My new performance work ‘SE14 Punchlines’ will be on show at Nomad Art School event in Ladette Space, which is a part of AntiUniversity Now event.
Rather exciting, so come and see it alongside a fresh line-up of mostly locally based artists doing some educational stuff… I am on Sunday 6pm. Programme starts at 2:30pm. 55 Cossal Walk SE15, right by Queens Rd. Pkhm.
With kind support from Pushkin House.
Programme curated by Elena Zaytseva.
November 2013
“Tatiana Baskakova invites you to join her on a walk though the sites formerly inhabited by Russian revolutionaries. Figures like Kropotkin, Kollontai, Lenin, Trotsky, Herzen and others chose London as their place to organize and publish more than a century ago. Based in the areas across Clerkenwell, Pentonville and Whitechapel this walk offers a way to collectively explore London through the locations connected to those histories..
For years British media is portraying Russians as commonly millionaires or spies, and one can actually witness cultural dominance of the West London in the presentation of Russian culture, and in forming expatiate identities. The origin of this work is connected to the interest in the exploration of another side of Russian heritage in London: the tradition of political study, revolutionary publishing, organizing and speech making. This work is a result of collaboration with Russian cultural centre, Pushkin House and is a second in the series of diaspora-connected works happening this November.
The walk starts at noon in Pushkin House, on 23 November 2013
There is no need to make bookings and this is a free event.”
http://www.pushkinhouse.org/single-event/events/lenin-in-london-a-walk-through-the-sites-of-revolutionary-thinking
Lecture about Lenin is a site-specific performance and sculpture work made for presentation in the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development, the lobby of its London office. The 15 minute speech focused on the difficulty of the representation of the revolutionary and actuality of his image in relation to today’s world. The project was documented as a commemorative plaque that was displayed in the bank lobby for the duration of the exhibition.
Thank to kind support of EBRD and Pushkin House in making this project possible.
Curated by Elena Zaytseva and Julia Solovieva.
25 Aipril – 26 July 2011, GCCC Moscow, intervention.
The project was carried out in the Garage Centre for Contemporary Culture in Moscow where Tatiana Baskakova held a position of an invigilator from 25th Aipril till 26th July 2011.
In this three-month performance matters of institutional critique coincide with practice of experimental exploration of Russian society and creative industry’s labour conditions. It largely relies on social and communal relations of gallery staff, their understanding of hopelessness of the current situation, and disbelief in the possibility of a positive change in their life, working conditions, or society in general.
The performance piece runs though three gradual stages of change in invigilator’s attitude – from happy enthusiasm and patience to “revolutionary” moods and attempts to organize a trade union. The climax of the performance happens when the artist performing an invigilator is fired from the gallery for “sabotage” (quote from an exhibitions department manager), due to sharing the legal rights information with fellow colleagues, which is understood as a pure subversive action.
Through the process of overidentification with an idea of contemporary art gallery and legal rights, the performance brings attention to power relations that are representative of the current condition of Russian society and attempts to shift it. It talks of the institutional structures that are run with big international budgets, but perceive their underpaid and undervalued workers as a mere consumable material for the beautifully presented causes. It brings one back to what was Soviet Union’s utilitarian perception of its people, for example.
We see that pretence of the Moscow gallery space to carry contemporary art ideology does not coincide with its workings on the level that goes few inches behind visual presentation. The ethics of Moscow’s private “equivalent of Tate Modern” depends on impulses of those in charge at the moment, and this makes an institution function in the permanent state of exception, as a structure of no rules, but servitude.
For those who observed the process of the performance in its subtle development for the whole three months, some gallery staff and other participants, as instance, the action was intended as something bringing in an alternative narrative and brighter look into the future. The naivety and goodness of an actor-outsider is tactical, however fails to bring anything but the dream of politically organized labour. Due to the failure of the piece to develop more positive scenario, this socially engaged work could also be seen as a live paraphrase of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s “Idiot”.
The documentation of the performance is presented a set of internet-sourced private view images that document presence of the artist at work.
