Wasting time with art, again.

Tonight I went to NoD, a gallery right next door to Roxy, one of the oldest and most legendary (underground) clubs of Prague. There was supposed to be some kind of stencil art 'thing', or so I was told by an American guy I met here (one of many; I've met more Americans here in a month than I've met in the past year, bands not included). I asked Jaime, one of the nicest persons I've met here, to come with me (yes, she's American too!) and she came with another nice girl called Jessica, from......well, you guessed it by now.
Unfortunately, there wasn't a stencil in sight. The exhibition consisted of a collection of artworks from different Icelandic artists. Some of the names looked vaguely familiar, as I had visited an exhibition of Icelandic artists the last time I was in New York City, but the works bared no resemblance to anything I had seen there: mostly very complex and almost surrealist drawings and paintings. This exhibition 'Islandia' however, showed some video's and some very poor mural artworks. After a few hours two girls started to do some performance that included laptops, huge wigs with flowers and a lot of screaming through a mega-phone. By then it was time to get the hell out of there, and so we left and ended the night in Duende, my favourite bar in Prague.

There was one work of art at the exhibition that was, well let's just call it 'pretty interesting'. It took me a few seconds to figure out what it was exactly.

The stills were next to a video on a loop. I forgot to write down the name of the artist or the title of the artwork, so I'll just call it 'Talking Penis'.

It's too bad that there's no sound, otherwise you could've heard the penis talking loudly in Icelandic.

By the way, there was a Danish girl also taking pictures at the gallery. I was intrigued by her camera, since it looked like an old fashioned Leica, but a very well preserved one. I asked her about it and she showed me the most beautiful digital camera I have ever seen: the Leica Digilux 2. It's digital, so it has a big screen on the back, but it looks just like a nice old Leica. Now I am probably the last person on earth to stop shooting analogue; I love films, I love the darkroom, I love all the 'hassle' that comes with it. But this was something special.
I probably can't afford it, but I want that camera!

Dangling Man.

'Viselec' ('Hanging out'), sculpture by David Černý, located above Husova.

I prefer to shut up today.

Not in the mood for writing, so I'll just leave you with a few pictures, taken the past few days.

Staroměstské náměstí (Old Town Square). A square in the middle of the Old Town of Prague. It is usually packed with tourists, who are closely watching the Orloj (Astronomical Clock). I was there on Thursday morning at 6 am, and it was almost completely deserted.....

Yesterday, I walked there again, noticing the beautiful facades at the buildings surrounding the square again (and the fiercely blue/grey sky). How I'm gonna miss this kind of architectural beauty...

The TV Tower however, is another story. Located in Žižkov, an area that used to be very rough and working class, it's one of the ugliest buildings I've ever seen. It stands on a plateau in the middle of a residential area, and can be seen from almost everywhere in town. It's 216 metres high. In 2001, sculptures of babies by Czech artist David Černý were attached to it.

One year ago today....

? September 1996 - 21 June 2006

Dixie, the most wonderful (and photogenic) rabbit in the whole wide world, died one year ago.

Wasting time with art.

Yesterday I visited some galleries. Since the guide I’m writing is mainly focused on history and culture, I am supposed to ‘know’ about the cultural climate and the (contemporary) art scene in Prague, and visiting galleries is always a good way of getting a taste. Unfortunately, as I already wrote two weeks ago, I have become completely jaded when it comes to modern art. So when I saw that one of the galleries I wanted to visit hosted an exhibition entitled Don’t waste time with art, that sounded promising! The artist, an Austrian ‘media mannerist’ (whatever that may be) named Markus Huemer, didn’t ring any bells, but I was definitely up for some self-mockery.
Unfortunately, the gallery-space itself was more interesting than the exhibition. Huemer does a good job at painting a few bird-like figures on huge, empty stretches of canvas though. It was pretty nice, aesthetic, and sometimes even beautiful. But boring.
One part of the gallery was closed off by a heavy black curtain; a sign next to it warned the visitors only to go in one by one. There was no one there, so I went in and entered a large room, completely dark apart from the bright and sharp light coming from a beamer. In the opposite corner of the space, around 50 small birds huddled together on a wooden branch attached to the walls. It was hot and muggy inside, and the birds seemed scared. On the floor were big bowls filled with water and birdseed, and bird droppings all over. I wondered what the fuck this was supposed to be.
I stood there for a few minutes, observing the birds and taking a few pictures (without flash of course). Nothing happened: there was no sound, no visuals. Just those poor animals caught in a beam of white light, for art’s sake. The brochure accompanying the exhibition contained an interview with the artist, who explained that it was entitled Action Painting: “A conic ray of white light illumines the floor of the black box with hundred alive birds [I guess half of them had died by the time the exhibition was reaching its end] and creates an interesting image on it. Flying birds and their silhouettes affect the spread of light in the box and thus the whole impression from the installation. The birds’ droppings on the floor create haphazard patterns reminding Pollock’s drip paintings.”
Yeah, whatever! I may not be the biggest Jackson Pollock-fan in the world, but this comparison is simply ridiculous. I have seen some of Pollocks works up close in New York in 2005, and I when I entered that 'Pollock room' in the MoMa, I was seriously moved by those huge paintings, bearing an impact still so violent after all those years. Pollocks work is agressive, desperate at times; with an urgency you hardly ever seem to find in contemporary art, since a lot of artist nowadays seem more concerned with being ironic and 'aesthetically sculpting their concept' than just spilling their guts for once.
If Hueller really knows Pollock so well, I'm very suprised that he dares to compare himself to him. To lock a hundred birds in a black box for six weeks and let them eat, drink, fly and shit in the dark, and call that 'Action Painting' is not only pathetic; it's pretty disgusting too.

"I play guitar for my car but I won't get very far..."

Today I was at Levné Knihy again, and I picked up Rise Above, the benefit cd (for the West Memphis Three) containing 24 Black Flag covers by various artists. There are some really good covers on this album, one of my favourites being ‘I’ve had it’ by The Mars Volta singer Cedric Zavala. I love the way he sings it.

(Thanks to my friend Erik, I know how to upload mp3's now! Visit his blog Electric Voodoo for more good music.)

All quiet on the Eastern front.

Yesterday I visited Terezín together with Jetske, a girl I know from Amsterdam, and her friend Gaspar. Terezín is a small fortress town, 50 km north of Prague. It was built in 1780, when Prague was part of the Austrian-Hungarian empire (then referred to as ‘Theresienstadt’) and used in the battle against the invading Prussians.
Already during the First World War was the ‘small fort’ of Terezín used as a prison. When the Nazi’s occupied the town in 1940 (and started calling it ‘Theresienstadt’ again) they built a concentration/transit camp for Jews and political prisoners, and used the small fort as a prison again. Most of the 140.000 people that passed through Terezín were eventually send to Auschwitz.
In 1943, 500 Jews from Denmark were send to the camp in Terezín, after which the Red Cross demanded to visit the camp in order to make sure they were safe there. The Nazi’s came up with a clever plan to trick the Red Cross representatives by building a temporary ‘model camp’. First, a lot of people where quickly shipped off to Auschwitz to hide the fact that the camp was overpopulated. Then, fake shops and bars were opened, and the prisoners were given regular clothing to wear. The whole camp was supposed to look like a nice and peaceful 'temporary home'. The Red Cross visited the camp and saw seemingly content people in spacious rooms, concluding that the transit camp was ‘acceptable and safe’. The Nazi’s, content with their successful scam, decided to make a short film about Theresienstadt (entitled Theresienstadt: Ein Dokumentarfilm aus dem jüdischen Siedlungsgebiet with the addition Der Führer schenkt den Juden eine Stadt – ‘the Führer gives a city to the Jews’), to pretend they weren’t as brutal as everyone thought. The actors and crew were all prisoners: forced to cooperate, and killed or transported immediately after the project was finished. The film itself was not widely distributed through the Red Cross, as it was intended, but found in the camp after the liberation in May 1945.

The weather was beautiful yesterday, with a fierce sun and a clear blue sky. When we arrived at the small fortress, there were hardly any visitors. We received a detailed map upon entrance and walked across the whole fortress, entering all the rooms and prison cells, and walking through the 500 m long (!) tunnel that was small enough to make you claustrophobic for the rest of your life.
It was very weird to visit a place with such a horrible past. You know that every room you enter was once filled with people who lived under terrible conditions and were uncertain of their lives, their future. The rooms and prisons were scarcely furnished with what I assume were the original beds and tables, and every space had a sinister atmosphere. And yet, every single room that had a window was occupied by swallows: up high, against the ceilings, were nests filled with little birds screaming for food. Countless swallows flied in and out of the rooms and across the territory.

After three hours of walking and visiting the detailed exhibitions that are scattered around the area, providing a lot of information on the camp, we were desperate for some food and drinks. We left the fortress and headed into the deserted town, and after dinner we waited for hours for a bus that didn’t come and eventually hitchhiked back to Prague.

I am still impressed by the visit, as I was the first time in 1995. I’ve always been extremely interested in World War II, mainly because of the stories my Dutch grandparents, who witnessed it from up close, told me when I was a kid. To walk around in a place that was once used as a concentration camp is fascinating and repulsive at the same time, and it made me wonder if it was in fact the right thing to do. Is it important to make a place like that public, to allow people to walk in, take pictures, touch the doors and beds and tables? Or is it disgusting? Should a place like that be preserved, like it is now, or destroyed? I stood in a huge, empty shower room, used more than sixty years ago to ‘delouse’ people that would be dead in less than five years; watching birds feed their young while other ‘catastrophe-tourists’ came in to take pictures…and I was completely confused.
At the end of the visit we watched a short documentary that contained excerpts of the propaganda-movie about Terezín. You saw a football match between two groups of prisoners, and scenes of ‘happy, healthy’ women talking, sitting on the same beds we had just seen. Different voice-overs, in different languages, kept repeating that “everything is fine in Theresienstadt, I’m not lacking anything at all.”

Mes meilleurs voeux!

Today is my mom's birthday, and I'm not there to celebrate it with her, unfortunately. Chère maman, bon anniversaire!

No big updates. Today, I went to the Museum of Decorative Arts (chock full of glass, ceramics, ornaments etc., it sounds more boring than it actually was), where there was 'A Beastly Show': a selection of animal-inspired work from two Czech artists. It seemed childish but turned out to be pretty cool, with works ranging from photographs and lino-cuts of animals to lobsters and fish made out of plastic bottles (which were quite impressive). One of the artists, Michal Cihlář, makes nice lino-cuts and does all the 'merch' and advertisement for the Praha Zoo. There were two walls filled with his images of animals.




Tomorrow I'll try to go and visit Terezín (also known as Theresienstadt), a town not far from Prague where the Nazi's built a concentration camp in 1941 (or a transit camp actually, since most of the people where eventually send to Auschwitz).

“I dig, you dig, the worm digs too.”

No updates in a week; that probably says enough about the past days. I feel like haven’t really done anything significant enough to post about.
My biological clock was running it own course this week. I’m afraid I only have myself to blame for this: last weekend, the weather was bad and I decided to be wise, stay at home, work and don’t spend any money. The staying at home-part went good, but in stead of only working, I spend a big part of my weekend watching the whole first season of ‘Lost’ online. When it was on TV in Holland, I only captured a few chunks here and there; and once I started watching it again, I was completely hooked. I watched three nights in a row, falling asleep at 6 a.m. in the morning.

Tuesday, George ‘Dubya’ Bush was visiting Prague, promoting his plans for Cold War – The Sequel. For those of you who do not know: the US wants to build a missile shield in Central Europe, to protect us (but mainly themselves) from possible attacks from the Axis of Evil. One part of the shield would be located in Trokavec, a Czech hamlet (97 inhabitants!) not far from Prague. The other part will be located in Poland. There were two days of demonstrations in Prague, although things didn’t really get out of hand. I didn’t attend any of them; I didn’t feel like it (or maybe I’m just lame). But I did walk up to the park not far from the Prague Castle that Bush was visiting that day, to see what security measurements the Czech government had taken. What I saw were rows and rows of small fences, low enough to jump over it. Where the fences closed off streets, groups of bored policemen were gathered; talking, eating and leaning. But the park around the Castle was largely deserted. The fences just stood there, with no policemen in sights, ready to be jumped over by whomever felt like it. I think the Czech have a thing or two to learn about Homeland Security…..

One of the highlights of my week was stumbling upon a beautiful woodcut by a Czech artist from North Moravia called Ferdiš Duša (1888-1958). It shows a young deer looking up, in quite a weird posture. When I showed it to my roommates their first question was "Why is its neck broken?". Whatever. I love it.
The picture is not very clear, unfortunately. It doesn't show how beautiful the cut is: smooth and delicate lines on the body, it's like you can almost feel the fur. The outline is thick. The woodcut is from 1941. I haven't found any information on the internet about it, although there is some info to be found on Duša, but mainly in Czech.

Wednesday, in the afternoon, I went to some sort of panel discussion in the Municipal Library. It was the last day of the 17th Prague Writers Festival, and since this year’s theme was ‘Dadaïsm’, I was curious about the program, which was built around the question "Where has Czech Dada gone, if it ever existed?" Since I have been to lectures and panel discussions like these numerous times, I knew that I would not leave the building with anything that would even remotely seem like an answer to that question.
I sat in a hall with around 50 people scattered, some of them old enough to have known Tristan Tzara (the Romanian poet who founded Dadaïsm) in person. On the stage were a bunch of equally old men, writers and literature professors, and one surprisingly young guy who turned out to be a curator from Zurich. The discussion was in Czech, but headphones were handed out, which allowed you to hear a very British woman’s desperate attempts to translate the mumbling going on onstage. It made me feel like I was at a UN convention.
After twenty minutes, the man next to me fell asleep, and on my other side a couple was making out, so I had no real chance of escaping. I tried to stay focused and actually learn something. After nearly an hour, one of the old guys (Ludvik Kundera, cousin of the famous Czech author Milan Kundera) decided to recite some poems of a poet who may or may not have been on of the few Czech dadaïsts. This spontaneous act of him was of course very ‘dada’, but since the translators were not prepared, they apologized through the headphones and I was forced to listen to nearly fifteen minutes of Dadaïst poetry in a language that barely makes sense to me in writing, let alone in speech.

During all this, I was wondering how it is possible that I have spent the past six years studying art and its history and theories, and although I’m always interested in stuff like this, it doesn’t seem to really capture me nowadays. I always like to give it a try, but while I’m at it, it hardly ever grabs me by the throat anymore.
I’ll be the last person to say “It’s just art”, because I truly believe that art plays a crucial, albeit often underexposed, role in society. Personally, I’m most interested in art that reflects (or has reflected) social structures; I’m attracted to art that springs from conflict, from war, from life changing events. And I'm particularly interested in the avant garde movements dating from the beginning of the 20th century: Expressionism, Futurism, Dadaïsm, Surrealism. These movements came into existence in a time when Western society was undergoing very drastic changes, and that is clearly reflected in almost everything. Besides that, these movements changed the course of art and the way art was looked upon permanently. All the more reason to be curious about what a group of so-called 'experts' had to say about the influence of Dadaïsm on Czech art and society...
But that afternoon, I was just plain bored. And I looked around wondering if anyone really gave a shit. In fifteen minutes, it would all be over, everyone would be outside again, in the sun, and 90% of the things said in that hall would be totally forgotten.

The motto of the festival was 'I dig, you dig, the worm digs too', taken from the poem Es war Erde in ihnen ('There was earth inside them') by Paul Celan, who spend some time in Romania writing surrealist poetry. Hermeneutics isn't my specialty, so I'll spare you my interpretations of it.