Katrine Meisfjord Januar 2016 Soft Protection, - textiles in war A textile - and dialogue based performance by Katrine Meisfjord Thursday 28.01.16 at Stiftelsen 3,14, Vågsallmenningen 12, at 19.00 Two women share their stories about how they experienced years of fighting for their people’s rights and independence as guerrilla fighters. They tell their stories through textiles, the material that follows us from cradle to grave. Under the harsh conditions of war, textiles are a precious and scarce resource. The women show us, and tell us, how textiles served as a lifesaving tool, as protection and as comfort. • By Katrine Meisfjord in cooperation with Hiwet Tesfaldet, Sarah Kessler and Savas Boyraz • Storytellers and performers: Hiwet Tesfaldet and Sarah Kessler About the performers and storytellers • Hiwet Tesfaldet, born in 1960, lives in Bergen, Norway. As a young student, Hiwet and fellow students in Asmara, Eritrea, were eager to join the struggle against the Ethiopian occupants. She joined the guerrilla in 1980, at the age of 17, and struggled as a guerrilla fighter for Eritrea’s independence until the country`s liberation in 1991. After independence, she played an important role in Eritrea’s new government. She came to Norway as a refugee in 2005. • Sarah Kessler (Evin), born in 1985, lives in Berlin, Germany. Evin joined the Kurdish movement when she was 13 years old, as “a gift” to the movement from her parents. For 7 years she lived with guerrilla troops in the mountains, struggling for Kurdish rights and liberation. Later on she moved to Germany. She holds a BA in International social work, and is presently doing her MA on migration and racism in German society. She has elaborated numerous workshops about gender and feminism in Latin American and in the Middle East. About the artists • Katrine Meisfjord, born in 1966, lives in Bergen, Norway. She holds a BA in textile art (2007) and an MA in fine arts (2009) from Bergen National Academy of the Arts. She is also a nurse. In the last years she has been showing performances, installations and participatory dialogue based works in galleries (solo exhibitions in Soft Gallery, Oslo, Rogaland Art Centre, Stavanger, Galleri Puls, Norheimsund), and in group exhibitions (BGO1, KODE2, Grieghallen, Bergen, KODE1, Bergen, Visningsrommet USF, Bergen). In addition, she has organized numerous community based art projects, both in private homes and in public space. Web page: www.cs55.no/katrinemeisfjord and www.meisfjord-satre.com • Savas Boyraz is a photographer and filmmaker. He was born in Istanbul, Turkey (1980), and lives and works in Stockholm, Sweden. Boyraz has a Master’s Degree in Fine Arts from Konstfack, Stockholm and a BA in Photography from Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University, Istanbul, and has previously studied ethnomusicology, ancient philology, cinema and television. In 2013 he received the Hasselblad Foundation award for New Nordic Photography. Supported by Bergen kommune.  FM16/Invitasjon_28.1.16.pdf