[spectre] Fwd: Evasion techniques, Hungarian avant-garde art exhibition catalogue now online

[Andreas Broeckmann]

Betreff: 	Evasion techniques exhibition catalogue now online from 
Palazzo delle Esposizioni
Datum: 	Fri, 15 Jan 2021 09:01:42 +0000
Von: 	e-flux <info at mailer.e-flux.com>
		
Palazzo delle Esposizioni

Evasion techniques. Strategies for the subversion and derision of power 
in 1960s and ‘70s Hungarian avant-garde art

Catalogue online now	

Curated by Giuseppe Garrera and Sebastiano Triulzi, the "Evasion 
techniques. Strategies for the subversion and derision of power in 1960s 
and ‘70s Hungarian avant-garde art" catalogue covers and illustrates the 
show of the same name which was held at Rome’s Palazzo delle 
Esposizioni, dedicated to a selection of those extraordinary avant-garde 
artists who found themselves operating in conditions of danger, 
inhibiting control and censorship, under a totalitarian communist 
regime, even at risk of their own safety. Through their brave and 
desperate attempts to express themselves and to disobey, their adventure 
enables us to experience a crucial chapter in art history.

The catalogue, which you can now download

https://www.palazzoesposizioni.it/pagine/tecniche-d-evasione-catalogue

is a universal investigation into the condition of art under all systems 
of power. Each chapter provides us with an instruction book of “evasion 
techniques,” offering a glimpse at images, actions, traces of 
performances held clandestinely and under the very nose of the 
authorities, driven by the sole urgency of actually doing them. In this 
way we encounter and get to know—in some cases for the first time in 
Italy—a number of highly important artists, from Endre Tót to Judit 
Kele, Sándor Pinczehelyi, Bálint Szombathy, András Baranyay, Tibor 
Csiky, Katalin Ladik, László Lakner, Dóra Maurer, Gyula Gulyás, Ferenc 
Ficzek, Tamás St. Auby (Szentjóby), Gábor Bódy, Marcel Odembach, Gyula 
Pauer, Zsigmond Károlyi, Tibor Hajas, László Beke, István B. Gellér, 
György Kemény, Kálmán Szijártó, Gábor Attalai, Károly Halász, László 
Haris, Orsolya Drozdik. Their work was saved thanks to the dedication 
and care of both museums and collectors. A special thanks goes to the 
endeavours of the Ludwig Museum – Museum of Contemporary Art of Budapest 
and to the Hungarian Academy in Rome.

Six different moments are explored in the catalogue, each exemplifying 
one of these evasion techniques. We begin with the artist’s 
self-portrait as an idiot, fool or madman (established power is disarmed 
when confronted by the childish and the clownish). Melancholy also 
features strongly in this section, with artists representing their own 
suffering, aware that they must operate outside any recognised state 
institution (established power considers melancholy a political 
disease). Female artists are well represented here, those who in a 
patriarchal and chauvinist society caused scandal merely by presenting 
themselves in public, and were accused of indecency. The second section 
deals with various degrees of freedom—the clandestine, fleeting, 
ephemeral ways of communicating and testifying dissent. This was most 
frequently achieved by writing on walls or in the snow, actions which 
were only witnessed by a camera whose reel remained a closely guarded 
secret. The third chapter covers mail art, a form which enabled these 
artists to communicate with their friends in the rest of Europe, those 
living in free countries. This art crossed borders and dodged censorship 
in the form of seemingly innocent envelopes or postcards.

The fourth chapter analyses the neurosis of power through photographs 
and visual accounts, painful testimonies which always allude to a 
reality perceived as a long succession of interdictions: railway tracks 
leading nowhere, stone markers, fencing, danger or warning signs. This 
urban signposting is continuously transformed into something 
allegorical, allusive in these works. The “invitation to guerrilla” 
section features piles of cobblestones masquerading as a documentation 
of works in progress, but which are in fact a fierce allusion to 
munitions and revolt. The final section explores the unease of art, the 
anxiety experienced by these artists in the process of simply by making 
their art. Some of their shows were literally held in their own back 
gardens, during gatherings among friends, in backstreets far from 
checkpoints and prying eyes. The Evasion techniques catalogue is 
ultimately a pretext for grappling with the concept of the pervasiveness 
of power, its dangerous paternalism, and serves as a political and civic 
lesson on making art, pointing the younger generations in the direction 
of still vital examples of libertarian and civic behaviour. As well as 
towards non-alignment with any system of power, in primis that of art 
itself.

Evasion techniques cataolgue—videos: January 19–26

Six short videos regarding the catalogue posted on Palazzo delle 
Esposizioni website 
<https://email.e-flux-systems.com/campaigns/eo253hqw6o2c0/track-url/ow494b2h6be12/38e24602eb98885c2e4c52b4bd5dc379ef8024e4>