[spectre] Two artists Two curators, Budapest, Hungary

[Nina Czegledy]

TWO ARTISTS - TWO CURATORS
-Recycled Attention-
email: fmr@mrf.hu
http://exindex.c3.hu/media/index.php3?mediafile=3Dkmkkx.html
http://exindex.c3.hu/media/index.php3?mediafile=3Dkmkk.html
http://exindex.c3.hu/media/kommunike.html

related links
http://www.artic.edu/webspaces/systematica/Janos%20Sugar.html
http://www.artmargins.com/content/roundtable/sugar.html
http://subsol.c3.hu/subsol/artists/sugarform.html


Two artists - Two curators, has been established in 2001 in Budapest,
Hungary by
Roza El-Hassan, Dora Hegyi, Janos Sug=E1r and Emese S=FCvecz.  Exhibitions a=
re
open for one evening on Fridays between 19:00 and 22:00h and topics range
widely. Between the summer of 2001 and 2002, events were presented weekly.
On September 20, 2002, London based, David Wilkinson's small porcelain
figures were on show, obtained from flee markets.  Last November Vadim
=46ishkin, internationally known artist presented his work and views - just
to name two examples. The audience numbers on the average thirty to forty
people, but the importance of these events is much better reflected in
other projects and shows which were informally initiated at these weekly
meetings. Up till now most of the events were shown in the studio of Janos
Sugar - from now on nomadic plans are developed for other sites. "I feel
that the open discussion and presentation of issues which have been "swept
under the carpet" is the most important feature of our activities" - said
Janos. These activities were recently featured in the Budapest Box
exhibition focusing on "the artist as curator" and presenting alternative
Hungarian cultural projects since 1989 in the Ludwig Museum of Budapest/
Museum of Contemporary Art. This exhibition, curated by Dora Hegyi and
Katalin Timar was unique in many ways. I was most impressed by the
curatorial process which involved the active participation of the
exhibiting groups and individual artists.

Emese S=FCvecz works as an independent curator and writer. Trained as an art
historian, in her postgraduate studies she focused on gender related issues.

Dora Hegyi, art historian works as a curator at the Ludwig Museum of
Budapest/ Museum of Contemporary Art.

Roza El-Hassan, artist works with installations, videos, sculpture and has
shown
her work internationally. Roza has been instrumental in developing
collaborative projects between Central European artists.

Janos Sugar studied sculpture at the Hungarian Academy of Fine Arts in
Budapest (1979-84) and worked with Indigo, the interdisciplinary art group
led by Mikl=F3s Erd=E9ly from 1980-86. His work includes installations,
performances, as well as film and video. He has been teaching art and media
theory in the Intermedia Department of the Hungarian Academy of Fine Arts
since 1990, and has exhibited widely throughout Europe  and beyond.
http://www.icols.org/pages/JSugar/JSugar.html

The interview with Janos Sugar was conducted over e-mail and by personal
conversation on September 25, 2002.


Nina Czegledy: You have initiated the 2 artists 2 curator project less than
a year ago. How and why did this initiative become such a successful reality
in a city full of galleries and cultural events?

Janos Sugar. It started, as every good functioning concept starts, as a
series of ad hoc, random, occasional, informal talks among friends. We all
worked already together in several forms and contexts, Roza El Hassan, Dora
Hegyi and Emese Suvecz. With Roza we exhibited several times together, we
both used to work with the Vienna gallerist, Hans Knoll; Dora is a curator
of Ludwig Museum/Contemporary Art Museum, Budapest; and Emese was the
director of the Budapest branch of Knoll Gallery, Vienna. And we all draw
similar consequences from our different activities, namely something is
missing in the art scene: attention to a living dialogue.

In 2000/2001 the artist group _Kisvarso_ started discussions in their
studio, called _Artwork of the Week_. It turned out a huge success, every
second week Wednesday evenings 40-50 people focused on and discussed one
particular artwork. There were other signs that talks, discussions became
important, like a new underground movement. The institutions are clumsy,
disoriented, or politically manipulated, and, of course, under financed-in
the worst case all at the same time.  There is no active art criticism; the
visual arts are presenting a sort of a blind spot for the general audience.
The professional audience suffers in a sort of an attention deficit
disorder, there is no systematical critical activity, most of the art
history of the last 50, 60 years remains undiscovered. In this aspect the
situation did not change in comparison to the eighties in Hungary: the
contemporary visual art is not part of the intellectual discourse.
Meanwhile the cultural activity is remarkable strong and colorful. It is a
strange contradiction in a country, where the literary scene is rich and
professional.

NC: I have been very impressed by the spontaneous events you organize. Can
you describe these activities and your aims?

JS: Between October 19. and March 22. we organized every Friday from 7 to
10 PM one-night exhibitions, all together 30. Originally we planned other
sites as well, but since we had a cold winter the venue was my studio,
where I have heating. My studio is rather small, the exhibition area is
about 30 sqm, but it is in a good location: on the ground floor in a
backyard in the center of the city. We exhibited  artworks/artistic
strategies which we liked and considered important to think about. I call
it _attention recycling_. We showed a broad range of artists from well
known painters to Estonian videos, from cartoon artist to the black books
of graffiti artists, etc. So, there was always an interesting small show,
and with such a background most of the discussions centered on art. And we
made another important decision, that instead of the low quality, so called
gallery wine, we tried to offer some better wine, this was our main
investment.  we organized chairs too, so people could just sit and hang
out. I consider the whole thing rather paradigmatic, as the role of art is
changing the _real life_ aspect of art becomes important.

NC: Please tell me about your audience

JS: We deliberately didn't want to reach masses, we were curious to see if
the _mouth propaganda_ works. We sent out only e-mails, which is a very low
key solution in the competitive "invitation-card" world. We attracted
about 40 regulars, mainly artists and curators. Soon the whole thing
developed into an informal weekly meeting point for them. For us. there
were several projects, initiatives starting from a discussion at the studio
to a small show in the Budapest Ludwig Museum/Contemporary Art Museum,
curated by Dora Hegyi; and an online newsletter (editor Katalin Timar).
This is just to mention two examples of events which couldn't happen
without this program. This could be the message: it is not so difficult to
accelerate the speed of events. We got a supportive feedback from our
colleagues, friends, and we enjoyed a very special media attention: the on
line art magazine of the C3, Exindex, published an enthusiastic review,
with lots of links. The monthly paper, Muerto (art connoisseur) published
an interview with us in March.

NC: You are a practicing artists. Can you tell me about your work in more
detail?

JS: I am in-between smaller and larger shows, and yet uncertain projects. I
just had a gallery show in Rome (Caf=E9 Europe, Center for  Contemporary
Art). The video I made in the last year  (Typewriter of the Illiterate, DV
8Min) is purchased by the Frankfurt Museum of Modern Art. This video will
be shown in an itinerary exhibition entitled "Without emergency exit",
organized by MECAD of Barcelona. Now I am just looking for post production
support of a nearly finished feature length film, Faust Again.

NC: What are your plans for the future?

JS: There will be a large exhibition called _Budapest Box_ in the Budapest
Ludwig Museum/Contemporary Art Museum, curated by Dora Hegyi and Katalin
Timar, and the theme is: Artists as Curators. The show tries to present all
the artists initiated galleries, independent programs of the nineties. The
KMKK will of course participate.  And we plan to go further with the KMKK
idea - maybe in other forms.