PASSAGES OF NEO-AVANT-GARDE
Artists: Tatiana Czekalska (PL), Leszek Golec (PL), Jarosław Kozłowski (PL), Andrzej Paruzel (PL), Józef Robakowski (PL), Emilio Lopez Menchero (BE), Peter Ronai (HU), Katharina Roters (AT), Josef Strau (AT), József Szolnoki (HU)
Exhibition organized within 100th anniversary of neo-avant-garde as a common project of the Centre of Polish Sculpture in Orońsko, Austrian Culture Forum in Warsaw and Polish Institute in Budapest
Opening June 29th at 6 pm in Platan Gallery
Opening speech by: Mag. Regina Rusz, director of Austrian Cultural Forum Budapest
Jarosław Bajaczyk, director of Polish Institute Budapest
Eulalia Domanowska, director of Centre of Polish Sculpture in Orońsko
The international exhibition of a few European artists coming from Austria, Belgium, Poland, Hungary and Germany presents their attitude as well their commentary on various political, social and economic phenomena which have been and still are relevant in contemporary Europe. The demons of communist totalitarianism, the possibility of manipulating the media, the difficult theme of refugees and terrorism, as well as overproduction and posthumanism are the topics taken up by the participants of the show. The majority of artists are classics of neo-avant-garde who established a dialogue with the achievements of Dadaists and the post-war Fluxus. The organized exhibition is part of the celebrations of the centenary of avant-garde in Poland and presents the continuations of modernist trends and ideas which were conceived at the beginning of the 20th century. It highlights the huge role the movement played in the development of visual arts, design and film, and how vivid is the impression it is still leaving on contemporary artists. The exhibition presents Polish and central European artists developing the avant-garde principles in the post-war period.
Avanat-garde was an all-Europe phenomenon and it had a critical influence on the development of modern aesthetic ideas and artistic practice all over the world. Artists connected with it presented a new outlook on the form and function of art and its characteristic features – openness to experiment, relentless search of new forms – directly impacted on the cultural activity of successive generations. The ideas of avant-garde have formed our environment, starting from urban development and architecture through industrial design to fashion or advertising.
The present exhibition is a continuation of the project On the Avant-garde of the 20th Century shown at Atlas Sztuki gallery in Łódź in 2016, created by Andrzej Paruzel – author of video installations, films and experimental photography, graduate of the State School of Film, Television and Theatre in Łódź; member of the Film Form Workshop and co-founder of Zespół T – artistic groups established at the Film School in Łódź in the 70s and animateur of art, who has implemented many projects in public space.
The participants of the exhibition In Relation to Politics, presented simultaneously at the Austrian Culture Forum in Warsaw and at the Platan Gallery at the Polish Institute in Budapest, include: from Poland Jarosław Kozłowski, Józef Robakowski, duet Tatiana Czekalska and Leszek Golec as well as Andrzej Paruzel; from Belgium – Emilio López-Menchero; from Hungary – Peter Ronai and a German-Hungarian duet Katharina Roters and József Szolnoki, as well as Austrian artist Josef Strau.
Józef Robakowski is going to show his video film Brezhnev’s Funeral from 1982, which the author presents as part of his series of ‘re-reports from television’. He combined the images of a Soviet army parade with the music of the group Laibach, in this way exposing the ideological determinants of the television message from the days of communism. This classical work is contrasted with Dadaist gestures of the Hungarian media artist Peter Ronai, creator of the collage Moscow DaDa, Jarosław Kozłowski’s installation Recycled News 2 – a series of coloured pages from various newspapers from the world, post-humanistic projects by Tatiana Czekalska and Leszek Golec who pay special attention to the world of animals and nature, Josef Strau’s designer installations, in which he critically speaks about contemporary overproduction, and Emilio López-Menchero’s video-film Check Point Charlie, discussing the incidents and situation in the Brussels district of Mölenbeck, which is the place of residence of the artist and the terrorists who committed attacks last year in Brussels.
The exhibition held on the occasion of the centenary of avant-garde proves that while certain formal resolutions introduced by avant-garde only have purely historical value today, the ethos of experimenting and engagement which strongly determined avant-garde, still seems to be attractive for contemporary artists.