[Nettime-ro] COMRADES OF TIME at PAVILION UNICREDIT

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PAVILION UNICREDIT

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18 Februarie - 28 Aprilie, 2010

COMRADES OF TIME
Expozitie

DESCHIDERE OFICIALA 18 February, 19.00

Participanti: Zbynek Baladran (CZ), Grigor Khachatryan (AM), Anna Molska (PL), Ioana Nemes (RO), Skart (SRB), Clemens von Wedemeyer (DE)

Curator: Joanna Sokołowska

“A fi con-temporan nu inseamna neaparat a fi prezent, a te afla aici si acum; inseamna sa fii mai degraba “alaturi de timp” decat “in timp”. In germana “con-temporan” se spune “zeitgenössisch”. Cum Genosse inseamna “tovaras“, con-temporan – zeitgenössisch – poate fi tradus prin “tovaras al timpului”, cel care colaboreaza cu timpul si il ajuta atunci cand are probleme, cand intampina greutati.” Boris Groys 

De ce devin artistii contemporani niste „tovarasi ai timpului” atat de activi si intervin asupra lui in asemenea moduri, incat il incadreaza in metanaratiunile istorice implicite în spaţiile sociale contemporane? Expoziţia asociază întrebarea de mai sus cu practicile artistice care implică dileme puse de reprezentarea, rememorarea şi actualizarea trecutului din perspectiva proiectelor modernitatii socialiste si comuniste. In lucrarile artistilor pot fi detectate doua moduri de gandire principale si interconectate. Pe de o parte avem o reflectie asupra posibilelor sensuri ale straturilor istorice prezente in arhitectura si in alte forme de organizare a vietii, ce investigheaza in particular modul in care istoria este transmisa si mediatizata. Astfel, aici centrul de interes il reprezinta conditiile contemporane de producere a experientei trecutului. Pe de alta parte se pune un accent puternic pe meditatia asupra aspectului emancipator al modernităţii ca proiect neterminat. Din aceasta perspectiva există o nevoie urgenta de evaluare a potentialului actual al modernitatii si, concomitent, de analiza critica a erorilor sale.

Proiectele ideologice moderniste pot fi observate cu o intensitate speciala in procesul de constructie si in actiunile de distrugere si reconstructie legate inexorabil de scrierea istoriei si de un control asupra memoriei. „Naratiunea si constructia”, noteaza Ricoeur „creeaza un gen similar de imprimare: una in longevitatea timpului, cealalta in trainicia materialelor. Fiecare noua cladire se inscrie in spatiul urban ca o naratiune intr-un cadru intertextual”. Distrugerea poate sterge sau suspenda in timp istorii vechi, anuntand astfel declansarea unor noi naratiuni. Procesul de producere si reproducere a spatiului social in care functioneaza structura, arhitectura si forma urbana in evolutie constituie o provocare interesanta pentru artisti, in masura in care acestia il interpreteaza ca pe un palimpsest compus nu doar din straturi spectaculare, vizibile si materiale, spatio-temporale, ci si dintr-o multitudine de straturi invizibile si imateriale asezate unul peste celalalt. Artistii nu sunt interesati atat de dezvaluirea si prezentarea unui text care s-ar putea sa fi existat odata, ci de codarea sau reactivarea lui, expunandu-l contextului actual in care el ar putea reaparea. Aceasta e situatia in care artistii devin tovarasi activi ai timpului, caci combina fara restrictii cadre recunoscute din descrierile istorice si inventeaza noi traiectorii pentru evenimentele trecutului. Fiind interesati de caracterul complex al dorintei de a captura trecutul, realizeaza transformari in sensurile alocate acestuia, utilizand, de exemplu, metoda repetitiei sau a remake-urilor. De fapt repetitia este de fiecare data o actualizare recenta a conditiilor de productie ce apar la o noua prelucrare a trecutului.

Explorarea in spatiul social contemporan a ramasitelor unei utopii pierdute, demers prezent in lucrarile lui Clemens von Wedemeyer (“Silberhöhe”, “Die Siedlung”), Zbyněk Baladrán (“Glossary”, “Socio-fiction II”) si Grigor Khachatryan (“Churches”), este legata de problema transmiterii actului de imaginare si reamintire a lor cu ajutorul diverselor imagini si a feluritelor tehnologii utilizabile in domeniul culturii vizuale: filmele de fictiune, cele documentare si de televiziune. Analizand imaginile prin diverse moduri ale "reproductibiitatii lor tehnice" ei ajung la esenta imaterialului contemporan si aspectul afectiv al economiei ce genereaza in primul rand imagini si dorinte mediate. 

Problema potentialului contemporan de emancipare a ideilor revolutionare, a socialismului si comunismului, precum si rolul artei in transformarea societatii, sunt abordate si in lucrarile lui Škart (“Our Miracle”) si Anna Molska (“W=F*S (Work)”,  “P=W:t (Power)”) si Zbyněk Baladrán. Ce conditii declanseaza astazi insasi necesitatea de a pune astfel de intrebari? Sugestia artistilor ajunge chiar la esenta polemicii despre problema comunismului in istoria societatilor care l-au trait: sa fie eliminat complet sau sa fie tratat pur si simplu ca o eroare, o falie temporara in nazuinta universala spre capitalism? Aceasta amnezie, laolalta cu absenta unor noi orizonturi politice, a constituit unul dintre prezumtivii factori ce au facilitat dominatia paradigmei actuale, in care antagonismele sunt atenuate.
Forta sentimentelor negate poate conduce la fantezia reconstruirii traditiilor pierdute, anistorice, stabile si “autentice”, in sensul descris de Svetlana Boym prin sintagma “nostalgie restauratoare”, si la “intoarcerea reprimatului”. Škart si Anna Molska ne propun sa ne incheiem conturile cu trecutul intorcandu-ne la el si verificandu-i elementele in momentul actual.

Investigarea de catre artisti a modurilor de reamintire, uitare sau reactivare a ideilor revolute ale modernitatii socialiste, ale caror elemente inca mai contribuie la edificarea spatiilor in care traim, permite o reevaluare a potentialului contemporan al artei in raport cu noua economie existenta, cu formele de organizare a vietii si cu initierea unor experiente colective.

Publicatie: "Tovarasi ai timpului", cu texte de Joanna Sokolowska, Boris Groys, Juli Carson.
Publicatie editata de  PAVILION - journal of politics and culture, Engleza/Romana, 80 pagini, B/W, 13,5 x 18,5 cm, softcover, 7 EURO/19 RON.

This project is supported by POLISH INSTITUTE BUCHAREST.


Imagine: Grigor Khachatryan, Churches, 1997, video still, courtesy of the artist.


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18 February - 28 April, 2010

COMRADES OF TIME
Exhibition

OPENING 18 February, 19.00

Participants: Zbynek Baladran (CZ), Grigor Khachatryan (AM), Anna Molska (PL), Ioana Nemes (RO), Skart (SRB), Clemens von Wedemeyer (DE)

Curator: Joanna Sokołowska

“To be con-temporary (…) means to be “with time” rather than “in time.” “Con-temporary” in German is “zeitgenössisch.” As Genosse means “comrade,” to be con-temporary—zeitgenössisch—can thus be understood as being a “comrade of time”—as collaborating with time, helping time when it has problems, when it has difficulties.”  (Boris Groys)

Why do contemporary artists become such active “comrades of time” intervening in the ways in which time is framed by the historical meta-narratives implicit in contemporary social spaces? The exhibition relates this question to artistic practices that confront dilemmas posed by the representation, remembrance and actualisation of the past as far as it concerns projects of socialist and communist modernity. In the artists’ works, two principal interconnected modes of thought can be detected: on the one hand, a reflection on the possible meanings of the layers of history present in architecture and other forms of the organisation of life, in particular questioning the way history is mediated and medialised. Thus, the focus here is on the contemporary conditions of the production of the experience of the past. On the other hand, a strong emphasis is also placed on thinking about the emancipatory aspect of modernity as an unfinished project. From this perspective, the urgent need is to assess modernity’s present-day potential and at the same time critically examine its mistakes.

Modernist ideological projects can be seen with especial intensity in the construction process, in acts of destruction and rebuilding that are inexorably linked with the writing of history and a policing of memory. “Narrative and construction,” notes Ricoeur, “bring about a similar kind of inscription, the one in the endurance of time, the other in the enduringness of materials. Each new building is inscribed in urban space like a narrative within a setting of intertextuality”.  Destruction can erase or suspend old histories in time, and thus announce the inception of new narratives. The process of the production and reproduction of the social space in which the evolving urban fabric, architecture and design function forms an interesting challenge for artists, in as much as they interpret it as a palimpsest composed not just of spectacular, visible and physical temporo-spatial layers, but also of multiple invisible and immaterial strata piled on top of one another. Artists are not so much concerned with the uncovering and presentation of an erased text that may once have existed, but encode or reactivate it, exposing the current context in which it might emerge. It is here that artists are active comrades of time, mixing frames recognized from descriptions of history and inventing new trajectories for past events. Interested in the complex nature of the desire to grasp the past, they perform transformations on the senses ascribed to it, making use, for example, of the method of repetition or remakes. Repetition is in fact an actualization of the conditions of production that emerge from a reworking of the past.

The exploration of the traces of a lost utopia in contemporary social space that is present in the works of Clemens von Wedemeyer (“Silberhöhe”, “Die Siedlung”) , Zbyněk Baladrán (“Glossary”, “Socio-fiction II”)  and Grigor Khachatryan (“Churches”) is connected with a question as to the mediation of the imagining and remembering of them through the different images and various technologies operative in the field of visual culture:  fiction and documentary films, video and television. Probing images through different modes of their “technical reproducibility” they get to the very heart of the contemporary immaterial and  affective aspect of an economy that generates first and foremost mediated images and desires. 

The question of the contemporary emancipatory potential of revolutionary ideas, of socialism and communism, and the role of art in the transformation of society are taken up in the works of Škart (“Our Miracle”) Anna Molska (“W=F*S (Work)”,  “P=W:t (Power)”)  and Zbyněk Baladrán. What conditions produce the need to even ask such questions today?  The artists` suggestions can be seen within  the discussions of the problem of the erasing of communism from the history of the societies that experienced it, or the simple treating of it as a mistake, a temporary break in the universal striving towards capitalism. This amnesia and the lack of new political horizons was one of the factors supposed to facilitate the domination of the current paradigm in which antagonisms are subdued. The strength of negated sentiments can lead to the fantasy of reconstructing lost, a-historical, stable and “true” traditions in the sense described by Svetlana Boym as “restorative nostalgia” and to an explosive “return of the repressed.” The artists propose a working through of the past through returning to it and testing its elements today. 

Their work on modes of recalling, forgetting or reactivating the former ideas of socialist modernity, elements of which still contribute to the production of the spaces in which we live, enables a reassessment of the contemporary potential of art in relation to the new economy, to forms of organisation of life and to the initiation of collective experiences. (Extras from the publication "Comrades of Time")

Publication: "Comrades of Time", with texts by Joanna Sokolowska, Boris Groys, Juli Carson.
Published by PAVILION - journal of politics and culture, English/Romanian, 80 pages, B/W, 13,5 x 18,5 cm, softcover, 7 EURO / 19 RON.

This project is supported by POLISH INSTITUTE BUCHAREST.


Image: Grigor Khachatryan, Churches, 1997, video still, courtesy of the artist.


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PAVILION UNICREDIT
center for contemporary art & culture

Sos. Nicolae Titulescu 1 (Piata Victoriei)
Bucharest  011131 Romania
T: + 4 031 103 4131
E: pavilion@pavilionmagazine.org
www.pavilionunicredit.ro

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PAVILION UNICREDIT este un centru pentru arta si cultura contemporana, un spatiu independent work-in-progress, spatiu de productie si cercetare a vizualului, a discursivului si a performativului. Este un spatiu al gandirii critice  care promoveaza o întelegere implicata socio-politic a artei si a institutiilor culturale.

PAVILION UNICREDIT is a center for contemporary art & culture, a work-in-progress independent space, a space for the production and research in the fields of audiovisual, discursive and performative. It is a space of the critical thinking, and it promotes an artistic perspective implying the social and political involvement of the art and of the cultural institutions.

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This is a project by PAVILION - journal for politics and culture. 
www.pavilionjournal.org

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PAVILION, BUCHAREST BIENNALE and PAVILION UNICREDIT are projects devised and founded by Razvan Ion and Eugen Radescu

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Supported by: UniCredit Tiriac Bank
Strategic partner: Pilsner Urquell
Partners: Center for Visual Introspection, Tanga Project, ADD, Paradis Garaj, laBomba, Romanian Cultural Institute, Austrian Cultural Forum, 
Media partners: Afterall, Framework, Radical Philosophy, Springerin, Radio Romania Cultural, 22, Alternativ.ro, Feeder.ro, 24Fun, Modernism.ro, Arhitectura
Production partner: UpDate Advertising
Printing partner: First Advertising Agency
Audio-visual partner: Sony

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