The crowning conclusion to the performance series is given by KDM Königin der Macht and The Royal Squad against Toxic Masculinity by highlighting climate destruction and the ecological footprint of the patriarchy. Whether Wiener Festwochen | Free Republic Vienna manage to stay credible after five weeks will be measured by more than their efforts: fingerprints will be taken for a careful examination of the festival’s actual ecological handprints.

KDM Königin der Macht will open the five-part performance series at the Club of the Republic together with the Royal Squad against Toxic Masculinity. This opening marks the start of a blunt and sharp critique of cultural institutions that does not shy away from also addressing Wiener Festwochen and the Free Republic of Vienna. As a performative battle rap arbitration court, the motto is that ‘Even an apparently critical institution must not be accepted uncritically.’ It is a queer-feminist commentary against violence and exploitation that will take a stand against obsolete mindsets and excluding practices on this evening.

Master of ceremonies KDM Königin der Macht invites the art of doubt to Volkstheater and illuminates the way art, capital and power are intertwined. Uncovering the true nature of capital calls for great care, however: on this evening, she will enter darkness as a wealth researcher in order to find out about the connection between mines and artworks. She immerses herself in the parallel society of the super-rich, whose grand chandeliers cannot deliver enlightenment and transparency for society. We need an illustrious witness: innocent of being a millionaire heir and guilty of disinheriting herself, Marlene Engelhorn has been summoned before the court to answer to Königin der Macht. The audience is invited to engage, to find out which spirits brought about the existing deficits and why the introduction of a wealth tax could be considered the lesser evil. Transparent insights and stirring sounds will be contributed by DJ, stripper and finance minister Kerosin 95.

On the third evening of the performance series, KDM Königin der Macht and The Last Glee Club turn Rote Bar into Vienna’s queer-feminist lung. A group of queer musicians bring their loudly screeching to quietly whispering voices, sharpen their tongues and raise their voices as the most direct instrument for political activism: song, clamour, sound and rap, gender euphoria for everyone who is described as too activist, too sensitive or too angry. The possibilities of radical solidarity and the conditions for true change in society will be discussed on this evening.

In Cracks in the Keks - A Loveperformance KDM Königin der Macht, the Balkan’s first drag king Zed Zeldich Zed and Grace Palmieri Jones take on the topic of love not as a universal feeling of heteronormative romanticism, but rather as a form of resistance against the heteropatriarchy. Far away from binary notions of high v. low, canonic v. popular, modern v. primitive, they point out how art and the notion of excellence are connected to imperial conquest, neoliberalism and the simultaneous mastery of time and space. Every crack, even breach of the canon, will mean sharing glocal and queer worlds with the local factor this evening.