Sex work is on everyone’s lips. Everybody knows the pictures from print and media – lightly dressed ladies at the roadside, legs with higheels, butts on bar stools.

But what is sex work, who engages in sex work and what happens there?

I have been a political sex-work activist for 6 years and deal in depth with the topics of sex work, the struggles of sex workers, the sex-work rights movement and increasing regulation.

Lecture

I’m talking about sex work in general, the approaches, the circumstances and the actors. Main topics can be: working conditions, places of work, demands of the whore rights movement, the history of the whore movement in Germany, links with human trafficking, peer work, stigma, decriminalisation, to name but a few.

What is important to me is a view of society as a whole and a representation of all actors in sex work. Not many colleagues are able to come out and are therefore dependent on remaining hidden. I bring these voices with me.
Possible as part of an internal further training for multipliers (e.g. counselling centres, political parties, universities), at symposia, congresses, interested groups of people, etc.

Performance

Close up – sex work.

A performance I developed for the taz.lab. I sit in a small, plush room, decorated with all kinds of everyday objects utilized in sex work. Based on the processes in a brothel, individual persons from the audience are allowed to visit me at intervals of limited time and in an intimate 1:1 setting to ask everything that interests them about sex work. The intimate space contains possibilities for dealing with sexuality and negotiating performance and work. The sex-working protagonist is an expert on sexuality and is not shifted into the often typical victim posture. At the same time, the interviewee can free herself from her own stigma and openly address issues that are too shamefaced in front of strangers.

Prerequisites: closed room, electricity.