B EAST Magazine website

– by Alex Jackson

Eastern Europe: (failed) Russian Empire or extension of the West? Twenty years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall, Eastern Europe perhaps seems to have forsaken the right to be interesting as a geopolitical whole. What used to be the East’s defining factor, Socialism and belonging (or not belonging) to the Soviet sphere of influence, is what makes a revisiting of the region and its ideologies most interesting – at least to the artists being shown in Photo I, Photo You, the latest exhibition at London’s Calvert22 gallery.

Opened in May 2009, the cool art space just off Shoreditch High Street is the city’s first not-for-profit foundation specialising in and promoting Russian and East European art. Finally, London’s own creative eastern-bloc has a place to get its fix of Eastology.

The aim of this, the gallery’s fourth exhibition, is to trigger a double-take on the East of Europe, leading us to reconsider what is presented. “Most things in the world that we think we know, in fact demand a second glance,” explained  Moscow-born exhibition curator, Iara Boubnova. “The known demands attention just as much as the unknown,” she said. So nothing is here obvious, nothing is what it seems.

Getting us revved was Boris Mikhailov arresting Yesterday’s Sandwich 1960-70s series, featuring his signature superimposed photography that hybridizes the seemingly mundane into scenes imbued with fresh statements and complexities. Jan Mancuska’s The Other (I asked my wife to blacken all the parts of my body which I cannot see) 2007, not only blurs boundaries between author/subject/object but also questions the (un)known and the misleading tendencies in the obvious. Kiril Prashkov’s Responsible Painting 2006, of flaking apartment buildings presents an unofficial Utopian ‘alt-art’ while Olga Chernysheva’s peeping-Tom style video installation, Windows 2007, a meditatively exposes the beautiful banality of strangers’ lives beyond the curtains of an unknown tower-block – such as our favourite, a forlorn guy gazing from his kitchen before simply standing up, swigging from the kettle-spout and leaving the frame. Melancholy magnificence.

“This exhibition is about challenging our collective assuredness over what we think we already know,” said Boubnova. “It all comes down to the mission of art: to show us something that usually we don’t see. There is something about these artists and their works that helps to better define their subjects of interest which, in turn, helps understand and remember that we are now all together and not really divided by walls anymore. I think that each of the works confirms the existence of ‘others’ – whoever they are and regardless of East or West.”

Above right: Jan Mancuska; The Other (I asked my wife to blacken all the parts of my body which I cannot see), 2007; Developed photographic negatives, Perspex and MDF light-box, aluminium hanging rail Courtesy of the artist; West london Projects, London; Andrew Kreps Gallery, New York and Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna.

Above: Boris Mikhailov; Photograph from the series Yesterday’s Sandwich, 1960s-70s; C-Print, 136 x 95 cm (framed) ed.5; Courtesy of the artists and Suzanne Tarasieve, Paris.

Photo I, Photo You runs until 28 March 2010

Iara Boubnova is the founder of the Institute of Contemporary Art, Sofia

– By Al Jackson

In a city gripped by recession tighter than most, precocious good-time guys are urging the youth of Budpest to get out, get happy and get partying.

Bence Meyeri, the brain behind Wacky Parties, who together with Andras Eichstaedt, Janos Prorok and Matyas Lendvai of serial party/production/DJ crew Sick As A Dog, have been throwing dynamic pop-up guerilla raves in the metro stations, underpasses, and abandoned buildings of Budapest for the past year.

The likely lads recently hosted iLLFEST, a libertine mid-January weekender who’s first night took place in the concourse of the Astoria metro station. Chosen precisely for the heavy footfall of Friday night revellers traversing busy Karoly Kut avenue, attention was guaranteed and the minimal tech-house pumping from a makeshift DJ booth of trellis tables and ironing boards outside a news kiosk managed to attract quite a crowd.

After a couple of hours, the 100-strong party halted as the power (jacked straight from an outlet in the wall) failed. Perplexed cops looked on while Plan B seamlessly clicked into action and the throng was whisked to a club where the tunes continued to spin.

Hitches and glitches though are simply par for the course for Bence and the boys. Indeed, they seem to revel in the off-the-cuff ethic of what they’re doing. Importantly, the party goers are all plugged-in to the same attitude too and are eager to be part of it.

It’s just as well ‘cos Saturday night’s installment, in a freezing underpass off Ferenciek Square next to Erzsebet Bridge, was hit-up by the riot squad. As tear gas brought an end to a party that, Budapest’s likely lads at the helm, was thriving on its ‘stolen moments’ vibe, it was a case of grab a lap-top, korg or ironing board and leg it to the van a few streets away.

However, this being a more focused, recession-era, Budapest, the 200 souls who had been waiting for this all week, or had simply stumbled across it and liked what they saw, were defiant. They were not ready for the authorities to kill their weekend (in addition to their economy). Not even at two thirty in the morning.

Again, exit strategies were already in motion and iLLFEST rumbled on in the eclectic Tuzrakter Cultural Centre. The squat-like former school building an inspired choice to sustain the hi-NRG D.I.Y. fun and keep us hedonists drinking and dancing well into Sunday.

In these troubled times it’s heartening to see that Andras, Matyas, Janos, Bence and associates, are throwing down the gauntlet: underground in Budapest, it’s invention vs recession and it’s kicking off.

By Joel Alas

Once upon a time, there stood a castle in the center of Berlin. A huge and hulking Baroque monolith, it was built by the Prussian kings to display their power and wealth. But the castle wasn’t powerful enough to survive World War II. It was damaged by bombing, and was later destroyed entirely by the occupying Soviets.

In the 1970s the DDR built the headquarters for its government, the Palast Der Republik, on the same site. But after German reunification, it too was destroyed under the guise of asbestos concerns (though many believe the building’s removal was a symbolic act against the former Soviet East German state).

Now it sits empty. A beautiful green park with boardwalks reaching down to the River Spree has been installed there, enjoyed all summer long by tourists and locals alike.

Over the past decade, a group of powerful and rich (mostly) west Germans have lobbied the government to reconstruct the old Prussian castle (known as the Stadtschloss) on the site. With their good ties with the ruling political parties, they were able to persuade parliament to agree to the plan. The project was budgeted at over half a billion euros, although the cost is expected to skyrocket beyond that. An architectural competition was called, and a boring design by an Italian architect was selected.

Over the past few months, the wheels have been falling off the project. The architectural competition was found to be improperly conducted, and a financial crisis has drained the treasury. Berliners are slowly waking up to the realization that the idea of building a fake castle was stupid to begin with, and makes even less sense in the current economic climate.

Today B EAST magazine announces the first public demonstration against the Stadtschloss. Called “Schloss Mit Lustig! Cancel The Castle!”, the demonstration will take place on Saturday October 17 at 15.00 on the site of the proposed castle. A jumping castle will be on site, and participants are requested to come dressed as royalty to help ridicule this indefensible waste of money.

Later that night, B EAST will host an afterparty for the demonstration at Betahaus in Kreuzberg called “The Only Good Castle is a Jumping Castle.” Our favourite DJs Shameless Limitless will spin some electro-techno-laptoprock, and Linards the Latvian DJ, formerly of Riga’s Space:Garage, will provide visuals.

Get all the details at www.stopstadtschloss.com