Performance with G. A. Cavellini and Julia Klaniczay.
Idea: Man is a “trans-functioned” statue. Location: Hősök tere (Heroes’ square), the scene of displays of national pomp and political power, under whatever government. The statue of Vera Muhina (Worker and Peasant Woman, 1937) symbolising the Soviet Union was the starting point of the reinterpretation. Instead of the hammer and sickle, György Galántai and Júlia Klaniczay held a book, opened at the reproduction of the statue, and positioned themselves in a similar forward-striding pose – as a statue vivante, while Cavellini was writing the most distinguished names in art history on their clothes. In this action, Cavellini stood for all Italian artists who in the course of history introduced European culture to Hungary.
Afterlife:
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Artpool’s first Mail-Film project (not realized) More performances between 1980 and 1984:■
1981: The clothing exhibition in Savaria Múzeum, Szomba-thely; Confrontation – at the opening of the exhibition The Fifties. Hungarian Art of the Twentieth Century, Csók István Képtár, Székesfehérvár; Walk along Felvonulási tér, Buda-pest; Clothes Make the Man? (exhibition) + Dress designing and video project, Textile Art Symposium, Velem (1980–81).■
1983: Liget Galéria, Budapest■
1984: Grenzzeichen (Border-signs) Symposium in Breiten-brunn, Austria. The life of the “refunctioned sculptures” in a closed space (museum or prison) – minimal action with video installation.DOCUMENT: photo, sound, video
WEB-DOCUMENT: www.artpool.hu/Galantai/perform/Muhina/
PUBLICATION: Artpool postcards
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Cavellini, G. A.: Cavellini in California e a Budapest.
Brescia, 1980, pp. 67–76.; Cavellini, G. A.: Cavellini in California and in Budapest, Brescia, 1980, pp. 69–78.
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[Presentation of the programs of Grenzzeichen / Határjelek. Neue Kunst aus Österreich und Ungarn / Új művészet Ausztriában és Magyarországon], AL 11 (Spring 1985), pp. 18–27.■
Living Textile 1968–1978–1988. A Selection from Contemporary Hungarian Works of Textile Art (exhibition catalog), Műcsarnok, Budapest, 1988, pp. 65, 137.■
Beke László:A szocreál különös utóélete, in: György Péter – Turai Hedvig (eds.):
A művészet katonái. Sztálinizmus és kultúra, Corvina, Budapest, 1992, pp. 109–116 [pp. 110, 114]
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Galántai György – Klaniczay Júlia (eds.):Galántai, Életmunkák/Lifeworks 1968–1993, Artpool – Enciklopédia Kiadó, Budapest, 1996, pp. 196–205.
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Marten, Cordelia: Action, Performance, Happening as Message. Aktion, Performance, Happening als Sendung, in: Dahms, Otto C. – Tania Müller (eds.): Art à la carte. Internationale Künstlerpostkarten seit den 60er Jahren, Neues Museum Weserburg, Bremen, 2004, pp. 84–86.■
GalántaiGyörgy, Hommage à Vera Muhina, The Room, Issue 9, Spring/
Summer, 2009, pp. 118–121.
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Pejlić, Bojana (ed.): Gender Check.Femininity and Masculinity in the Art of Eastern Europe, Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig, Wien – Buchhandlung Walther König, Cologne, 2009, p. 210.
III/III secret police document: “Festő” dossier, July 29, 1980; July 8, 1981;. July 31, 1984
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G. A. Cavellini – exhibition interior
hoMMaGe À VeRa MuhiNa
performance by György Galántai with Júlia Klaniczay and G. A. Cavellini
Idea: Man is a “trans-functioned” statue.
Realization: The reinterpretation of Vera Muhina’s statue (the birth of the “statue vivante”).
The original: A statue symbolic of the worker-peasant alliance: a man and a woman striking a purposeful pose, their hammer and sickle (symbols of the revolution) raised high above their heads. Muhina’s statue stood atop the Soviet pavilion at the Paris Expo of 1937; later, the Mosfilm Studio adopted it as its emblem. To the public mind, it came to symbolize the Soviet Union as a whole.
Reinterpretation: Similarity: The figure “man and woman” harks back to the most deep-rooted of conventions;
it is the smallest unit of the collective. Purposeful, forward-striding pose.
Differences: Hammer and sickle are replaced by a book. The reproduction of the statue in the book is, at the same time, the starting point of the reinterpretation, and part of the reinterpretation. Within this new context and related to the book, there’s writing on the figures’ clothing: the most distinguished names in art history, signifying world art. The man and woman represent not two different classes, as in the original, but the smallest unit of a classless world.
Location: Hősök tere [Heroes’ Square]. The scene of displays of national pomp and political power, under whatever government. The nation’s theater. The point to which Budapest’s one and only avenue leads. The avenue starts in the heart of the city, to come to rest in a natural setting [a park]. It terminates in the sweeping semicircle of the Millennial Memorial. It is here that [statues of] the key personalities of Hungary’s thousand-year history are on display. The Museum of Fine Arts on the left of the square stands for the old masters and for world art; across, on the right, the Exhibition Hall with its constant stream of temporary exhibitions stands for contemporary art. The geometric center of this square was the setting where the “trans-functioning” of the statue was enacted.
Direct motivation: The presence of the Italian artist G. A. Cavellini, and the possibilities inherent in his artistic approach: self-historiography. Cavellini’s manuscripts – written on the naked bodies of other people or on objects, such as his own clothes – are parts of his own real or imaginary history. Cavellini is symbolic of all the Italian artists who introduced European culture to Hungary. (The strong Italian influence on Hungarian art is common knowledge.)
Source: György Galántai – Júlia Klaniczay (eds.): Galántai–Életmunkák/Lifeworks 1968–1993, Artpool – Enciklopédia Kiadó, Budapest, 1996, p. 198.
György Galántai: Hommage à Vera Muhina (performance with G. A. Cavellini and Júlia Klaniczay), Heroes’ Square, Budapest, 1980 Photos: György Hegedűs
A r t P o o L e V e n t s 1 9 7 9 – 1 9 9 1 55
Contributions to / reflections on the call from: Ádám Bálint, Levente Baranyai, József Bódis, Péter Bokros, Tamás Diner, László feLugossy, Árpád fenyvesi Tóth, Elemér Hankiss, László Hegedűs L., Béla Kelényi, Imre Kocsis, Gábor Lajta, Endre László, András Lengyel, Oszkár Rihmer, Géza Sáska, György Szemadám, Péter Tamás, Alíz Torday, Gábor Ulveczky, Ferenc Veszely.
DOCUMENT: call, ideas–plans–scripts received from the participants ARTWORKS: in Artpool’s collection
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Fényképészeti Lapok, III, 1981 September (publication of the call); reprint edition: Fényképészeti Lapok, Magyar Fotográfiai Múzeum, 2010, ca. 270 p.
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Markó György: Válaszféle Kőszegék ferdítéseire, Élet és Irodalom, September 4, 1988, p. 5. (illustration)■
Galántai György: Tisztelt Markó György!, Élet és Irodalom, September 11, 1998, p. 6.
III/III secret police document: “Festő” dossier, June 14, 1982
21 July – 20 August 1981 Mini Galéria, Újpest, Budapest
Art + Post
Művészet és Posta (APS no. 7)
Artpool’s first Hungarian mail art exhibition was organized from the postal art works of 86 Hungarian artists, the invitations of 36 cultural institutions as well as from various other mail art, object and book works. The show also included two international projects organized by Hungarians (Substitutable Self-portrait – a project by Róbert Swierkiewicz, and Artpool’s assembling titled Textile without Textile) and the sound was provided by Artpool’s sound archive.
DOCUMENT: postcard-invitation, call, flyer-invitation, poster, installation design of the exhibition, photo, video (by András Szirtes)
WEB-DOCUMENT: www.artpool.hu/events/APS_7/
PUBLICATION: ART + POST (Művészet és Posta), 1981, Four A6 size booklets in envelope, offset, ca. 200 copies. (The series containing the Hungarian translation of articles and studies about corres pon dence art was published to prepare the first exhibition of Hungarian mail artists. The fourth booklet is also the catalog of the exhibition.)
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[Swierkiewicz Róbert]: Önfejtágító – Mail Art Project, artist’s publi ca-tion, Országos Grafikai Műhely, Vác, 1992 ARTWORKS: in Artpool’s collection (except the material of the project “Önfejtágító” [Substitu-table Self-portrait])
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Poolwindow, No. 7 (March 1981) and No. 10. (May 1981)
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Bán András: Művészet és Posta. Újpesti Mini Galéria, Új Tükör, August 23, 1981, pp. 3–4.III/III secret police document: “Festő” dossier, April, May 12, August 5, August 27, September 8, October 9, 1981
30 October 1981 Young Artists’ Club, Budapest
Gérald Minkoff:
Chinese Chess + Instant Hexagram Kínai sakk + Instant Hexagramm (APS no. 9)
“What might happen among artists during a meeting like this?” An “instant event” waiting for an answer. The question is also the title of the event to which the answer is given by 6 Polaroid photographs that form a hexagram. “Each photo bears in itself three levels or layers of different temporal and spatial origins. The event appears as the reality content of the photos taken and instantly displayed.” (Gérald Minkoff) DOCUMENT: invitation–flyer (with the description of the event on the back), photo WEB-DOCUMENT: www.artpool.hu/events/APS_9/
III/III secret police document: “Festő” dossier, November 10, December 30, 1981
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Gérald Minkoff’s event, 1981