Cultural Changes And Video Ventures In Eastern Europe

To the Western Eye, the world east of Vienna still seems exotic and somehow uniform. This view prevails despite extensive media coverage of upheavals, revolts, crumbling borders, and the political and economic metamorphosis of the entire region. The current turmoil - even to the uninformed observer - has replaced a hitherto amorphous territory with a giant multifaceted jigsaw, comprised of small nations, religions, languages and cultures of varied aspirations. Full realization of this diversity and the re- establishment of ethnic cultural identities will need a concentrated effort of all participants including the West.

Recent cultural transformations have been instigated by extreme economic deconstruction. This in turn has lead to a cultural process causing great tensions to unfold in the rapidly changing region. Thought, work and creative art has been profoundly influenced by these developments, especially art forms which are still in developing phases. In addition current political culture is assuming a new fluidity, and as a result fresh definitions are constantly required.

Distance from the political establishment was an essential feature in the life of East European artists, especially those involved in experimental arts. Art and artists, throughout the years of repression, have become poltiticized through the very act of exhibiting or performing. The question of national and cultural identity remains to this day, a subject of continous concern and investigation, in which the involvement of art occupies an ever changing role.

In the West, knowledge of progressive Central European art has been restricted for decades to surreptiously portable forms such as the samizdat literature, music and selected films. In contrast, visual arts or multimedia works posed a difficulty in transport and consequently received widespread publicity only of late. Attemps by young artists have often floundered in the surge of new trends and occasionally have themselves locked into a new traditionalism. A new difficulty now poses itself for Central Europeans, who formerly gazed westward with a certain naivete. It is becoming increasingly clear that the West and its market economies demand its own price. As a result artists are faced with the dilemmas similar of those in the West, i.e. to discriminate between truth, the real and hyper-reality. The rapidity and degree of change has corresponded directly to the extent of Western influence in the recent past.

Despite the difficulties of adaption to a "new world", the liberal atmosphere has facilitated unprecedented developments throughout Central and East Europe, especially in the area of media arts. These changes have been brought about mainly through the dedication of remarkable individuals, rather than government policy. Media art, distinctly dissident under Communist rule, served as a barometer in the region during the turbulences of the last decade. In the face of adversity and political repression, the artists have maintained their integrity and have continued to produce stimulating, dynamic and often provocative work. Cultural policies varied greatly with political time and place. During the years of strict martial law in Poland, clandestine films and videos were made with minimal equipment, while in the then nominally "free" Yugoslavia, liberal television policies contributed to the development of high artistic and technological standards. Despite the drab circumstances of Russia's centralist geo-cultural rule, which attempted to homogenize artistic expressions, film and (lately) video artists have produced highly satiric and often outrageous work.

In this exquisite patchwork of cultures, commonly called "Eastern Europe", video art has an uneven history, which varies from country to country and changes from day to day. This is further confounded by locally available technology. Communication remains a problem, and attendance at every event in the region continues to be more of a dream than reality. Consequently it is exceedingly difficult to present a homogeneous picture, a bird's eyes view of some of my personal experiences is the closest I can offer. Although the following events were recorded in the last few years, due to the rapid changes, some of them now seem like ancient history.

HUNGARY: Cultural policy in communist Hungary did not embrace conceptual or experimental art. As a consequence explorers were blacklisted and new media was practiced in the most unlikely places. In the mid seventies, "Creativity/visuality", a series of lectures on art awareness, were offered by the well known conceptualists Miklos Erdely and Dora Maurer at Ganz Mavag, a heavy industrial factory in Budapest. Erdely had a tremendous influence on the development of Hungarian new media. My most poignant memories of the experimental film scene are attached to the Bela Bal sz Studio (BBS) and the person of Miklos Erdely.

Since the late seventies the unique facility of the Bela Bal zs Studio (BBS) served as a haven for alternative film makers. At BBS, which was subsidized by Hungarofilm, Hungarian artists have been able to produce films and lately videos. Many of these, however, were censored, shelved and never shown in public. Thus a paradoxical situation developed whereby the most interesting alternative films, which ranged from the lyrical to the strictly conceptual - were all gathering dust in the BBS. Due to the good offices of a friendly projectionist some of the films were screened privately. This is how I came to see Erdely's films.

Provocative Miklos Erdely was a legendary dissident artist among Hungarians. In addition to an extensive body of photos, collages, drawings, and essays, he has also made important experimental films (for the shelves of the BBS). I remember vividly those occasions when, together with Erdely (resplendent in his fantastic black fedora and black cape) I watched with amazement some of his films.

Miklos Peternek, film/video theoretician, writer, teacher and video artist, also played a unique role in the Hungarian "new media" landscape. By systematically exploring the relationships between picutre, photo, film, video and computer art, he elucidated universal theories and provided documentation of Hungarian aspects of electronic art. Today through BBS, Hungarian video artists have access to education, information and new technology. The films came off the shelves and are shown together with new compilations all over the world. The major political, economical and cultural change of Hungary happened during the very period when a video art become more visible in the country. Nevertheless these changes are seldom portrayed directly. It is on a much more subtle personal level that artists express their views.

POLAND looks back on a long history of experimental film making - the first of these date back to the twenties. Fifty years later, in the mid seventies, a handful of artists, among them Wojciech Bruszewski and Jozef Robakowski produced the first Polish conceptual video works. In the eighties a whole new generation lead to a flourishing of video art.

As I travelled in Poland in 1989 , the contrast between the hardships of daily life of the Poles, and their optimistic spirit (containing an undertone of despair) was compelling but difficult to describe. This spirit was certainly evident in May of that year at "Lochu Manhattan (Caves of Manhattan), The Art Of Different Media". This was the first major international event organized by Jozef Robakowski after the lifting of martial law. Everybody connected even remotely to contemporary art in Poland was talking about travelling to L¢dz to participate in the month-long multi- media activities. The aim of this event was to present new trends and different forms of alternative art of different generations.

In the asphalt jungle of the "Lochu Manhattan" towers, posters covered the grey cement walls. Inside the enormous, dimly lit underground garage, huge sculptures, large canvases, complicated installations, videos and a long, long line of photographs were to be seen. On a late afternoon I was present at the video installation/performance of Izabella Gustowska at Lochu Manhattan. This installation was amazing for conveying a meaningful message with makeshift technology. Gustowska talked about women's preoccupation with the passing of time, passing of youth and impending death. The installation included coloured photographs of female figures mounted on glass. Gustowska was standing in front of a mirror - one monitor (in reality a TV set) presented her image in the mirror. Other TV sets showed pre-recorded tapes concerning passage of time and dying, through stunning images of red sand, flowing water - and everywhere there were cables and cables and cables...

Individual initiative is a major factor in the development of New Media in Central Europe. They key figure in Polish video has been Ryszard Kluszczynski, who in addition to his teaching and critical writing on film and video, has established the first Video Center in Poland. He has curated numerous other Polish video activities such as the lively WRO Sound Basis Visual Art Festival held in Wroclaw.

RUSSIA: Nothing is remotly conventional about Russia's video art. Dates, names, titles or technical descriptions are misleading when one considers the video scene and history of St. Petersburg or Moscow. Take video artist Juris Lesznyik for instance, whose commune has occupied a former palace, close to the Hermitage, a place big enough to organize exhibitions, parties or screenings. In 1991 a monitor in a gilded baroque picture frame, a Video8 camera and two VHS recorders constituted his studio equipment. This is where he produced Pirate TV, shown in various places including (former) Lenigrad television. For more intensive screening venues Lesznyik used the huge overhead screen of the Planetarium at midnight. It was an eerie scene: the "golden youth" of St. Petersburg gyrating to disco music under Lesznyik's outrageous video images.

Boris Yuhananov's exotically named Galerie Orangerie, and the Free Academy in Moscow, is yet another example. The Free Academy has been housed in the underground territories of a grim, typically forbidding Moscow appartment building. But there was a yard with scrawny trees and enough space inside for the faithful disciples to exercise, exhibit, debate, perform and, if necessary, sleep. The Orangerie has been transformed numerous times for exhibits, video installations and video performances. Yuhananov's disciples have been performing and steadily video-taping Chekhov's "self- evolving" Cherry Orchard for over two years. It is an astonishing tape.

And then there are the legendary Alejnyikov Brothers, who through censorship and blacklisting have produced a body of hilarious, satirical, minimum budget films. They were among the founders of the Parallel Cinema Movement, created outside the centralized cinema industry, as an independent movement in 1987. They organized the first independent Film and Video Festival in Moscow. Of late, the Alejnyikovs have expanded into feature films.

The electronic medium of video and consequently video art is fraught with contradictions and complexities. In contrast to most Western video artists who specialize in their field, many video artists in this region are coming from a pluralistic background. They live and work with the medium, but are not married to it. Nevertheless the video landscape of the last few years clearly reflects the quickly changing world of Central Europe - in spite of limited resources it is practically impossible to keep up with new developments. The hope for the future lies in the vision and vigor of the dedicated media artists in the vast video-landscape beyond Vienna.

Nina Czegledy