Social Muscle Club

ABOUT THE SOCIAL MUSCLE CLUB (SMC)
First launched in Berlin/Germany by a group of performers, Social Muscle Club was created to exercise our giving and receiving muscles. Branches have been established by collaborators in other cities, including Bristol/England and Basel/Switzerland. SMC is a hybrid of art, non-art, playfulness, and usefulness. What are social muscles? Social Muscles are “soft skills”— invisible muscles that are the basic building blocks for an individual to navigate and participate fully in society.

Social Muscle Club began as a private happening for a small group of eight people hosted in a flat and quickly grew to a 100 person bi-monthly event in the Sophiensaele Berlin. In June 2014 the Social Muscle Club's Trying to Talk Tour premiered, an initiative created to 'workout' and strengthen three new social muscles.

The Club is inspired by the social club in the documentary film Menschen von Scheffield by Peter Nestler, a film about a group of blue collar workers in Scheffield, England, who pay membership into a club that states “entertainment and social support” as its primary purpose.

The Social Muscle Club Philosophy: 
1. Provoking dialogue between different types of people using performance as a tool

2. Creating new ways of being with each other leading to mutual support and change the habitual paradigms of thinking

3. Creating spaces where people can train their social muscles, independent of existing societal structures

4. Grassroots: Social Muscle Club began in a living room and grows through the participation of a diverse group of people

For more information about the Social Muscle Club please contact Dieta Sixt, Social Muscle Club Manager.

SELECTED PERFORMANCES
Social Muscle Club Bristol
November 2015, Ausform Micro-Fest
In Bristol/UK, a new branch of the Social Muscle Club is produced in collaboration with SMC Berlin. SMC Bristol explores transposing the SMC format to a new setting, while maintaining the core rules of the score. In November 2015, SMC Bristol will be featured at Ausform Micro-Fest, a three-day burst of progressive performance and events from the UK and Europe.

Social Muscle Club Basel
SMC Basel Premiere Performance Series
June 5-14, 2015 Wildwuchs-Festival | May 1, 2105 at Markthalle
Performances of the new SMC Basel are scheduled at several venues, including the Markthalle, through the summer and fall. Shows highlight the art of sharing, barter and community.

SMC Bimonthly Club at Sophiensaele
May 13, 2015 | February 13, 2015
Beginning in 2015 invited guest curators program bi-monthly SMC Club editions at Sophiensaele Berlin, including NowMomentNow. Emerging curators bring in new artists and attract wider audiences. "We all need something and have something to give. A hug? Advice? Money? Helping hands? Everything is possible! Let's train our giving muscles."

Men in Garages | Männer in Garagen
September 2014
Find them behind apartment blocks, at subway stations, at the city's edge or on urban waste land: garages. Lined up, they exist as a marginal presence. They are everywhere, useful for many things and yet – almost invisible. Members of the Social Muscle Club took a closer look in a performance series at secret garage locations in the Berlin-Pankow district and at the Sophiensaele in September 2014.
Download the Program.
Read or download the Tagesspiegel article.