Transformers Petersburg

Artist Lado Darakhvelidze and curator of the public program of MANIFESTA 10 Joanna Warsza present "Transformers Petersburg." Lado Darakhvelidze is interested in urban informality expressed in local markets or the city hitchhiking. He explores the remaining shades of Soviet multiculturalism, its modes of self-management, resourcefulness and originality. He developed a map and an installation based on grassroots entrepreneurship and bottom-up knowledge, especially through the resourceful yet invisible labor force of migrants. The artist believes that the collective energy generated by markets is comparable to that of public assemblies, where Armenians, Azeris, Ossetians, Abkhazis and Central Asians work side-by-side.