Part II: Collectif Fin de Un muNdO - FUNO

In this SECOND PART of our review of El Colectivo el Fin de Un muNdO (FUNO), we're going to continue describing this exceptional group.

All photos and videos were taken during rehearsals on Sundays, March 17 and 24, 2023.

OPENNESS AND DIVERSITY

There's great diversity among the artists, all ages, all physical conformations, different artistic horizons.

The call is open:

"Fin de un mundo invites you to take part in the action on March 24. You don't need to have any artistic training, the idea is that everyone can take part. Of course, if there are people with a particular talent, we'll take advantage of it. This year, 140 comrades of all ages, with a large majority of women, answered the call."

But there's also a diversity of political opinions!
Seba explains:

"Despite the fact that there are comrades with different political views within the Collectif, we've always been able to stay together. Right from the start, this idea prevailed: Let's stick to what unites us. An old comrade once said a phrase that made a deep impression on me: "I don't campaign to be right, I campaign to change the world".. Unfortunately, in Argentina there are a lot of people fighting to be right. We're not here to win an argument with our neighbor, or to fight a minor battle between two parties, or to be recognized in an academy. We're here to change the world. We're in this fight."

In a country where dissension and rancor reign supreme, I find this attitude remarkable.
The Collectif is not affiliated to any political party or trade union organization. That's why, on the day of the march, the Collectif marches with human rights organizations.

ORGANIZATION

I wonder: how can an entity function and survive without a formal structure, without designated managers, without premises, without finances...?

Seb, Patricia and Carolina explain:

"At first, there weren't many of us - 70 or less - and we were able to work totally collectively. Then the Collectif started to have more impact, and a lot of people started to join us, we are, some years, 400 people on the street."

"So the organization had to evolve. In a group of 200 comrades, it would be impossible to make important decisions all together. We've tried to maintain this form of collective creation, but adapting to the number of participants. We've always been a collective very concerned with the concretization of actions and we try to invent something that keeps a certain horizontality while being efficient."

"We've tried to resolve the conflict between horizontalism and verticalism by adopting an organization by circles, which we find very symbolic, because in circles all the points are equidistant from each other."

"Circles are working groups charged with a specific task. There is the Technologythe Logisticsthe FOCO which records everything we do in photos, videos, drones, the group Abondance responsible for raising money to ensure economic independence, a group Action which makes proposals, a group Identity that brings together all the ideas that support us and the Synchro which synchronizes the whole and ensures continuity...
We're very insistent that the performance space should be one of great pleasure and care for each other. For example, the Logistics guarantees the safety of the artists and the group Love makes sure that on the day of the action, there's everything you need
for hydration and nourishment".

A participant confirms in a post after the March 23 march:

"And the Circle LOVEwhich distributes water throughout the entire
action, so that we can all drink fresh water on the rocks! They give us nutritious and energetic food, with the love that characterizes them!"

"We try to guarantee horizontality and collective work. We are constantly asking ourselves what form of organization we should adopt to reconcile horizontality and efficiency. It's not easy, but we do our best.

There's not a single aspect not covered by the organization: in the collective WhatsApp, activists can find the basics of costumes, make-up, hair, shoes... and even instructions for making knee pads. The whole thing ends with a VERY IMPORTANT message:

"Build with care: Let all the materials we bring into our changing rooms be pleasant to the touch and skin, and let them allow us to inhabit body and movement comfortably and joyfully." 

One of the participants sums up the performers' feelings well:

"It wasn't just the performance that shook me, but also the memory of how it was built with such dedication and respect. Few places I've been to respect individuality as lovingly as here. Where camaraderie and respect for bodies trump personal ego. I've grown weary of reading and listening to advice and requests to take care of ourselves. It's worth a lot. Thank you so much!"

Juli

And Pilar adds:

"There's another aspect that surprises me and that I want to emphasize. It's the gentle, loving and efficient way in which we managed the 140 rehearsal participants, and achieved the realisation in just three rehearsals!
C'is admirable.

Personally, I don't know how it's possible that all this machinery, which only works episodically and with partly different people every year, manages to prepare a show of the quality of the one on March 24 in such a short space of time. This is partly due to the quality of the organization. But it's also, and perhaps above all, due to the quality, dedication and professionalism of our activists. All of them are volunteers, and all of them have their day-to-day occupations on the side. I've found in this Collectif a "professionalism" that I've rarely seen in the large European companies I've worked for as a consultant!

---

LE FANZINE

Malala explains the importance of this format:

"I'm analog, I'm from another generation, I like to touch things. On the march I was given a piece of paper, I put it in my pocket and then I sent an e-mail and that's how I started participating. More than once I've heard people say "Hey, we're not doing the paper flyer, because of the ecology issue"; and I've replied "We're doing the flyer one way or another".

This year, another format was created, with the folding fanzine. In my graphic experience, the fanzine is a revolution that goes against the system, the norm, the way a text should be laid out, the way a title should be done. "

Fanzine texts:

When I walk, I desire. - Anonymous

Love doesn't stop, even if those who love die. - Zito Lema

Malala:

"The people who perform in Colectivo have played a big part in its development, chewing up these texts that we've worked out from texts by Liliana Bodoc, Lohana Perkins, Vir Cano and all the people who feed our critical thinking. All these texts took shape in the fanzine, in the publication. Each of us did a bit of folding and an original was composed, digitized, scanned and printed."

"We thought of it as something folded, with an option that could be stuck on a wall or put in your pocket."

A volunteer workshop was organized to make it, attended by some twenty volunteer activists.

"It seemed important to us that there should be a personal contribution to the whole production chain, that activists should be linked to the work. The collective aspect is always present with us".

Several thousand fanzines were produced and distributed during the march!

AMBITION

The name adopted by the collective, la Fin d'un monde, reveals the breadth and radicalism of their project. 

Seb explains:

"When we had to choose a name, we told ourselves that we didn't want a slightly better world, or a slightly newer world, but that we wanted the end of one world and the birth of another. That's what motivates us and pushes us forward."

And Marta Candela adds:

"I loved this idea of the end of one world and the beginning of another. It's not about change for change's sake, but about putting an end to a self-destructive style of world and humanity. It's this position, this commitment through art, which tends to go beyond reality, that attracted me."

All the "artivists" I interviewed were convinced of the need to change the world. The same is true of the dozens of comments that participants sent to the Collectif's WhatsApp group after the march.

"Compas (compas is short for compañeras), it's difficult for me
to put into words what went through my body yesterday. I left
with the feeling that if there are so many people organizing with
care, respect and love, another world is truly possible.
I embrace each and every one of you, I'm grateful for the looks, the smiles and the dances. It was my first time participating with you ✨ thank you so much to the organization for the care and love. And for respecting and taking so much account of individualities, as otrx compa said.
With you, the desire to change everything really burns !!!! 

Cami

"How can we create a new world? By multiplying in each of our worlds what we experienced not only yesterday, but throughout the process of building La FETE. Trusting the otherto bond with love, respect and diversity. To listen. Bracketing our individual certainties to rise above them in the wisdom of the group. Hugging each other. Knowing that the person next to me is watching over me, even if we don't know each other's names. Always having a good intention at the outset. To learn that the collective gesture has an amplifying and contagious power, that the "I" is important, but that now, here and now, the "I" is not the only one. "weis more important. Feeding on collective identity. Make poetry, transform the horrible into something beautiful. Trust the body. Transforming our ideas into creative action. May we transmit a little of this to those around us, in each of our actions, in each of our words. May we always build on love, with others, with others, with others.

Thank you very much.

Proud to be 🌳

#ColectivoFindeUNmundO

Laura Mickelsen

The enthusiastic messages sent out after this transformative experience say it all. This new world begins within the group itself.

As Patricia says:

"Because at the end of the day, there's no way to change the world if we don't start changing our own way of being in the world. That's what we learn at FUNO: to be and act in this world together, meeting others."

A brief portrait of generous, creative, open-minded, enthusiastic, authentic and selfless activists. (Second part)

"I'm an actor, I'm interested in physical theater, I've done clowning, performance art and visual arts.
I joined the collective last year for the artistic side. Then the political side gradually took over.
If you really connect with what's going on in the rehearsals, it's mega-mobilizing. Sometimes it's hard for me, it's like I'm escaping emotion. It's like I'm doing something artistic with all the shit that's happened. Like giving it another look. Like recycling. But yes, it's very moving."

"I encountered the end of a world at the first action, on October 12, which commemorates the first arrival of capitalism through submission, colonization and evangelization. What interests me in this collective is its poetics, its political stance, this crossroads between politics and poetry. I do physical therapy and re-education. Bodies are absolutely dominated by capitalism, they get sick, close up, separate themselves from others, where pain and pleasure are individual. I participate in an Andean dance community, where the idea is also to dance in community. I'm also part of a women's group, "Mujeres creando", which militates where we need to be, like trigger-happy women, or victims of trafficking, feminicide, water demands, rejection of mining companies."

Too bad I didn't ask Marta about the secret of her tireless energy!

"I began my activism around ten years ago in feminist groups and joined the Collectif in 2020. I'm an early stimulation therapist and psychomotricist working with babies and young children. I coordinate a team of over 20 women. I have my own activist spaces, I work in certain neighborhoods, I support schools. I'm also studying theater. I have two beautiful granddaughters, aged one and six. The one-year-old will be taking part in her first march. It's all part of my life.

"I say I'm a graphic designer by training and a lot of things, a visual artist, a communicator... by deformation. I work for myself as a designer and visual artist, and I organize workshops. I've been a member of the "Fin de un mundo" collective since 2014, 9 years ago.
I joined the collective to perform, to put my body into it, but I ended up being a polymer, as I do the flyers, internal communication, graphics for broadcasts.
On March 24, 2014, I went to the march with my son, who was 6. He was in first grade at school and they had talked about what had happened in '76, during the dark years. It was wonderful, because the story that was told on the bus was very exemplary. Thanks to everything they told about the bodies, it was very easy for me to explain to my son what had happened. Seeing the bus gave me a lot of emotion. They gave me a leaflet and I got involved."

"The Collectif is an important part of my life. During the pandemic, I saw my Collectif friends almost more often than my family, because it's my way of resisting and understanding the world."

Malala