No frontiers.
Save the dreams
“All things one has forgotten scream for help in dreams”. More than half a century after they were written by Elias Canetti1, these words almost sound like a prophecy for the future destiny of Bulgaria. Obviously, we speak here of “things” that are forcibly “forgotten” under the terrible grip of political power. Yet, the view of the Bulgarian- born writer, awarded with the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1981, was not intended as an explicit reference to
the nation. Nevertheless, this thought seems to me highly symbolic of Bulgaria’s gradual lesson of (self) liberation, especially in the field of contemporary art.
Untitled (2014)
by IV Toshain
Current Western art sometimes – unintentionally
– expresses stereotyped contents and a level of conceptualism which seemingly ends up diluting or hiding the “dreams” that should go hand in hand with creativity. As part of a familiar establishment which extends to other countries, Westerners – artists included – have a weak memory of “marked boundaries”.
Video still from Far Away as Near 2012-2013 (2014) by Kalin Serapionov
The European Union has effectively removed frontiers; soon visas will become history: who will ever remember that there were times when your own name, so to speak, was not enough to travel freely? The memory of “younger” Europeans instead, like Bulgarians or Romanians, still thinks of boundaries as the last bastion to fall. The young artists who have formed small Bulgarian islands in Vienna or Berlin – the two great laboratories of today’s contemporary art – are well aware of this. For them, the disintegration of all types of boundaries, particularly geo-political ones, has released a huge potential of forgotten energy and rediscovered creativity. Whole generations of artists who were forced to make art underground world can finally breathe: dreams are taking revenge on the skeletons in the closet of history.
Bulgarian Graffiti (2014) by Elena Panayotova
It would be quite unusual for a foreign curator to explore and introduce the history of Bulgarian art of the last 25 years – a task that Maria Vassileva has carried out with great refinement and accuracy in her introduction. So I will simply add a short analytical comment. As the person who has selected the Bulgarian collection of works for Imago Mundi, I began my research for this project as a real investigation. I wanted to discover and understand the “personal”, “unique” path followed by Bulgarian artists in the polyphonic art expression that is typical of all post-communist transitions in South East Europe.
Equalizer, from the series: The world at 90 degrees (2014)
by Ivaylo Stoyanov
Self-portrait (2014)
by Vihroni Popnedelev
Among the different approaches to search for identity in the years that immediately followed 1989, I was particularly struck by Luchezar Boyadjiev’s project- experimentation2. The artist was trying to relocate and find his country in some of the US states – Arkansas, California, or Arizona – to understand where it would
fit best from a geographical point of view.
Project Areas (2014)
by Peter Tzanev
His research became a model of projection of an imaginative, ironical, joyful and desperate Bulgarian identity under construction. A permanent oscillation between imagination and reality, irony and fiction, polemics and desire to cross all mental and real boundaries, is often found in the personal and creative path followed by many of the Bulgarian artists featured in this collection.
Floating Horizon (2014) by Antoaneta Galabova
Above all, it illustrates a phenomenon that has evolved in Bulgaria over the past two decades: the strong migration that has brought many Bulgarian artists abroad. This artistic diaspora has redefined and extended the borders of Bulgaria to many European countries and even the United States. This collection is also the spontaneous diary of this change, in the form of “travelling canvases”. On the one hand, works have come from Vienna and Berlin, New York, San Francisco, Toronto, Paris, Basel, Bremen, Düsseldorf and The Hague. From Sofia, Plovdiv, Ruse and other Bulgarian cities on the other.
Honey (2015)
by Ivan Kostolov
Every small piece of this mosaic puzzle is a
soft cry, guarded by a dream and therefore saved – if we were to go back to Canetti’s aphorism. And here comes the sudden answer to my initial investigation: the unique and vivid profile of today’s Bulgarian art and its voices lies in its healthy distance from “ready- made” ideas/concepts/boundaries. Dreams, instead, are “home-made”, personal and therefore possible.
There is no space (2014)
by Stanimir Genov
It wouldn’t have been possible to draw the map
of contemporary Bulgarian art without the precious guidance of Maria Vassileva, chief curator of the Sofia
Art Gallery and Gaudenz B. Ruf, former Ambassador of Switzerland to Bulgaria, great and refined art collector and founder of the Gaudenz B. Ruf Award for New Bulgarian Art.
Golden age (2014)
by Albena Mihaylova
Self-portrait (home made) (2014) by Michail Michailov
Undoubtedly, this collection wouldn’t exist without the openness, understanding, generosity and availability to play and still be themselves of all participating artists, including Elena Panayotova, who helped us at every step of the way with her friendly support and attention. Equally valuable was the assistance provided by gallery owners Rumyana Yoneva (Rakursi Gallery), Desislava Moneva, Stanislava Stoyanova (Yuzina/Monev Gallery) and Rositsa Getsova (Arosita Gallery). We owe the linguistic fluency and richness of the texts to translator Irina Cherkelova.
Utitled (2014)
by Rosslan Lozev
Finally, the Dada Cultural Bar has enriched this project with its environment and unforgettable atmosphere and conversations.
Claudio Scorretti
Curator
Line (2015)
by Juliana Do
