March 30 to May 20
Atlas of Fantastic Science - From the Július Koller Visual Archive
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Július Koller’s work, which focused on day-to-day reality steeped in a public realm submitted to state oversight and control, was contrasted by the artist’s personal figure—a phenomenon in parallel appears in the work of conceptual artists in Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and other former communist countries. In former Eastern Europe artists were often compelled to take on the position of art historians and archivists (Zdenka Badovinac), as many of them also authored programme texts and manifestos.(1) Koller’s interest in day-to-day reality and public affairs immediately prompted him into collecting daily press, newspaper clippings and mass reproduced images. The product of his search for «unidentifiable objects» and the follow through in archiving them comprises a momentous complement to the documentation on his concepts and actions.
Cosmic age in socialist Czechoslovakia
The 1960s in Czechoslovakia characterized themselves in extensive popularization of science and technology initiated by the country’s successful presentation at the world EXPO 1958 exhibition in Brussels. It was a decade of technological optimism sustained by the triumph of scientific discoveries which impacted all areas of visual culture.(2) Initially Július Koller’s work did not show any marked signs that he shared the captivation of his contemporaries, protagonists of the so-called geometric abstraction and Neo-Constructivism (represented by groups Nová citlivost and Klub konkrétistov), by technological advances, with an exception of his civilist paintings. Nonetheless, the author’s recently disclosed inheritance reveals some interesting findings. Koller recorded and archived an immense scope of information about technology, science and space research in printed media.(3) As the advancement of science and technology permeated the sphere of every-day life and became a real element of living, advertisement, design, journalism, and mass consumption, Koller identified in it the «cultural situations» suitable for transmitting his anti-artistic signals. The extensive archive of period press compiled from wide-ranging aspects of mass culture took on the form of collective sensations, pseudo-scientific speculations, utopias and notions about civilization and space. What were his intentions when he amassed such a collection of publicity material? Was his collecting a product of a mere fascination with printed media, or can we perceive a deliberate and single-minded nature in it? […]
Since 1967, the number and variety of magazines and daily press grew to include historical and popular science periodicals. The collection contains complete volumes of such popular magazines as Veda a život (Science and Life), Svet techniky (World of Technology), and Letectví—Kozmonautika (Aviation—Astronautics). The cultural event which Koller followed with greatest avidness was the landing of the American probe Apollo 12 on the Moon. One whole pack labeled Veda a technika (Science and Technology) follows the entire course of the American space mission step by step. The archive contains articles from domestic and foreign press glued on paper, varying from tiny cuttings to full reports.
Sphere of reality and sphere of fiction
In the 1970‘s, Koller’s collection marked a certain shift. With incoming political changes of so called Normalization in Czechoslovakia, his technological optimism started receding, whereas hypotheses about contact between our civilization and extraterrestrials became more frequent. Koller collected all information available in popular science on the origin of ancient civilizations, on the latest archeological research, and his attention focused on the fabled Atlantis and U.F.O.s. Against the background of these seemingly neutral and pseudoscientific articles in that period’s press, evidence of the presence of a utopia presented itself in the popular press and acquired the dimension of reality. Consequently, to Koller, it expanded into newly found reality. He arranged, described and archived all records with great care. Evidently, he set about to accumulate the widest possible spectrum of information about the given topic. […] When he marked the discovered visual material with the U.F.O. initials, he set something in motion which was very characteristic of him, namely the act of shifting the sphere of reality over into a sphere of fiction. […]
Koller the collector and Koller the conceptual artist
Július Koller characterized his artistic activity in 1969–1970 when he wrote a manifesto titled Potreba kozmohumanistickej kultúry (The Need for Cosmohumanistic Culture) as the author’s participation in shaping the new, cosmohumanistic culture: «In this complex space-time, I feel the need for a new culture. Modern art has been absorbing all that is so-called artistic and so-called non-artistic; whole civilizations with fascinating technologies and the entire natural world are treasure troves of contemporary art. In this standing, I become an author of signals transmitted to the space of our universe, using select elements of this space through individual selection, regardless of the traditional artistic means and milieu. The target is not set in contemporary art, but in the author’s participation in shaping the new, cosmohumanistic culture.»(4)
Archive as a message for the future
Július Koller’s visual archive represents a subjectively structured model of the world. Determined by the artist’s life and the cultural milieu, it encodes more than spheres of his interest—it contains a multitude of reference material on visual culture between the1960s and the1980s in Czechoslovakia. It includes popular magazines, daily press, tourist guide books, postcards, prints, posters—simply everything one can imagine can be printed on paper. The socialist regime kept its citizens in a state of deprivation—be it the lack of consumer goods, but also availability information. Lack of information marked the existence of the artist living and working in conditions of socialism. The artist’s archive was accessible by a small circle of people, which implies that it was not intended for public view and as such it represented a private probe into the public space and mass culture.
Daniel Grúň
1 Petrešin-Bachelez, Nataša: Archiv(y). In: Baladrán, Zbynĕk – Havránek, Vít: Atlas transformace. Praha: tranzit, 2009, p. 33–34.
2 Kramerová, Daniela – Skálová, Vanda (Eds): Brussels Dream. Czechoslovak Contribution to EXPO 58 in Brussels and Life Style of the First Half of the 1960s. Exhibition Catalogue. Praha/Brno: Arbor vitae, 2008, p. 16–17.
3 For comparison see also: Spieker, Sven: The Big Archive. Art from Bureaucracy. Cambridge/Mass.: MIT Press, 2008, p. 11–12.
4 From Artist’s Programmes and Actions. Július Koller a Peter Bartoš. In: Výtvarný život, 15, 1970, cˇ. 8, p. 41.
Július Koller 1939 born in Piešt‘any (SK); 1954–58 Škola umeleckého priemyslu (Industrial Art), Bratislava; 1959–65 Vysoká škola výtvarných umení (Academy of Applied Arts and Design), Bratislava. 2007 died in Bratislava.
Solo Exhibitions (Selection):
2010 Retrospective exhibition (tour), National Gallery, Bratislava; Galerie Martin Janda, Vienna; 2009 Július Koller Symposium, National Gallery, Bratislava; 2007 Galerie Martin Janda, Vienna; «Space is the place», gb agency, Paris; 2004 «Július Koller – Kontakt», kunstraum muenchen, Munich; 2003 «Utopia Station» – La Biennale di Venezia, 50. Esposizione Internazionale d’Arte, Venice; «Július Koller Univerzálne Futurologické Operácie», Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne; 1991 «Post-komunikácia», Považská galéria umenia, Žilina (SK); 1969 «Antigaléria», Komunálna opravovňa pančúch, Bratislava; 1968 «Permanentná demystifikácia 1., 2.», V-klub, Bratislava.
Group Exhibitions (Selection):
2010 «Les Promesses du passé», Centre George Pompidou, Paris; 2009 «1968. Die Große Unschuld“, Kunsthalle Bielefeld, Bielefeld (D); «Performing the East», Kunstverein Salzburg, Salzburg (A); 2007 «Learn to Read», Level 2 Gallery, Tate Modern, London; 2006 «Erzählungen», Kunsthaus Graz, Graz (A); «… und so hat Konzept noch nie Pferd bedeutet», Generali Foundation, Vienna; «Julius Koller/Jiri Kovanda», Index, Stockholm; «Kontakt», MUMOK, Vienna; 2004 «Who if not we…?», BAK, Utrecht (NL), Centraal Museum, Utrecht (NL); «Utopia Station», Haus der Kunst, Munich; 2000 «Global Conceptualism», MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge/MA, Ludwig Museum Budapest, John Hansard Gallery, Southampton (UK); 1999 «Global Conceptualism: Points of Origin (1950– 1980)», Queens Museum of Art, New York; 1997 «Face à l’Histoire (1933– 1996)», Musée national d’art moderne Centre George Pompidou, Paris; 1996 23. São Paulo Art Biennale, São Paulo; 1994 «Der Riss im Raum», Martin Gropius Bau, Berlin; Galeria Zacheta, Warzawa; 1992 «Zwischen Objekt und Installation», Museum am Ostwall, Dortmund (D); 1990 «Súcasné slovenské výtvarné umenie», Slovenská národná galéria, Bratislava; «Umeni proti totalite», Bratislavský hrad, Bratislava; «Slovenská fotografia šest´desiatych rokov», Dom umenia, Bratislava; 1987 «Art of Today II.», Club of Young Artists, Budapest Gallery, Budapest; 1979 «Works and Words», Stichting de Appel, Amsterdam; 1974 «Prospective ‘74», Museo de Arte contemporanea, São Paulo; 1970 «J.K. Ping-Pong Klub», Galerie für junge Künstler, Bratislava; «Polymúzická priestor», Piešt‘any (SK).