Here I’ll reflect on a meeting we had with Hajnalka Somogyi, a curator and founder of OFF-Biennale, which helped crystallise some questions that recurred through our extensive tour of Budapest’s art scene, put together by the wonderful Anett Gecov and Jane Lawson:
What is the role of artists in the political landscape?
What do we mean by political art?
What do we even mean by the term political?
After visiting art studios, a theatre and gallery space at Jurányi Ház, we met Hajnalka in a café in District 7. She explained how support for the arts had radically changed in the past few years. The autonomy of institutions such as Budapest Art Hall and the Vigadó Concert Hall for instance were greatly reduced through their forced acquisition by the Hungarian Academy of Arts (MMA), a burgeoning institution which since 2011 / 2012 has had a tight grip on funding and exhibition possibilities in the city. Professors, artists and curators across the city united in protest against the resultant censorship the contemporary art scene was facing [1]. Direct action was taken; buildings were occupied, demonstrations were held for days. The critique generated during this time was important, but we were all familiar with the resultant disappointment Hajnalka expressed about the limitations of protest.
Budapest’s cultural actors however were mobilised. In 2014, Hajnalka founded OFF-Biennale, independent of state funds and institutions, and supported through a mix of international grants, donations and a hefty amount of volunteer hours. Nearly 200 programs were hosted, featuring more than 350 artists from 22 countries in more than 100 venues. Exhibitions were held in buildings under renovation / private apartments / public places / an astronomical observatory in the Buda Hills. Favourites we’d visited during our week in Budapest featured in the second iteration of the Biennale:
‘Escape to the Future – Anti-establishment Pedagogy’ at Auróra
‘All or Nothing: Trianon and the Horthy-era at the OFF-Biennale’ at Chimera-Project Gallery
and
‘Propositions for a Pan-Peripheric Network’ curated by tranzit.hu (Dóra Hegyi, Zsuzsa László, Eszter Szakács)
The biennale model afforded an ambition in scale whilst remaining grass-roots in its organisation – each part of the programme self-organised by the artist / curator / educator / publisher who proposed it, under the wider umbrella of the biennale. Importantly, with two years between each iteration, the programme was manageable and sustainable in terms of volunteer time and energy.
When power is conceived of as something the government holds, it is easy to delineate action in to camps of for or against. This not only draws up polarising barriers but can lead to political in-fighting, as terms of engagement become restricted to the language of upholding or resisting. The question of where art practice fits in to this mix becomes complicated. The Biennale however re-conceptualised power in a way that meant cultural producers could reclaim their individual creative strengths and practices in the production of artworks, exhibitions, publications, events, and education programmes.
…(A)rt is a laboratory for social change; it is bewildering, putting the familiar into new perspectives, interrupting the routines of thought and action. As such, it contributes to new thoughts and ideas, to the dismantling of prejudice, to the discovery of individual and common opportunities previously unnoticed. Thus, the role independent contemporary art plays in a democratic society is essential.
Understood in the terms above, supporting individual and collective creative practice can be taken to be a political act. This rejects the idea that art = political only when made in response to the debates and decision making of institutional organisations. Rather, art as embedded in the everyday is political in the way it influences our thoughts and actions. This is not a new idea, as Hajnalka was keen to emphasise, but OFF-Biennale was an exciting example of a structural alternative which allowed Budapest’s artists, curators, gallerists and collectors to re-establish the Hungarian art scene they wanted.
Hajnalka filled us in on 2017’s edition of OFF-Biennale, titled Gaudiopolis. Translating as The City of Joy, it took its name from a Children’s Republic founded in Budapest in the aftermath of WWII by Lutheran pastor Gábor Sztehlo. Running as an orphanage from 1945–1950, the children of the City of Joy formed their own government, elected their representatives, and adopted laws that applied to all its citizens, including their teachers. Although it did receive some funding, it functioned independently of the state.
This mini-republic of trust, generosity, responsibility, and care serves as inspiration to both the projects and the working method of OFF-Biennale [3].
Hajnalka described OFF-Biennale as a demonstration of civil courage, explaining that regardless of who gets in to power in the next national elections, OFF-Biennale will continue [4].
FOOTNOTES
[1] For an overview of structural changes to the art scene, see http://politicalcritique.org/cee/hungary/2017/hungary-art-protest-culture/
[2] Taken from https://offbiennale.hu/en/off/off-biennale-budapest
[3] Taken from https://offbiennale.hu/en/gaudiopolis-2017
[4] Update: Viktor Orban was re-elected as Prime Minister for a third term on Sunday 8th April 2018.
