergelyofner )

In today’s @politiken you’ll find an interview with ( @placenta___ ) who is not only HAUT’s new artistic leader, but also the first artistic leader in Scandinavia of trans experience. While doing research for the interview, we were reminded that Chris Schenlaer was the first trans business manager of an art institution in Scandinavia, namely at Inkonst ( @inkonst ) in Malmö. As you can read in the interview, it takes more than a couple of fine faces in high places to break the patterns of disenfranchisement and systemic violence. Get your hands on a copy to read more about “den jyske hede”, failing art, dabke, drag and much more. #interview #read #let #your #voice #be #heard #transgender #leader #artistic

flashback to happy Pride, swipe to see how gay sex radicalized me

Have you ever thought about being in residency at HAUT? In this AN HOUR WITH, artistic leader Alex Blum will share how she plans to co-curate residencies and invite artists during the season 2025/2026. In previous years, HAUT has mainly co-curated residencies through open calls. In this season, we plan a biannual application and reading round that surveys the artistic context and concrete needs for space, paid time, and artistic feedback in the independent scene. We assume that a needs-based approach can make our curation more transparent, but we rely on your curios questions, feedback and critique to be held accountable to that intention. That’s why we hope to see you this AN HOUR WITH. Book your ticket via link in bio.

Can't believe it's only two weeks till I assume my new role as the ARTISTIC LEADER (!?!) of HAUT, a tender and protective membrane for performing artists in Copenhagen and beyond ❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥 I'm following in the bigbigbig footsteps of Naja and Betina, who've led the Danish independent scene towards fairer and braver practices with kindness, grace, and deeeep deep deep listening— if y'all wanna join me in celebrating their tenure and help me throw some spells for mine, HAUT invites for a small celebration on June 13 from 17 o'clock in Nordvest. It'd be good to feel new and old friends be a part of this, yeah 💓💓 We'll also launch our new book, which I've contributed a chapter to about the ongoing erasure of trans and gender disobedient knowledge, culture and bodies. I dedicate the chapter to my sister, Teresa Ves Liberta, who is so, so missed, and for whom I'll be doing this 🪷🪷 In the next two years, I'll curate soft and generous residencies, host artistic and social critique, and extend lifelines to artists who materialize and embody the freedom of artistic expression. With all these fascist attacks on trans rights and bodies, and the silencing of artists and activists who mobilise in solidarity with Palestinian liberation, trust and believe that HAUT will wanna be a haven for liberatory and socially engaged arts 🫧🫧 I mean it. Reach out, invite yourself in, send me your portfolios, express your embodied desires and needs, and we will get in a tender and loving touch <3<3 In the institution, not of it, as Raoni so presciently reminded me, xx, alex 💋💋 PC: @sofiastaal__

"Trauma responses, such as dissociation and numbness, are tools of fascism meant to incapacitate the body work of refusal. By looking, looking, looking at Israel’s livestreamed genocide of the Palestinian people and by witnessing my government’s continued complicity with the ethnic cleansing across Occupied Palestine, my body is implicated in a moral injury that sets me up for systemic dissociation. How can I practice embodiment against this kind of fascism?" Read Alex Blum's important text on idoart.dk @placenta___ #alexblum #idoartdk

HAUTs nye leder er fundet!🎉 
Vi byder velkommen til koreograf og kunstpædagog Alex Blum @placenta___ , som fremadrettet skal stå i spidsen for at udvikle residency- og vidensformater hos HAUT. “Jeg er spændt over at skulle løfte værtskabet for vores kunstnere i residency”, siger Alex Blum. “HAUT opleves i det frie felt som et frirum fra samtidens tryk. Vores intention er at fordre det samlede scenekunstfelt til at tage flere risici, turde fejle og improvisere ud over sine vante forestillinger. Det bliver kun muligt gennem vores bløde og generøse værtsskab.” – Alex Blum Alex Blum tiltræder d. 15. maj for at tage del i en overleveringsperiode og vil fra næste sæson overtage ledelsen efter @najaleejensen og @betinarex .
 Du kan allerede møde Alex ifm. vores kommende seminar d. 26.-27. maj, hvor hun faciliterer samtalen “A short conversation between the future dreamers”. Derudover håber vi, at I vil sætte kryds i kalenderen til vores Book Launch and summer bar på @thoravej29 d. 13. juni, hvor vi udover at lancere vores nye publikation også markerer lederskiftet med en fejring af både fortid og fremtid.💚 Mere info følger – men sæt kryds i kalenderen allerede nu! Læs hele nyhedsbrev via link i bio. Pressefoto: @sofiastaal__ 
#HAUT #Scenekunst #stageart #Lederskifte #Residency #kunstneriskfrihed

I've been doomscrolling a lot lately. It feels increasingly difficult to partake in a reality that's glossing over facts of fascism and gen0cide—so my body responds how it knows best, namely by dissociating. It numbs me down. I look on but don't feel a damn thing— Can't say it's always pleasant, but it is the kind of willful negation that says: Eww, not this, and then proceeds to imagine an alternative, albeit subdued future. But a future in all its possibility. Futures in this economy are never gonna be possible, but maybe in a wayward reality, one born from my body's dissociation from this world, I can begin to feel and imagine one. I feel like I can future (as verb) powered by all the minor gestures of care circulating in my community rn, as lifelines extend between strangers and old lovers. When I carry around hormones in my purse for a friend, who's not (yet) in HRT. When I sit at a dinner for trans folks across generations. Or when friends gather in a group chat to organise fundraisers for gender- and life-affirming surgery. Or yesterday's demo in Copenhagen, which was a true breathing space for our grief and rage. I am inspired to future by friends, who keep up organizing parties and community dinners and write chapters to books that they really wanna discuss at some point which (let's be real) never really happens and friends who take it upon themselves to embody possibility and remember taking their HRT, or undergo surgery, or none of it but still wreck open the gender binary with their lived deviancy. I love y'all so much for your futures. One friend who always encourages me to future is Toni, here in these photos of our installation TRANSOPOCENE in 2023. Together with Juli, we wanted to make a trans optimist time for rest and relaxation, one that proposed to dance in the ruins of the gender binary and transcend the cis economy. Toni is collecting coins for their gender- and life-affirming surgery in May, and I ask you to consider throwing them a lifeline by donating to the GoFundMe that I set up for them. The link is in my bio: every coin matters <33 lysm, a

ZERO BULLSH*T - INTERSECTIONAL WOMEN’S DAY ♫ ✮ ♫ ✮ Saturday 08/03/25 @den_anden_side_cph ♫ ✮✮ ♫ PLACENTA (Performance) is a doll in distress. Born as the nutritious fetal organ of all of her siblings by Aryelle Freeman Hopelezz and as a proud member of the Amsterdam-based House of Hopelezz, PLACENTA is now cummming to Copenhagen with equal parts romance and terror. IG: @placenta___

NEXT WEEK'S TRAINING AT DANSEHALLERNE : CONSENT REHEARSALS <33 teaching touch- and pressure-based material next week, lemme know if you wanna come by, it'll be pragmatic, soft and cute + I'll integrate core workouts I'm currently failing to do on my own — 💦 👉🏼👈🏼 🫧 "Dance is finally (!) busy with consent. As tool and discourse, consent is needed to mitigate bodily transgressions. But consent is more than a corrective posture. We risk ignoring the potentials of consent-as-method, if we reduce it to a verbal contract between two, or more, bodies engaging with touch. So, let’s not reduce but complexify it. During this week, we will rehearse consent by listening through our skin to shared pleasure and (dis)comfort. We will employ consent as method to rehearse scores with pressure. Through touch-based warmups and a gradual engagement with the movement practice ‘body hiking’, we will build a shared language around embodied and limit consent. Each class is pragmatic, soft and cute. We begin by warming up, opening our skin and rehearsing our haptic listening skills. Through partnerwork, I will introduce some simple scores for the manual negotiation of consent. The class is a rehearsal: We will fail and learn together through repetitions. Consent is heart work <3" Also, how cute are these photos of TRANSOPOCENE (2023) made with juli frodermann and Toni Kritzer? PC: Nellie de Boer

tysm to y'all who came out for LILY SCREAMS on the weekend at Veem House <333 Lili was there, and we listened to her present absence together. Through terror and romance, she unfolded like a flower to fill and feel the gaps in our mourning and rage. This first solo dance research after graduating school is both tricky and revealing: I'm grateful to be accompanied by critical friends Ghaith kween Quotainy and juli frodermann, and to have been supported by GREENHOUSE and the AFK. tysm @_._k.w.e.e.n_._ @jiji_jitsu @academicapathy @veem.house @bau_platform @kerenlevi.neverlike @nicole_beutler_amsterdam @afk020 Now hibernation, xx

In Lily Screams alex blum insists on the crisis of representation and its (im)possibility of trans embodiment. She explores through reasearch the refusals of visibility, legibility, and regulation by insisting on the study of overwhelm, loss of control, and madness. Joined by her critical friends juli frodermann and Ghaith Kween Quotainy she will continue her vocal movement research to sketch a new solo work LILY SCREAMS (NOT YOUR DANISH GIRL). Haven't got your tickets for Lily Screams yet? What are you waiting for? Don't miss out! Go to our link in bio or website! #Amsterdam #veem #alexblum #residency #performance #theatre #queer #trans #representation