Central and Eastern Europe

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Experimental art in Central and Eastern Europe: artists, events, scholars and resources

Contents

For a multilingual bibliography of writings on experimental art, see Central and Eastern Europe Bibliography. For a bibliography of transversal, regional perspectives on contemporary art, see East Central Europe. For literature by and about individual authors and groups see their respective pages.

Light-music[edit]

Composers, artists, initiatives[edit]

1900s-1920s: Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis (Warsaw/Vilnius), A.N.Scriabin, Vladimir Baranoff-Rossiné, Mikhail Matyushin (St. Petersburg), Alexander László, Arnošt Hošek, Zdeněk Pešánek (Prague), Miroslav Ponc (Prague)

1960s-2000s: Prometei (Kazan).

Colour organs[edit]

There will be a day when a composer will compose music with a notation that will be conceived in terms of music and light… and that day, the artistic unity we were talking about will probably be closer to perfection.. (Vladimir Baranoff-Rossiné, 1925)

  • (Colour) pianos (or organs) were constructed by the likes of Alexander Scriabin (with Preston Millar), Vladimir Baranoff-Rossiné, Alexander László, and Zdeněk Pešánek (with Erwin Schulhoff) in an attempt to navigate between musical and visual realms.
  • Scriabin composed the color-music piece Prometheus: The Poem of Fire (1911) and commissioned Preston Millar to build an instrument to produce colours to the music, called the Chromola (Clavier à lumières; tastiéra per luce; keyboard with lights).
  • Futurist painter Baranoff-Rossiné's instrument introduced patterns and shapes into a colour organ based on a modern piano, called the Optophonic Piano (Piano optophonique). The piano projected light through painted and rotating glass panels, whose colours, shapes and rhythms closely complemented the music (1916, developed since 1912); it was presented at Vsevolod Meyerhold's theatre, at his exhibition in Oslo (1916) and at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow (1924). Baranoff-Rossiné performed until the late 1920s, but his work was exhibited in several museums in Europe and the USA from 1966 to 1975.
  • Alexander László, a Hungarian raised in Germany, a pianist and orchestra conductor, composed and performed music for various silent films in 1900s-1910s. Arguing for a relation between the film and the music, he wrote a theoretical text on colour-light music, "Farblichtmusik" (1925). The theories were put into practice in a series of performances throughout Europe. His device, the Sonchromatoscope, consisted of a few switches above his piano that controlled a few projection lights and a slide projector that illuminated the stage above the piano. When the first reviews came in, the main comment was that the projections were too simple. It was in a different league to the Chopin-like complexity of the piano music. At the time, Oskar Fischinger was experimenting with abstract films. László contacted him to improve his performance. Several extra slide projectors and overlapping projection lights were added to increase the complexity and number of possible colours. The result was a visual spectacle that completely turned the reviews on their heads. Both László and Fischinger toured with the show. [1] [2]
  • With their Spectrophon-Piano (1928), Pešánek and Schulhoff attempted to create an audio-visual sculpture. The piano enabled the dynamic synthesis of music and coloured light in performances in large concert halls.

Exhibitions[edit]

Publications[edit]

Bibliography

See also[edit]

Further bibliography.

Constructivists, Futurists[edit]

Terms[edit]

formism (1910s, Chwistek, Czyżewski), Pure Form (1920s, Witkiewicz), strefism (1920s, Chwistek), mechano-faktura (1920s, Berlewi), unism (1920s, Strzemiński), photogenism (1920s, Funke), robot (1920s, Čapek)

Artists[edit]

Groups, networks, journals
Artists (active c. 1910s-1920s)

Events[edit]

Second Spring Exhibition of OBMOKhU, Moscow, May-Jun 1921.
Congress of International Progressive Artists, Düsseldorf, May 1922. L-R: unknown boy, Werner Graeff, Raoul Hausmann, Theo van Doesburg, Cornelis van Eesteren, Hans Richter, Nelly van Doesburg, unknown (De Pistoris?), El Lissitzky, Ruggero Vasari, Otto Freundlich (?), Hannah Höch, Franz Seiwert and Stanislav Kubicki.
Congress of the Constructivists and Dadaists, Weimar, Sep 1922. Top-bottom L-R: 1st row: Lucia Moholy, Alfréd Kemény, László Moholy-Nagy. 2nd row: Lotte Burchartz, El Lissitzky, Cornelis van Eesteren, Bernhard Sturtzkopf. 3rd row: Max Burchartz, Harry Scheibe, Theo van Doesburg (with paper hat), Hans Vogel, Peter Röhl. 4th row: Alexa Röhl, Nelly van Doesburg, Tristan Tzara, Sophie Taeuber, Hans Arp. 5th row: Werner Graeff and Hans Richter. Stedelijk.
  • Constructivists [Конструктивисты] exhibition in Moscow, January 1922. Stenberg brothers and Medunetsky show 61 constructivist works and publish a catalogue with manifesto. [7]
  • The Congress of International Progressive Artists [Kongress der Union Internationaler Fortschrittlicher Künstler] in Düsseldorf on 29-31 May 1922. Formation of the International Faction of Constructivists was organised by van Doesburg (representing the journal De Stijl), Richter (representing 'the Constructivist groups of Romania, Switzerland, Scandinavia and Germany') and Lissitzky (representing the editorial board of Veshch'-Gegenstand-Objet). The faction's declaration was later published in De Stijl (no. 4, 1922).
  • Congress of the Constructivists and Dadaists, Weimar, 25-26 September 1922.
  • The First Russian Art Exhibition [Erste russische Kunstausstellung] opened at Galerie van Diemen in Berlin on 15 October 1922, with over 1,000 objects by c180 artists: 237 paintings, more than 500 graphic works, sculptures, as well as designs for theater, architectural models, and porcelain. The exhibition's official host was the Russian Ministry for Information, and it was put together by the artists Gabo, David Sterenberg, and Nathan Altman. Version of the exhibition later travelled to Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, in April-May 1923.
  • New Art Exhibition [Wystawa Nowej Sztuki], organised by Strzemiński and Kairiūkštis in Vilnius on May-June 1923. The works included painting, drawing, sculpture, architecture, scenography, and print; cubist, constructivist, and suprematist compositions predominated. The 7 exhibiting artists went on to form the Blok collective.
  • The Block of Cubists, Constructivists and Supermatists [Blok Kubistów, Suprematystów i Konstruktywistów], an exhibition of Blok at the Laurin & Clement car dealer's shop in Warsaw, March 1924. Works by 9 artists.
  • First Zenit International Exhibition of New Art [Прва Зенитова међународна изложба нове уметности], organised by Micić in April 1924 in Belgrade. Featured one hundred works advertised as "futurism, cubism, expressionism, ornamental cubism, suprematism, constructivism, neoclassicism and the like".
  • The First Contimporanul International Exhibition organised by Contimporanul magazine in November 1924 in Bucharest brought together the Romanian avant-garde along with international artists.
  • The a.r. International Collection of Modern Art, donated by a.r. group to the Municipal Museum of History and Art (now Museum of Art; Museum Sztuki) in Łódź, opened to the public in February 1931. It included 111 works and represented - as no other contemporary European collection had done - the main movements of avant-garde art, from Cubism, Futurism and Constructivism, through Purism and Surrealism, to Neo-Plasticism, Unism and Formism.
  • The Constructivists [Die Konstruktivisten] exhibition at Kunsthalle Basel, Jan-Feb 1937. Poster. Review.
Retrospective exhibitions
  • Constructivism in Poland 1923-1936: BLOK, Praesens, a.r., Museum Folkwang, Essen, May-Jun 1973. Also shown in Otterlo/NL 1973; Stockholm 1975-76, New York 1976 [8], Detroit 1976, Buffalo 1976, Montreal 1977, Rome 1979, Genoa 1979, Venice 1979, Belgrade 1979, Zagreb 1979, Cambridge 1984, London 1984, Oxford 1984, Budapest 1990, Washington 1993. [9]
  • Konstruktywizm w Polsce 1923-1936, Muzeum Sztuki, Łódź, May 1978, Catalogue.
  • The Planar Dimension: Europe, 1912-1932, Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1979. Curated by Margit Rowell. Catalogue published.
  • Europa, Europa. Das Jahrhundert der Avantgarde in Mittel- und Osteuropa, Kunst- und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Bonn, 27 May - 16 October 1994. Large-scale exhibition with constructivist section. 4-volume catalogue published.
  • Central European Avant-Gardes, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2002. Curated by Timothy O. Benson. Large-scale exhibition with constructivist section. Catalogue published: TOC.
  • Von Kandinsky bis Tatlin: Konstruktivismus in Europa/From Kandinsky to Tatlin: Constructivism in Europe, Staatliches Museum, Schwerin, and Kunstmuseum, Bonn, 2006. Catalogue published.

Literature[edit]

Catalogues
  • Europa, Europa. Das Jahrhundert der Avantgarde in Mittel- und Osteuropa, eds. Ryszard Stanislawski and Christoph Brockhaus, Bonn, 1994. Contributions from c150 authors. Four volumes: Vol I (five introductory essays followed by 73 short texts on the work of specific artists) 479 pp. incl. 247 col. pls. and 116 b&w ills.; Vol II (36 essays on aspects of architecture, literature, theatre, film and music) 239 pp. incl. 251 b&w ills.; Vol III, compiled by Hubertus Gassner (354 short texts of the period 1894-1994 by artists, critics etc., in German translation), 367 pp.; Vol IV (biographies; selected bibliography; list of exhibited works; index) 99 pp. [10] [11] (German)
  • Central European Avant-Gardes: Exchange and Transformation, 1910-1930, ed. Timothy O. Benson, forew. Péter Nádas, Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002, 447 pp. Publisher. Review: Zusi (SEEJ). (English)
  • Von Kandinsky bis Tatlin: Konstruktivismus in Europa/From Kandinsky to Tatlin: Constructivism in Europe, Schwerin: Staatliches Museum; and Bonn: Kunstmuseum, 2006. (German)/(English)
  • Vzplanutí. Expresionistické tendence ve Střední Evropě 1903-1936, ed. Ladislav Daněk, Olomouc: Muzeum umění Olomouc, 2008, 200 pp. [12] (Czech)
Anthologies
Books
  • George Rickey, Constructivism: Origins and Evolution, New York: G. Braziller, 1967, xi+306 pp, OL; rev.ed., 1995, xi+306 pp. (English)
  • Willy Rotzler, Konstruktive Konzepte: eine Geschichte der konstruktiven Kunst vom Kubismus bis heute, Zurich: ABC, 1977, 299 pp; new ed., 1988, 332 pp; 3rd ed., 1995, 332 pp. (German)
  • Krisztina Passuth, Les avant-gardes de l'Europe Centrale, 1907-1927, Paris: Flammarion, 1988, 327 pp. (French)
    • Avantgarde kapcsolatok Prágától Bukarestig 1907-1930, Budapest: Balassi, 1998, 381 pp. (Hungarian)
    • Treffpunkte der Avantgarden: Ostmitteleuropa 1907–1930, trans. Aniko Harmath, Dresden: Verlag der Kunst, 2003, 337 pp. Review: Dmitrieva-Einhorn (H-Soz-Kult 2006). (German)
  • Lothar Lang, Konstruktivismus und Buchkunst, Leipzig: Edition Leipzig, 1990, 208 pp. TOC. (German)
  • S.A. Mansbach, Modern Art in Eastern Europe: From the Baltic to the Balkans, ca. 1890-1939, Cambridge University Press, 1999, 384 pp, IA. (English)
  • Dubravka Djurić, Miško Šuvaković (eds.), Impossible Histories: Historical Avant-gardes, Neo-avant-gardes, and Post-avant-gardes in Yugoslavia, 1918-1991, MIT Press, 2003, xviii+605 pp. (English)
  • Vojtěch Lahoda (ed.), Local Strategies, International Ambitions: Modern Art and Central Europe 1918-1968, Prague: Artefactum, 2006, 243 pp. Papers from the international conference, Prague, 11-14 Jun 2003. TOC. Papers: Anna Brzynski, Maria Elena Versari. [13] [14]
  • Elizabeth Clegg, Art, Design, and Architecture in Central Europe 1890-1920, Yale University Press, 2006, 356 pp. [15] (English)
  • Sascha Bru, et al. (eds.), Europa! Europa? The Avant-Garde, Modernism and the Fate of a Continent, 1, Berlin: De Gruyter, 2009. (English)
  • Günter Berghaus (ed.), Futurism in Eastern and Central Europe, De Gruyter (International Yearbook of Futurism Studies 1), 2011. (English)
  • Sarah Posman, Anne Reverseau, David Ayers, Sascha Bru, Benedikt Hjartarson (eds.), The Aesthetics of Matter: Modernism, the Avant-Garde and Material Exchange, De Gruyter, 2013. (English)
  • Beata Hock, Klara Kemp-Welch, Jonathan Owen (eds.), A Reader in East-Central European Modernism, 1918-1956, London: Courtauld Books Online, 2019, 432 pp, PDFs, HTML. Review: Drobe (Craace). (English)
  • Beate Störtkuhl, Rafał Makała (eds.), Nicht nur Bauhaus – Netzwerke der Moderne in Mitteleuropa / Not Just Bauhaus – Networks of Modernity in Central Europe, Oldenbourg: De Gruyter, 2020, 400 pp. Publisher. Review: Secklehner (Art East Central). (German),(English)
Journal issues
  • Art Journal 49(1): "From Leningrad to Ljubljana: The Suppressed Avant-Gardes of East-Central and Eastern Europe during the Early Twentieth Century" (Spring 1990). [16] (English)
  • Centropa 3(1): "Central European Architectural Students at the Bauhaus", New York: Centropa, Jan 2003. [17] (English)
  • Centropa 6(2): "Central European Artists and Paris: 1920s-1930s", ed. Irena Kossowska, New York: Centropa, May 2006. [18] (English)
  • Centropa 11(1): "Central European Art Groups, 1880-1914", ed. Anna Brzyski, New York: Centropa, Jan 2011. [19] (English)
Articles, talks

See also[edit]

Section on Constructivism. Avant-garde in Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, Romania, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania. Further bibliography.

Literature, literary theory, aesthetics[edit]

Terms[edit]

structuralism (1920s, Prague Linguistic Circle), linguistic functionalism (1920s, Prague Linguistic Circle), proletkult (1920s, international), Poetism (1920s, Teige and Nezval), factography (1920s, LEF), aesthetic object (1930s, Ingarden), phoneme (Jakobson), morphophonology (Trubetzkoy), genetic structuralism (1960s, Goldmann), communicative functions (1960s, Jakobson)

Poets, writers, theorists[edit]

Networks[edit]

Photography[edit]

Terms[edit]

photogram, photo-eye, photomontage, photogenism (1922, Funke), heliography (1928, Hiller)

Artists[edit]

See also[edit]

Photography in Czech Republic, Slovakia.

Light art[edit]

Artists[edit]

Experimental film[edit]

Terms[edit]

montage (1920s, Eisenstein), Kino-Pravda (1922, Vertov), Cine-Eye (1920s, Vertov), cinema club, Open Form (1950s-60s, Hansen), antifilm (1962, Pansini)

Filmmakers[edit]

Events[edit]

GEFF festival (Zagreb, 1963-70), MAFAF festival (Pula, 1965-90), 8 mm (Novi Sad), Alternative Film Festival (Split), April Meetings festival (Belgrade, 1972-77), Alternative Film & Video Festival (Belgrade, *1982), xfilm festival and series of lectures / screenings (Sofia, since 2005), This Is All Film! Experimental Film in Yugoslavia 1951-1991 exhibition (Ljubljana, 2010)

Networks[edit]

Literature[edit]

Books, catalogues
  • Łukasz Ronduda, Florian Zeyfang (eds.), 1,2,3... Avant-Gardes: Film/Art between Experiment and Archive, Warsaw: Centre for Contemporary Art, and Berlin/New York: Sternberg, 2007, 224 pp. Publisher. (English)/(German)
  • Ana Janevski (ed.), As Soon as I Open My Eyes I See a Film. Experiment in the Art of Yugoslavia in the 1960s and 1970s, Warsaw: Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw, 2010, 344 pp. Publisher. Distributor. Exhibition.
    • Kiedy rano otwieram oczy, widzę film. Eksperyment w sztuce Jugoslawii w latach 60. i 70., Warsaw: Muzeum Sztuki Nowoczesnej w Warszawie, 2011. Excerpt. (Polish)
  • Bojana Piškur, et al. (eds.), This Is All Film: Experimental Film in Yugoslavia 1951-1991 / Vse to je film: Eksperimentalni film v Jugoslaviji 1951-1991, Ljubljana: Museum of Modern Art, 2010, 154 pp. (English)/(Slovenian)
  • Pavle Levi, Cinema by Other Means, Oxford University Press, 2012, 224 pp.
  • Ksenya Gurshtein, Sonja Simonyi (eds.), Experimental Cinemas in State-Socialist Eastern Europe, Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2022, 334 pp. Publisher. TOC. [20]
Journal issues
  • Studies in Eastern European Cinema 7(1): "Experimental Cinema in State Socialist Eastern Europe", eds. Ksenya Gurshtein and Sonja Simonyi, 2016. [21] (English)
Resources

See also[edit]

Experimental film in Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Romania, Estonia, Lithuania. Further bibliography.

Art and architecture[edit]

Artists[edit]

Oskar Hansen, Karel Honzík, Vjenceslav Richter, Jerzy Rosołowicz, VAL, Sigma

Literature[edit]

Action art, Happening, Performance, Body art[edit]

Artists[edit]

Tadeusz Kantor (1915-90 Kraków), Alina Szapocznikow (1926-73 Poland/Paris), Geta Brătescu (1926 Bucharest), Włodzimierz Borowski (1930-2008 Warsaw), Jerzy Bereś (1930-2012 Kraków), Ilija Šoškić (1934 Montenegro/Rome), Tomislav Gotovac (1937 Zagreb), Natalia LL (1937 Wrocław), Zbigniew Warpechowski (1938 Kraków), Milan Knížák (1940 Prague), Karel Miler (1940 Prague), György Galántai (1941 Budapest), Jana Želibská (1941 Bratislava), Zorka Ságlová (1942-2003 Prague), Katalin Ladik (1942 Novi Sad/Budapest), Grzegorz Kowalski (1942 Warsaw), Tamás Szentjóby (1944 Budapest), Petr Štembera (1945 Prague), Raša Todosijević (1945 Belgrade), Ion Grigorescu (1945 Bucharest), Zofia Kulik (1947 Warsaw) & Przemyslaw Kwiek (1945 Warsaw), Ewa Partum (1945 Warsaw), Marina Abramović (1946 Novi Sad/Amsterdam/New York), Sándor Pinczehelyi (1946 Pécs/Budapest), Tibor Hajas (1946-80 Budapest), Ľubomír Ďurček (1948 Bratislava), Sanja Iveković (1949 Zagreb), Ján Budaj (1952 Bratislava), Jan Mlčoch (1953 Prague), Jiří Kovanda (1953 Prague), Vladimír Havlík (1959 Olomouc), Łódź Kaliska (1979-, Łódź), Orange Alternative (1983-, Wrocław), Autoperforationsartistik (1980s, Dresden).

Literature[edit]

Books
  • Aktuelle Kunst in Osteuropa, ed. Klaus Groh, Cologne: DuMont-Schauberg, 1972, 222 pp. One of first books to cover performance, conceptual, and mail art in Yugoslavia, Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and the Soviet Union. Short introduction by the author followed by b&w photographs, artists’ statements, and a bibliography. (German)
  • Gender Check: A Reader. Art and Theory in Eastern Europe, eds. Bojana Pejić, ERSTE Foundation, and Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Vienna, Cologne: Buchhandlung Walther König, 2010, 416 pp. An extensive collection of texts that explicitly analyze visual arts created before and after 1989 in the 'other' Europe in terms of gender and feminist theories. Texts by Anna Alchuk, Branislava Andjelkovic, Edit András, Zdenka Badovinac, Ágnes Berecz, Lyudmila Bredikhina, Branislav Dimitrijevic, Hildtrud Ebert, Ewa Franus, Jana Geržová, Nataša Ilić, Eva Khachatryan, Katrin Kivimaa, Izabela Kowalczyk, Vjollca Krasniqi, Laima Kreivyte, Dejan Kršic, Paweł Leszkowicz, Suzana Milevska, Danica Minic, Olivia Niţiş, Aleksis Osmanis, Martina Pachmanová, Bojana Pejić, Piotr Piotrowski, Zora Rusinová, Angeli Sachs, Lydia Sklevicky, Vera Sokolová, Inga Šteimane, Maria Vassileva, Mirek Vodrážka. TOC. Project website. Publisher. [25]
  • Removed From the Crowd: Unexpected Encounters 1, eds. Ivana Bago and Antonia Majača with Vesna Vuković, Zagreb: BLOK & DeLVe, 2011, 312 pp. Considers comparative, transnational, conceptual and performance art in Latvia, Slovenia, Croatia, Hungary, Chile, Peru, Poland, and Romania. Among other essays, presents Bago and Majača on Yugoslavian experimental art of the 1960s and 1970s; Alina Serban on the Romania performance artist Geta Brătescu; Vesna Vuković on Croatian artists Sanja Iveković and Tomislav Gotovac; Nataša Petrešin-Bachelez on the Slovenian group IRWIN; and Lucian Gomoll and Lissette Olivares on Chilean conceptual and performance. (English)
  • Amy Bryzgel, Performing the East: Performance Art in Russia, Latvia and Poland since 1980, London and New York: I.B. Tauris, 2013, 303 pp. Contains three chapters: one on post-Soviet Russian identity focusing on Sergei Bugaev (aka Afrika) and Oleg Kulik; a second on Starix (2000–2004), the fake media star invented by the artist Gints Gabrāns, and The Bronze Man (1987–1992), a homeless man moving from Riga to Bremen and Helsinki, constructed by Miervaldis Polis; and a third chapter on gender performances by the Polish artists Zbigniew Libera and Katarzyna Kozyra. Video talk. Publisher. Reviews: Jeschke (Slovo), Cseh-Varga (Oxford Art J). (English)
  • Adam Czirak (ed.), Aktionskunst jenseits des Eisernen Vorhangs. Künstlerische Kritik in Zeiten politischer Repression, Bielefeld: transcript, 2019, 242 pp. [27] (German)
  • Corinna Kühn, Medialisierte Körper. Performances und Aktionen der Neoavantgarden Ostmitteleuropas in den 1970er Jahren, Vienna: Böhlau, 2020, 324 pp. Publisher. Reviews: Renz (ArtMargins), Drobe (Art East Central). (German)
Catalogues
  • Body and the East: from the 1960s to the Present, ed. Zdenka Badovinac, MIT Press, 1999, 192 pp. Exh. held at Museum of Modern Art, Ljubljana, 7 Jul-27 Sep 1998. Chronicles art, especially that of performance and body artists, in central and eastern Europe, with short artist biographies of 80 artists. Essays by Joseph Backstein, Bojana Pejić, Iara Boubnova, Jurij Krpan, Ileana Pintilie, Kristine Stiles, Branka Stipančić, László Beke, Igor Zabel, a.o. [28] (English)/(Slovenian)
  • Gender Check: Femininity and Masculinity in the Art of Eastern Europe, ed. Bojana Pejić and Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Vienna, Cologne: Walther Koenig, 2009, 392 pp. Texts by Edit András, Keti Chukhrov, Branislav Dimitrijević, Katrin Kivimaa, Izabela Kowalczyk, Suzana Milevska, Martina Pachmanová, Bojana Pejić, Piotr Piotrowski, Zora Rusinová, Hedwig Saxenhuber, Georg Schöllhammer. Project website. Publisher. Exh. held at mumok, Vienna, 13 Nov 2009-14 Feb 2010; Zachęta, 19 Mar-13 Jun 2010. List of works. Review: Krüger (Ostblick). Symposium. [29] (English)
    • Gender Check. Rollenbilder in der Kunst Osteuropas, Vienna: mumok, 2009, 162 pp. TOC. [30] (German)
  • Left Performance Histories: Recollecting Artistic Practices in Eastern Europe, eds. Judit Bodor, Adam Czirak, Astrid Hackel, Beäta Hock, Andrej Mircev, and Angelika Richter, Berlin: neue Gesellschaft für bildene Kunst (nGbK), 2018, 205 pp. Text by Kata Benedek, Judit Bodor, David Crowley, Adam Czirak, Constanze Fritzsch, Astrid Hackel, Beata Hock, Jürgen Hohmuth, Roddy Hunter, Bojana Matejić, Andrej Mirčev, Angelika Richter, Elske Rosenfeld, Heike Roms, Branka Stipančić. TOC, Introduction. Publisher. Project website. Review: Bryzgel (CAA). (German)/(English)
  • Artists & Agents. Performancekunst und Geheimdienste, eds. Kata Krasznahorkai and Sylvia Sasse, Leipzig: Spector, 2019, 686 pp. [32] (German)
Journal issues
  • Centropa 14(1): "Performance Art in Central and Eastern Europe", eds. Amy Bryzgel and Pavlína Morganová, Jan 2014. [35] (English)
Book chapters, essays
  • Kathleen Reinhardt, "Persons and Objects Are to Be Removed from the Balcony: Artists Performing in Public and Private Spaces of Control during the Cold War", in Multiple Realities: Experimental Art in the Eastern Bloc, 1960s–1980s, ed. Pavel S. Pyś, Minneapolis, MN: Walker Art Center, 2023. Exhibition. (English)
  • Sven Spieker, "Taking It to the Street: Eastern European Art Demonstrations (Milan Knížák, Jiří Kovanda, Endre Tót, Mladen Miljanović, Ciprian Homorodean)", in Spieker, Art and Demonstration: A Revolutionary Recasting of Knowledge, MIT Press, Feb 2024. [40] (English)
Interviews

Conceptual art[edit]

Artists[edit]

Groups
  • Gorgona, 1959-1966, Zagreb. Josip Vaništa, painters Julije Knifer, Đuro Seder, and Marijan Jevšovar, sculptor Ivan Kožarić, architect Miljenko Horvat, art theoreticians Matko Meštrović, Radoslav Putar, and Dimitrije Bašičević Mangelos.
  • Red Peristyle [Crveni Peristil], 1966-1968, Split. Pavao Dulčić, Tomo Čaleta, Vladimir Dodig-Trokut, Slaven Sumić, Nenad Đapić, Radovan Kogej, Srđan Blažević, Denis Dokić.
  • OHO Group, 1966-1971, Ljubljana. Marko Pogačnik, David Nez, Milenko Matanović, Andraž Šalamun.
  • Kôd Group, 1960s-1970s, Novi Sad. Mirko Radojčić, Slobodan Tišma, Miroslav Mandić, Slavko Bogdanović, Peđa Vranešević.
  • E Group, Novi Sad. Ana Raković, Čedomir Drča, Vladimir Kopicl, Miša Živanović.
  • Bosch+Bosch, 1969-1976, Subotica. Slavko Matković, Edit Basch, István Krekovics, Zoltán Magyar, László Szalma, Bálint Szombathy, Slobodan Tomanović, a.o.
  • Group 143, 1975-1980, Belgrade. Miško Šuvaković, Jovan Čekić, Paja Stanković, Neša Paripović, Maja Savić.
  • Group of Six Artists, 1975-1981, Zagreb. Boris Demur, Željko Jerman, Vlado Martek, Mladen Stilinović, Sven Stilinović, Fedor Vučemilović.
  • ZzIP Group, 1983-1989, int'l. Marko Pogačnik, Mirko Radojčić, Miško Šuvaković, Dubravka Đurić, Zoran Belić Weiss, Nenad Petrović.
Artists

Resources[edit]

  • Forgotten Heritage, 8,000 works of selected artists of the Polish, Croatian, Estonian, Belgian and French postwar avant-gardes. Launched 2018.

Literature[edit]

  • Klaus Groh (ed.), Aktuelle Kunst in Osteuropa, Cologne: DuMont-Schauberg, 1972, 222 pp. One of first books to cover performance, conceptual, and mail art in Yugoslavia, Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and the Soviet Union. Short introduction by the author followed by b&w photographs, artists’ statements, and a bibliography. Archive. (German)
  • Tony Godfrey, Conceptual Art, London: Phaidon, 1998, pp 264-275, IA. (English)
  • László Beke, "Conceptualist Tendencies in Eastern European Art", in Global Conceptualism: Points of Origin 1950-1980s, eds. Jane Ferver, Luis Camnitzer and Rachel Weiss, New York: Queens Museum of Art, 1999, pp 41-51. TOC. Exh. held at Queens Museum, New York, 28 Apr-29 Aug 1999; the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN, 19 Dec 1999–5 Mar 2000; Hayden Hall MIT, 24 Oct-31 Dec 2000. Exh. review: Meyer (Artforum), Johnson (NYT). (English)
  • in Conceptual Art, ed. Peter Osborne, London: Phaidon, 2002. (English)
  • Miško Šuvaković, "Konceptualna umjetnost", in Šuvaković, Pojmovnik suvremene umjetnosti, Zagreb: Horetzky, 2005. (Croatian)
  • Piotr Piotrowski, "The Critique of Painting: Towards the Neo-avant-garde", "Mapping the Neo-avant-garde, c. 1970", "Conceptual Art between Theory of Art and Critique of the System", chs. 6, 7 & 8 in Piotrowski, In the Shadow of Yalta: Art and the Avant-garde in Eastern Europe, 1945-1989, trans. Anna Brzyski, London: Reaktion Books, 2009, pp 178-237, n454-458, 241-314, n458-466, 315-340, n467-469. (English)
  • Zdenka Badovinac, Eda Čufer, Cristina Freire, Boris Groys, Charles Harrison, Vít Havránek, Piotr Piotrowski, Branka Stipančić, "Conceptual Art and Eastern Europe: Part I", e-flux 40, Dec 2012; Part 2, e-flux 41, Jan 2013. Based on a conference organised by Zdenka Badovinac in Ljubljana, 2007. (English)
  • My Sweet Little Lamb (Everything We See Could Also Be Otherwise), eds. What, How & for Whom/WHW and Kathrin Rhomberg, Zagreb: What, How & for Whom/WHW, 2017, 167 pp; new ed., exp., eds. Emily Pethick, Kathrin Rhomberg, What, How & for Whom/WHW, and Jill Winder, Berlin: Sternberg Press, and Vienna: Kontakt Collection, Mar 2023, 456 pp. Based on a series of exhibition episodes based on the Kontakt Collection and dedicated to the artist Mladen Stilinović, held in Zagreb, 4 Nov 2016–8 May 2017, and The Show Room, London, Jun 2017. Texts in exp. ed. by Branislav Dimitrijević, Miguel A. López, Oxana Timofeeva, Marina Vishmidt. Publisher. (English)

See also[edit]

Conceptual art

Geometric abstraction, Neo-constructivism, Op art, Kinetic art[edit]

Artists[edit]

Groups
Artists

Terms[edit]

visual kinetics (plastique cinétique, 1950s, Vasarely)

Literature[edit]

See also[edit]

Audiovisual compositions[edit]

People[edit]

See also[edit]

Audiovisual compositions in Czech Republic, Slovakia. Further bibliography.

Fluxus, Intermedia[edit]

Literature[edit]

  • Fluxus East: Fluxus-Netzwerke in Mittelosteuropa / Fluxus East: Fluxus Networks in Central Eastern Europe, ed. Petra Stegmann, Berlin: Kuenstlerhaus Bethanien, 2007, 288 pp. Exh. catalogue; exh. held at Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, 4 Sep-4 Nov 2007. Contains artists' biographies, an extensive illustrated chronology divided in sections, including an “Overall Survey of Fluxus Events in Central Eastern Europe (1962–1989), “Fluxus Concerts,” “Individual Exhibitions and Performances,” “Exhibitions and Festivals,” “Mieko Shiomi’s ‘Spatial Poems,’” “Nine Global Events,” and “Fluxus East and West,” and essays by Eric Andersen, Andrea Bátorová, Milan Knížák, Pavlína Morganová, Luiza Nader, Maria Anna Potocka, Tamás St. Auby, Petra Stegmann, and Emmett Williams. [47] [48] (German)/(English)
  • "The Lunatics are on the Loose...": European Fluxus Festivals, 1962-1977, ed. Petra Stegmann, Potsdam: Down With Art!, 2012, 591 pp. Exh. catalogue. Extensive documentation of 32 selected European Fluxus events in Aachen, Aberystwyth, Amsterdam, Berlin, Budapest, Copenhagen, Düsseldorf, London, Madrid, Nizza, Oslo, Paris, Prague, Poznan, Rotterdam, Scheveningen, Stockholm, Vilnius, Wiesbaden, Wuppertal. [49] [50] (English)
  • The Freedom of Sound: John Cage Behind the Iron Curtain, ed. Katalin Székely, Budapest: Ludwig Múzeum - Kortárs Művészeti Múzeum, 2013. Exh. catalogue. Publisher. Exhibition. Exh. brochure. (English)
  • Petra Stegmann, "Fluxus and the East", Centropa 14:1, Jan 2014. (English)

Cybernetics[edit]

See Computing and cybernetics in CEE.

Electroacoustic music, Sound art[edit]

Trivia[edit]

  • Lev Termen, the patriarch of musical electronics, a talented physicist, created Aetherophone (later called the Theremin or Thereminovox) in 1920 - unsurpassed till now in the family of performing electronic instruments (owing to its keen sound control options).
  • Other early instruments include Sonchromatoskop by Sándor László (1920), Sonar by N.Anan'yev (c1930), Ekvodin by V.A.Gurov (1931), Emiriton by A.Ivanov and A.Rimsky-Korsakov (1932). While in the United States, Termen also created Theremin Cello (electric Cello with no strings and no bow, using a plastic fingerboard, a handle for volume and two knobs for sound shaping, c1930), Theremin keyboard (a piano-like device, c1930), Rhythmicon (world's first drum machine, 1931), and Terpsitone (platform that converts dance movements into tones, 1932). In the 1930s, professor E.A.Sholpo established a laboratory for sound synthesis where he developed his Variophone (1932), a precursor of the synthesizers. A.A.Volodin, a scientist in the field of electronic sound synthesis, designed a whole series of new instruments.
  • In Moscow, Eugene Murzin constructed one of the world's first synthesizers in 1955. He named his invention, ANS synthesizer, in honor of Alexander Nikolayevich Scriabin, as the ANS worked on the principle of the transformation of light waves into electronic soundings. The compositions created on the ANS in the Moscow Studio of Electronic Music since 1958 played the major role in the development of electronic music in USSR. In the 1960s, the ANS was the only synthesizer in the Union, and became the training ground of a great number of young composers, including one of the most dedicated experimenters in the field of electronic music, Edward Artemyev. Artemyev's compositions are characterized by a constant search for new sounds and by a desire to obtain maximum timbre modification from minimal sound material. In the music for A. Tarkovsky's film Solaris (1972), Artemyev discovered an entire realm of unusual (for that time) sound effects; he founded a new trend in electronic music that musicologists have named 'space music'. (In 1972 the studio acquired the module synthesizer "SYNTHI-100" of English company "Taylor".)
  • Warsaw Autumn Festival initiated by Baird and Serocki presented since 1956 works by Berg, Schönberg, and Bartók; Stockhausen and Schaeffer visited. Polish Radio Experimental studio was founded by Patkowski in 1957.
  • In Czechoslovakia, the first representative Seminar on Electronic Music, organized on the initiative of several Czech and Slovak composers, musicologists and sound technicians, was held at the Research Institute of Radio and Television in Pilsen in 1964. It appeared a miracle to many people interested in this kind of musical creativity. The seminar dealt seriously and manifestly with questions of electronic music, for the first time in Czechoslovak cultural context. The representative survey on electronic music written by Czech musicologist Vladimir Lebl and published in 1966 was the fundamental theoretical work, followed by his translation of the book "La Musique concrète" by Pierre Schaeffer. Several compositions by the classicists of concrete, tape and electronic music appeared in radio broadcasts in 1965 and the first LP with electronic music pieces by both inland and foreign composers was published as soon as in 1966. Followed by foundation of experimental music studios in Bratislava (1965) and Pilsen (1967).
  • During 1950s-70s the number of composers visited New Music courses in Darmstadt (Kotonski, Piňos, Jeney, Sáry), studied and worked with studios WDR Cologne (Kotonski, Eötvös, Dubrovay), GRM Paris (Kotonski, Kabeláč, Piňos, Vidovszky), Munich (Piňos), STEM Utrecht (Kabeláč), or IRCAM Paris (Eötvös).
  • Gorizont became known as some sort of Russian version of Kraftwerk, releasing an LP by the "Soviet State" record label Melodia.

Terms[edit]

musique concrète (1949, Schaeffer, Paris), elektronische Musik (1950, Eimert and Meyer-Eppler, Cologne), New Music, synthesizer (ANS synthesizer, 1955, Moscow; RCA Music synthesizer, 1955), white noise, vocoder, atonal music, serialism

Studios[edit]

Polish Radio Experimental Studio Warsaw (1957, Patkowski), Experimental studio of electronic music Moscow (1958, Murzin), Experimentalstudio für künstliche Klang- und Geräuscherzeugung East Berlin (1953 or 1962?), Experimental Studio of Slovak Radio Bratislava (1965, Kolman), Experimental Studio of Czech Radio Pilsen (1967-94), New Music Studio Budapest (1970), Electronic Studio of Radio Belgrade (1972, Radovanović), Electro-acoustic Music Studio at Academy of Music Krakow (1973, Patkowski), Electronic music studio Sofia (1974), Electroacoustic Music Studio of the Hungarian Radio Budapest (1975, Decsényi), Studio for Electronic Music Dresden (1984, Wissmann), Audiostudio of Czechoslovak Radio Prague (1990-94), Theremin Center Moscow (1992, Smirnov), Electronic Music Studio at the Estonian Academy of Music Tallinn (1995, Sumera) more

Composers, artists, musicologists[edit]

Events[edit]

Resources[edit]

Literature[edit]

See also[edit]

Electroacoustic music in East Germany, Poland, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Serbia, Croatia, Romania, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia. Further bibliography. See also Audiovisual tools and instruments, Electronic art music, The International Documentation of Electroacoustic Music and [53].

Multimedia environments[edit]

Artists and works[edit]

Literature[edit]

See also[edit]

Multimedia environments in Czech Republic, Hungary. Further bibliography.

Computer art, Dynamic objects, Cybernetic sculpture, Digital art[edit]

Terms[edit]

new materials, information aesthetics (1960s, Bense and Moles)

Artists[edit]

Events, Networks[edit]

Works[edit]

See also[edit]

Computer art in Croatia, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Poland, Croatia, Slovenia, Serbia, Romania, Bulgaria. Further bibliography.

Video[edit]

Terms[edit]

new art practices (1970s)

Artists[edit]

Events[edit]

April Meetings festival (Belgrade, 1972-77), Video CD biennial (Ljubljana, 1983-89), WRO Biennale (Wroclaw, since 1989), Sub Voce exhibition (Budapest, 1991), French-Baltic-Nordic Video and New Media Festival (Riga/Vilnius/Tallinn, *1992), Ex Oriente Lux exhibition (Bucharest, 1993), Videomedeja festival (Novi Sad, *1996), New Video, New Europe exhibition (Chicago, 2004), E.U. Positive exhibition (Berlin, 2004), Instant Europe (Udine, 2005)

Networks[edit]

Archives[edit]

Literature[edit]

See also[edit]

Video in Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia (2), Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, Romania, Bulgaria, Estonia, Lithuania. Further bibliography.

New media art, Media culture[edit]

Terms[edit]

mailing list, discussion forum, media lab (1990s-2000s), net art (1990s), streaming, tactical media, hacker culture, audiovisual performance, digital signal processing (DSP), Pure Data, Max/MSP, vvvvv, SuperCollider, online social network

Artists, writers[edit]

Events[edit]

The Media Are With Us conference (Budapest, 1990), Ostranenie (Dessau, 1993/95/97/99), Orbis Fictus exhibition (Prague, 1994), Hi-tech/Art exhibition and symposium series (Brno, 1994-97), MetaForum conferences (Budapest, 1994-96), Butterfly Effect (Budapest, 1996), Dawn of the Magicians? (Prague, 1996-97), LEAF conference (Liverpool, 1997), Beauty and the East Nettime conference (Ljubljana, 1997), Communication Front (Plovdiv, 1999-2001), Media Forum (Moscow, *2000), Enter Multimediale festival (Prague, 2000/05/07/09), Multiplace festival (Bratislava/Prague/Brno/international, *2002), FM@dia (Prague, 2004), Trans european Picnic (Novi Sad, 2004), Remake exhibition (Brno/Bratislava/Cluj, 2012).

Networks[edit]

Literature[edit]

Ostranenie catalogues
  • Ostranenie: 1. Internationales Videofestival am Bauhaus Dessau, 4.-7.11.1993: erschütterte Mythe, neue Realitäten: Osteuropa im Focus der Videokamera / 1. Meždunarodnyj videofestival v Bauchaus Dessau: poshatnuvshiesya myfy, novaya deystvitelnost: vostochnaya Evropa v fokuse videokamery / 1. International Video Festival at the Bauhaus Dessau: Shattered Myths, New Realities: Video Focus on Eastern Europe, eds. Inke Arns and Elisabeth Tharandt, Dessau: Bauhaus Dessau Foundation, 1993, 499 pp. Selected texts: Erjavec, Arns, Sei, Kovats, Kuhn, Milev, Sobetzko, Czegledy, Performances, more. [55] [56] (German),(Russian),(English)
  • OSTranenie '95: das internationale Video-Forum an der Stiftung Bauhaus Dessau / The International Video Forum at the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation: Video, Installation, Performance, Workshop: 8.-12. November, eds. Mirja Rosenau, Stephen Kovats, Thomas Munz, and Tina Rehn, Dessau: Bauhaus Dessau Foundation, 1995, 403+14 pp. [57] [58] (German)/(English)
  • Ostranenie '97: Dessau 5.-9. Dezember 1997: das internationale Forum elektronischer Medien / the International Electronic Media Forum, eds. Mirja Rosenau and Stephen Kovats, Dessau: Bauhaus Dessau Foundation, 1997, 553 pp. [59] [60] (German)/(English)
  • Ost-West Internet: elektronische Medien im Transformationsprozess Ost- und Mitteleuropas / Media Revolution: Electronic Media in the Transformation Process of Eastern and Central Europe, ed. Stephen Kovats, Frankfurt am Main/New York: Campus (Edition Bauhaus 6), 1999, 381 pp. ISBN 9783593363653. TOC, TOC. Review: Broeckmann (Leonardo). [61] [62] [63] (German)/(English)
  • Ostranenie 93 95 97, ed. Stephen Kovats, Dessau: Bauhaus Dessau Foundation, 1999. CD-ROM, Mac & PC. ISBN 3910022308. Documents the works and impressions of over 400 artists, critics, academics and journalists from 32 countries who participated in the Ostranenie events from 1993 to 1997. Produced by the Studio Electronic Media Interpretation of the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation in cooperation with C3 - Soros Foundation Budapest. [64] [65]
Nettime/ZK/NK Proceedings, [66]
  • ZKP3.2.1, ed. Vuk Cosic, Ljubljana: Ljudmila, Nov 1996. [76] (English)
Syndicate Publication Series
other

See also[edit]

Media labs, Media art festivals, Media art conferences

Media theory[edit]

Theorists[edit]

Vilém Flusser (Prague/Germany/Brazil)

Events[edit]

The Media Are With Us (Budapest, 1990), Prague Media Symposium (Prague, 1991-98), MetaForum (Budapest, 1994-96), Mutamorphosis (Prague, 2007)

Art history, theory, and criticism[edit]

Scholars[edit]

Collectives, centres, networks[edit]

Local histories[edit]

See also[edit]

Colophon[edit]

This section was initiated as part of a project (2009-2011) supported by cOL-mE, International Visegrad Fund, and ERSTE Foundation.

Contributors include Dušan Barok, Guy van Belle, Nina Czegledy, Lenka Dolanová, Eva Krátká, Magdaléna Kobzová, Barbora Šedivá, Joanna Walewska, Darko Fritz, Miro A. Cimerman, Matko Meštrović, Paul Stubbs, Rarita Szakats, Călin Man, Raluca Velisar, Miklós Peternák, János Sugár, Pit Schultz, Diana McCarty, Barbara Huber, Maxigas, Miloš Vojtěchovský, Grzegorz Klaman, František Zachoval, Sølve N.T. Lauvås, a.o.