Outcast Registration

Punitive Society

JURISPRUDENCE II

08 February 2013, DORTMUND

PARTICIPANTS

Nina Glockner, Artist, Amsterdam, Netherlands, and Vienna, Austria
Ulrike Möntmann, Artist, Amsterdam, Netherlands, and Vienna, Austria
Peter Budde, Lawyer and Notary Public, Dortmund, Germany
Sabrina Kimmeskamp, Lawyer, Dortmund, Germany

During the second Accomplices’ Meeting of jurisprudence, Möntmann and Glockner talk to the lawyers Peter Budde and Sabrina Kimmeskamp in Dortmund. The lawyers explain legal concepts and the interpretation of the judicial application of amendments to the law in the Basic Law, Criminal Code, Juvenile Courts Act and Narcotics Law.

VIOLENCE AND DRUG ADDICTION IN CONTEXT

The examination of the crimes committed by a drug addict and the associated social consequences visualise the so-called revolving door effect of repetitive offences and sentences to prison. The level of sentences and amendments to the law on which judges base their judgments correspond to the current legislative (chronology of the dates and ages concerned) in Germany between 1976 and 2016.

During the second Accomplices’ Meeting of jurisprudence, Möntmann and Glockner talk to the lawyers Peter Budde and Sabrina Kimmeskamp in Dortmund. The lawyers explain legal concepts and the interpretation of judicial application of amendments to the law in the Basic Law, Criminal Code, Juvenile Courts Act and Narcotics Law.

VIOLENCE AND DRUG ADDICTION IN CONTEXT

The examination of the crimes committed by a drug addict and the associated social consequences visualise the so-called revolving door effect of repetitive offences and sentences to prison. The level of sentences and amendments to the law on which judges base their judgments correspond to the current legislative (chronology of the dates and ages concerned) in Germany between 1976 and 2016.

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Cf.: Ulrike Möntmann THIS BABY DOLL WILL BE A JUNKIE – Report of an Art and Research Project on Addictions and Spaces of Violence. Introduction: Peter Weibel. Published by Edition Angewandte, De Gruyter, 2018, page 298-299

initialism for the project title THIS BABY DOLL WILL BE A JUNKIE, which suggests that drug addiction is an unavoidable fate—an ominous prophecy for a human life that has barely begun. On the one hand, it contradicts common notions of freedom, independence, equal opportunity, and individual self-determination as guaranteed, indisputable rights of every individual. On the other, it also criticises a fatal consequence of this ideal, which often goes hand in hand with supposedly being justified in condemning the illness of addiction and the resulting violations of the law as a purely individual matter of personal failure. This failure to mourn those who have already been denied being regarded as a life worth living discredits connectedness and solidarity, that is, the willingness to engage in a shared world in equality and diversity.

the projects of the OUTCAST REGISTRATION operate in different topological spheres, that is, in spaces that reflect specific social functions and all have a private (individual) and a public (communal) meaning. The fact that private space is largely excluded highlights the problematic fact that the private sphere in democratic systems is fundamentally—and constitutionally—hidden from public view. While this does protect from state control and interference, it does not protect those who are exposed to (sexual) violence behind closed doors. For all the women who participated in the projects, the private space has never been a protective space, as is clear from their respective biographies—on the contrary. Since access to private space is denied, the OUTCAST REGISTRATION projects concentrate on social spaces that are accessible but under normal circumstances strictly separated from each other, and it is there that encounters or even confrontations are initiated between their inhabitants: — in isolated spaces, where segregated life far away from society is imposed, for example, in prisons, therapy facilities, psychiatric wards, and asylum seekers centres; — in cultural spaces, that is, institutionally legitimised and supported spaces and facilities, including museums, art halls and galleries, as well as, for example, playgrounds, parks, and zoos; spaces that are categorically in contrast to subcultural, secret, or even forbidden spaces for ideas, thoughts, and life styles, which are rejected by the majority and/or officially banished from the public sphere; — in the public realm, which ideally expresses the need and obligation of all people to be able to articulate in public everything that concerns all us, independent of whether they have been granted, have acquired, or have coerced authorisations and privileges. In the sense of Hannah Arendt, the sphere of what is public is not only a possibility, but rather a call to action.

a term from prison jargon that refers tersely to the constant in and out of women repeatedly sentenced to prison. It actually describes the devastating cycle of violence, drug use, prostitution, and imprisonment from which there is no way out as long as it is systematically prevented legally and socially. This form of seriality is also reflected in the individual components of the project.

as well as graphs, digital drawings, statistics, etc., assemble and visualise empirically collected data and facts from criminal records. The criminal offenses of the respective project participant are depicted in this way (see the diagram Criminal Offenses I), which resulted in conviction and imprisonment, as well as the criminal offenses committed against her, including their consequences (see the diagram Criminal Offenses II). In conjunction with the events given in the “basic” biography and the notes from memory protocols of countless conversations (in person, by telephone, and in writing) that Ulrike Möntmann conducted with the participants, the specific conditions, patterns, and recurring consequences are illustrated and contextualised.