The composer, poet & Byzantine abbess KASSIA is considered the first European composer whose works have survived and still play an important role in European (music) history. Kassia was born in Constantinople in 810. KASSIA is not only an enigmatic personality as a musician. She is also a writer of astonishing radicalism, composing not only sacred poetry but also secular texts, of which more than 250 have survived in the form of epigrams. Last but not least, she appears as a political figure who rhetorically opposes the emperor Theophilos in his search for a bride.

Kassia is a kind of early feminist and cosmopolitan role model. Her work was taken by kainkollektiv and various artists, scholars and institutions from Germany, Poland and Turkey as the starting point for a multi-dimensional and multidimensional project consisting of the KASSIA opera performance and the (digital) KASSIA conference. Finally, the KASSIA online exhibition/archive is now being created, which will make these project parts visible in a bundled form and link them interactively.

The online exhibition/archive KASSIA will make the Kassia cosmos accessible, with all media developed in the previous parts of the project – music, texts, performance, lectures, images, portraits etc. – becoming part of this digital space. – will become components of this digital space

In cooperation with the Heinrich Böll Foundation. Supported by the Ministry of Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia in the Media Art Fund and by the City of Bochum.
More information about the project here: kassia-archive.org