Post-Soviet artists in the West

[Allena]

Postdiaspora: finding and the anticipation
Yevgeniy Fiks

The term "postdiaspora" in the past six months was applied to post-Soviet generation of artists and intellectuals moved to the West in the 90 years - after the fall of the Berlin Wall, in an era of debates about globalism and the widespread demoralization of the locality. Postdiasporicheskoe generation of highly homogeneous: among postdiaspory there are "settled" in the West subjects (post-Soviet version of the local Western else), there are "temporarily displaced, nomadic individuals, which are sometimes virtually indistinguishable from traditional colonial travelers.

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Education postdiaspory unthinkable without the state policy of "flexible citizenship" in the West, as well as substantial improvements in the 90 border crossing for the representatives of Central and Eastern Europe. The rhetoric of globalism, the regime of "flexible citizenship," nomadic dynamics, as well as hope that the gulf between East and West is about to overcome, have contributed to the fact that in the 90 years postdiaspora continued to feel at once part of the post-Soviet art scene (and because - the post-Soviet reporter or a resident of the West) and a full member of the traditional Western discourses. As viewed from the side, then the post-Soviet Diasporic subject perceives and is perceived in the West as an imitation of "authentic" subject to "core areas" (geographical post-Soviet space), which only reinforces the duality.

In the field of cultural production for postdiasporicheskogo generation is characterized by pluralism and undermining established over the past 50 years of division of intellectual labor between East and West. Since the 90's post-Soviet diaspora, for that matter, and other diaspora in the West, calls into question the inviolability of borders between nation-states. Locally, however, postdiasporicheskie actors refuse to apply to itself the term "other", considering themselves still just "the other" first world.

As a consequence, a significant number of post-Soviet artists 1990 - 2000's, living in the West, continue to follow the trajectory "of Western modernism, understood as" an international contemporary art. " "Western modernism" produced Diasporic artists, becoming one of the components of post-Soviet Diasporic mosaics: the authenticity of the products of such artists as Alex Koshkarov, Glory Mogutin, Anton Ginzburg, and partly Anna Ermolaeva, exacerbated by their "vlipaniem" in traditional First World discourses. In the work of other artists of identity politics only occasionally reaches the surface, as in "Anna Karenina Goes to Paradise" Oli Lialinoy or in some projects, Olga Kiseleva and Pavel Braila, yielding then place an international "common places". Post-Soviet Diasporic consciousness works "properly", and its manifestations is extremely fragmentary. For postdiasporicheskogo generation is characterized as different levels of Diasporic consciousness and varying degrees of integration into the art scene of post-Soviet "core territory", which also determines the degree of their "diasporichnosti.

Nostalgia for the Second world experienced in 1990 - 2000-x, a principal postdiasporicheskogo consciousness. So, Anton Ginzburg defines his art as based on the aesthetics of "ugliness" graphic and industrial design of the Soviet Union, 1980. However, the method of Ginsburg kommodifitsiruet nostalgic appeal of the "Soviet ugliness" and dissolves it without a trace in the modern Western form. Nostalgia, which is manifested in the work of Ginsburg or project "Music on Bones" Pavel Braila, however, does not become effective "working memory". It is hoped that a period of a finding of post-Soviet nostalgia, a time when nostalgia for the Second world will become a tool of the new critics of modern Russia and other former Soviet territories.

In the 2000's postdiaspora, at least in the United States seems to have become more sedentary in nature and is determined by your location, understood as a traditional local, aided by the cooling of the political climate following the events in September 2001. "Flexible boundaries" now seems not so flexible as in the 90's. The post-Soviet diaspora starts to feel a new narrative, as distinct from the authentic West, and from the post-Soviet territory. Symptom postdiaspory separated from fragmented globalisticheskogo clouds.

Among the artists whose position most closely corresponds to the classical Diasporic identity politics - the New York group "You Yes You," which since the mid-90 produces the same name as the print edition to be deformed in the Diaspora "broken" in Russian, using deconstruct ethnic images. "You Yes You" knowingly and with a fair regularity cultivate their "ethnicity" and "Drugova. In addition to publishing "You Yes You" also carry stocks of social intervention within immigrant communities in New York and beyond, as, for example, "Project Kit 1" - shares of distributing kits "to activate the sense organs on case of war with Iraq, held in January 2003. Distributing the kits in various parts of New York, "You Yes You" served as "good citizens" of Western metropolis - ethnic activists.

Among the video artists Yuriy Gavrilenko and Joanna Malinowska, perhaps the most consistently reflects the post-Soviet Diasporic subjectivity. His study of the life of marginalized ex-Soviet agents in New York Gavrilenko began with the movie "20 Cans of Chunky Beef Soup" on New York's homeless, in the past, Moscow artist Maxim Vahmine. Gavrilenko works with documentary material and nesimulyativnym language, reflecting, without moralizing, reality and fate of specific post-Soviet subjects in the West. Jobs Joanna Malinowska "In Practice" is based on both gender and ethnic identity politics. This video installation documenting the work Malinowska housekeeper in American homes - the typical occupation of Polish immigrants in New York. However, compensation for work Malinowska are not money, and lectures on the philosophy that the artist reads the master of the house. Exchange homemaker services to lectures on philosophy, read American intellectual-man - the exchange of both gender and Diasporic.

In connection with the momentum the future of post-Soviet diaspora in the West can be as developed in the following scenario. Postdiasporichesky artist and intellectual in the 2000 ceases to be a mediator or translator between the "mainland" and the West, that he so successfully did in the 90's. Instead, he began active negotiations with all post-Soviet diasporas (including the Baltic countries), with diasporas in the former Soviet bloc, as well as with more traditional diasporas in the West, such as, for example, the African (Black Atlantic). Postdiaspora resigns himself to his situation as a "second world in exile" and produces, finally, a new critical stance towards the West (1), in relation to post-Soviet space (2) and in relation to the diaspora of Soviet times ( "high Diaspora") ( 3). Awareness of symptoms postdiaspory is possible only through humble acceptance of terminology inadvertent bias, random deterritorizatsii "and recognition of the 90's history. Special efforts are being made to resist assimilation, which is extremely easy for white subjects from Central and Eastern Europe ( "light" reception in Western modernism often results in post-Soviet subjects to engage in supporting roles in the traditional Western discourses). Diaspora becomes a place of new criticism and real, nesimulyativnogo activism.

A unique place of contact and interaction postdiaspory and post-Soviet space in 2000's become the "imagined community", which are beginning to blur the boundaries between nation states and boundaries between nation states and Diasporic communities. These "imagined community", formed with the help of modern technology (chat rums, mailing-lists and so on), allow the diaspora and the mainland "to function as a single organism. "Imaginary Community" - sometimes nostalgic, and revenge - become a forum for serious discussions about the fate of the Second World, its utopias and dystopia.


Yevgeniy Fiks
Born in Moscow in 1972, artist and critic.
Lives in New York.

Art Magazine. № 56, 2004.

[NATA NOVA]

... "Some people think that English. Anti-utopia and English. Dystopia - synonyms. There is also a point of view (both in Russia and abroad), distinguishing anti-Utopia and dystopia. According to her, whereas the dystopia - a "victory for the forces of reason over the forces of good, the absolute antithesis of utopia, dystopia - it is only the negation of the principle of Utopia, which represents more degrees of freedom. [2][3] [4] Nevertheless, the term dystopia is far more widespread and commonly understood in the sense of dystopia "...( Wikipedia)