The exhibition Glocal Equality and Hospitality (Invalid Ideas?) at the County House is accompanied by a series of encounters with the artists whose works are featured in the exhibition. Following Sanja Iveković, Hito Steyerl and the British duo Cooking Sections will visit Trenčín in November.
Curated by Edit András and Ilona Németh, the exhibition is one of the key projects of the Trenčín 2026 European Capital of Culture programme. Through contemporary art, it addresses the climate crisis, social and gender inequality, geopolitical conflicts and the impact of technology on our everyday lives. According to the curators, equality and hospitality are not empty slogans. Even if we can never fully achieve them, they can serve as a compass at a time when the world seems to have gone somewhat “off the rails”.
The accompanying events offer visitors an opportunity to hear directly from the artists about the works featured in the exhibition.
“Artists such as Hito Steyerl, Sanja Iveković, Anca Benera and Arnold Estefán, as well as our own Jaro Varga and Lucia Tkáčová, have a genuine interest in reaching audiences beyond New York or London. They don’t create their work solely for prestigious institutions; they want to communicate with real people in different places,” says Ilona Németh, co-curator of the exhibition.
The series of encounters began on 8 October at the Army Officers’ Club with pioneering feminist and conceptual artist Sanja Iveković. In conversation with Edit András and Veronika Němcová, she introduced her artistic practice and her work Shadow Report, 1998–ongoing / 2026 Trenčín version. She created the work specifically for the exhibition at the County House in dialogue with the Open Culture! platform. Visitors can see it there until 7 December.
Hito Steyerl: Lecture Performance
Wednesday, 11 November 2026, 6:30 pm
Cultural and Creative Centre Hviezda, Kniežaťa Pribinu 3, Trenčín
In English with interpretation into Slovak | Registration
Hito Steyerl, one of the leading figures in contemporary art, will present her artistic practice and her work Mechanical Kurds in a lecture performance. The work is part of the exhibition Glocal Equality and Hospitality (Invalid Ideas?) at the County House.
Hito Steyerl (born in Munich in 1966) is a German artist, filmmaker and theorist whose work explores the relationships between images, power and contemporary technologies. She studied documentary filmmaking and philosophy and, since 2000, has developed an artistic practice combining visual essays, video installations and critical reflection. Her work examines the circulation of images in the digital age, automation, the militarisation of technology and the invisible infrastructures that shape perception.
She has presented her work internationally, notably at the Venice Biennale (2019), the Centre Pompidou in Paris (2020), the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Seoul (2022), MAK Contemporary in Vienna (2025) and, most recently, Fondazione Prada in Milan. She is currently regarded as one of the leading contemporary artists examining technopolitical systems.
Before the performance, we warmly invite you to join a guided tour of the exhibition at 5:00 pm.
Cooking Sections: Mud Baths, Performative Lecture
Thursday, 19 November 2026, 6:00 pm
Cultural and Creative Centre Hviezda, Kniežaťa Pribinu 3, Trenčín
The lecture will take place at KKC Hviezda, where the installation Mud Baths by Cooking Sections is also located for the duration of the exhibition.
In their performative lecture Mud Baths (2026), the British duo will present a sonic journey through the disappearing post-industrial wetlands of northern Istanbul. The work traces how water buffalo once moved between floodplains and forests, dunes and former open-pit mines, areas now transformed to accommodate logistics facilities, airports, highways and speculative real estate developments.
Drawing on long-term field research with herders, the performative lecture explores mud baths as a more-than-human infrastructure shaped by communities of herders and buffalo. As development increasingly drains the wetlands between the Black Sea and the Sea of Marmara, herding practices and mud baths are gradually disappearing, along with unique forms of knowledge, care and collective habitation.
This transformation is connected to broader hydrological systems, tracing how sediment flows, extraction and agricultural systems reshape distant yet interconnected landscapes. Moving between sound and image, Mud Baths asks how we might understand what remains after wetlands disappear, and what forms of alliance might still emerge when we wallow together in the mud.
Cooking Sections explores the systems that shape the world through food, tracing the spatial, ecological and political legacies of extractivism. Founded in London in 2013 by Daniel Fernández Pascual and Alon Schwabe, the duo has been running CLIMAVORE since 2015, a long-term project investigating how to metabolise climate change in specific physical environments.
Their work has been presented around the world, including at Tate Britain in London (2020), SALT in Istanbul (2021), the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh (2023), the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (2022), the Museo delle Civiltà in Rome (2025) and many other venues. They have also participated in major international exhibitions, including the Taipei Biennial (2021), the 58th Venice Biennale and the New Orleans Triennial (2021).
Visit the Exhibition Until 7 December
Glocal Equality and Hospitality (Invalid Ideas?) is open at the County House, Mierové námestie 46, from Wednesday to Sunday, 10:00 am to 6:00 pm.
Admission is free, so there is no need to see everything in a single visit. You are welcome to return as often as you like. During the guided tours, visitors are encouraged to ask any questions they may have.
Further guided tours are scheduled for 22 October, 11 November and 27 November, with the exhibition’s closing event taking place on 4 December.
“Come without prejudice, but with an open mind, an open heart and, above all, curiosity,” encourages Ilona Németh.
