POSTSPECTACLE

The World of Integrated Spectacle

2012-01-03T11:54:00.001-08:00

The immovable walls and the iron curtains that divided the two worlds were wiped out in a few days. The Eastern governments allowed the Leninist party to fall so that the integrated spectacle could be completely realized in their countries. In the same way, the West had already renounced a while ago the balance of powers as well as real freedom of thought and communication in the name of the electoral machine of majority vote and of media control over public opinion - both of which had developed within the totalitarian modern states.

Timisoara, Romania, represents the extreme point of this process, and deserves to give its name to the new turn in world politics. Because there the secret police had conspired against itself in order to overthrow the old concentrated-spectacle regime while television showed, nakedly and without false modesty, the real political function of the media. Both television and secret police, therefore, succeeded in doing something that Nazism had not even dared toimagine: to bring Auschwitz and the Reichstag fire together in one monstrous event. For the first time in the history of humankind, corpses that had just been buried or lined up on the morgue’s tables were hastily exhumed and tortured in order to simulate, in front of the video cameras, the genocide that legitimized the new regime. What the entire world was watching live on television, thinking it was the real truth, was in reality the absolute nontruth; and, although the falsification appeared to be sometimes quite obvious, it was nevertheless legitimized as true by the media’s world system, so that it would be clear that the true was, by now, nothing more than a moment within the necessary movement of the false. In this way, truth and falsity became indistinguishable from each other and the spectacle legitimized itself solely through the spectacle.

Timisoara is, in this sense, the Auschwitz of the age of the spectacle: and in the same way in which it has been said that after Auschwitz it is impossible to write and think as before, after Timisoara it will be no longer possible to watch television in the same way.

How can thought collect Debord’s inheritance today, in the age of the complete triumph of the spectacle?
It is evident, after all, that the spectacle is language, the very communicativity and linguistic being of humans. This means that an integrated Marxian analysis should take into consideration the fact that capitalism (or whatever other name we might want to give to the process dominating world history today) not only aimed at the expropriation of productive activity, but also, and above all, at the alienation of language itself, of the linguistic and communicative nature of human beings, of that logos in which Heraclitus identifies the Common. The extreme form of the expropriation of the Common is the spectacle, in other words, the politics in which we live. But this also means that what we encounter in the spectacle is our very linguistic nature inverted. For this reason (precisely because what is being expropriated is the possibility itself of a common good), the spectacle’s violence is so destructive; but, for the same reason, the spectacle still contains something like a positive possibility - and it is our task to use this possibility against it.

(From Giorgio Agamben - Marginal Notes on Comments on the Society of the Spectacle.)

The Inauguration of the People's Salvation Cathedral

2011-11-02T01:58:00.001-07:00

The Romanian Orthodox Church wants to build a huge People's Salvation Cathedral. Of course with the money from the State budged (around 900 millions euro). Ironically will be next to the House of the People, the huge building made during Ceausescu's regime.

They started the construction but they already build also a small, simple, cheap and temporary, cartoon made church, as a way to mark the territory. We made a campaign announcing that that's the People's Salvation Cathedral, and we set the day of 11.11.11 for its inauguration.

At the inauguration I appeared as a priest and, after a very short religious procession, I apologized, in the name of the Orthodox Church, for the exploitation and commercialization of gypsy slaves by the Romanian Orthodox Church till the 19 century (a taboo issue for them).

I announced that the orthodox churches will be day and night open, for the homeless people, that are more and more on the streets, evacuated from their homes by the banks.

I announced also some possible reforms inside the Church, like the women to have the same rights as man to perform the mass and to have access in the hierarchical structure at any level, not just to clean the church and sell candles.

But actually I criticized also the hierarchical structure of the Church and the hypocrisy - everything is in gold, allot of properties and political power. The top members of Church travels in limousine surrounded by police, blocking the traffic for the rest of people. I said that all this represents the Antichrist because is the opposite of Jesus message - simplicity, poverty, love...

But in general I was thankful for the honor to inaugurate the People's Salvation Cathedral and happy for an important step of Romanian Orthodox Church towards christianity - they chose to do a simple and spiritual church instead of building the opulent home for the Antichrist (of course they didn't).

McImpuls Tanz or nothing to eXplore

2011-10-09T08:46:00.000-07:00

What does it mean to do a festival of contemporary art in 2011? And what does it mean to do a festival of contemporary dance in the city of Bucharest in 2011? What does it mean to be involved in contemporary arts in general? Those questions seem of no concern for eXplore Dance Festival that at least for the past editions was trying to produce a minimal (even if banal) text that proposed a position in the world of spectacle.

This year we get directly names. The only concern of the festival seems to be to bring us “world-known artists” from the much larger and more successful Festival Impuls Tanz Vienna. We even have a “coaching” project, scholarships and an “8:tension” like category for “emerging artists” disguised as a competition named “Prix Jardin d’Europe” (which includes, of course, many participants in the 8:tension program).The self-colonizing at it’s purest! The local context with its issues and realities is of no interest at all. We must only feel very happy to see the same “world-known artists” that we saw this year in Vienna and Berlin. You know….”it’s good for the audience”…

The periphery does not produce discourse. It only integrates the already produced discourses and names by its bigger and stronger partner and reproduces it in its own territory with no critical distance whatsoever. The success model must be reproduced (in a minor key of course) regardless of any other imperatives of the moment in hope that we might be successful as well if we only follow closely the receipt of our bigger brothers. Nothing should interrupt this logic not even a proposed protest by fellow artists to address the disastrous situation in which the Ministry of Culture keeps the National Center of Dance Bucharest and the loss of the only space available for the dance community.

Solidarity with your local context must come only when you need financing for your own project! The march towards becoming a local branch of Impuls Tanz must continue without any disturbances in a conformist and provincial manner that will secure our modest place inside the global “network”. This (lack of) attitude stands in deep opposition from that of the local dance community that over the past ten years has been promoting a critical stance towards their own art form and towards the politics involved in it.

Together with the loss of the venue of CNDB, 2011 begins to look like the year when Romanian contemporary dance steps back into it’s ‘90s “pre-thinking” condition.2011 - not much left to eXplore!

The Romanian Presidential Candidate

Bezna #1

2011-10-06T05:34:00.001-07:00

The dark side of art and its autonomy
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AN ARTIST MORE - A TERRORIST LESS

2011-10-03T04:41:00.001-07:00

In Romania during the so called "communist period" there was what they called "the resistance through culture". In the sense that some artists and intellectuals didn't compromise to praise the dictator, but at the same time they didn't take any risks, they went with the regime doing their art and now they pretend that they were dissidents. They are very badly judged now. They are called "collaborators". Paradoxically they are more badly judged than the obvious collaborators. People accuse them that it was their responsibility to criticize the regime and because they didn't do it, they legitimized the regime. It was their responsibility to set how the struggle should look like and what they provided was a kind of a fake resistance, succeeding in this way to steal potential from other kinds of resistance.(1)

Same now. There is the obvious collaboration, the clear example being the "creative industries" and the artists that are "sent" in problematic places, in slums, between immigrants or in "emergent" countries to prepare the terrain for "democracy" and capital - the stalkers of capital, like in the past the catholic priests were send in colonies to introduce the christianity and the economic thinking.

But more problematic is the fake resistance, the subtle collaboration. The so called "political art", the majority of "critical theory" that are carefully attentive not to pass some clear limits. It is problematic because they are setting the tone of how the resistance and critique in society should look like.

Analyzing how media works, Chomsky noticed a kind of interiorised self-censorship, an interiorised authority at the core of it. The tendency is to self-adjust to the "normal"/official perception, to the status quo. People automatically take the frame of the superior publications, which take the frame of officials, which take the frame of the financial sustainers. The self-censorship is not so much about what information is presented, it is more about the perspective about reality, about the implicit paradigm from which the reading of what's happening emerges.(2)

This kind of analysis can be easily extended to art and to entire cultural component. The artist, like the journalist, is in a chain of economic-political power relations. He's the subject of a pressure from above - curators, programers, which are the subject of a pressure from politicians or banks/corporations (via financial support). From this point of view the artist is a link between officials and the subjectivities it addresses, an important piece in a chain of power influences.

The majority of the population is sufficiently "covered" by the mass media and entertainment, apparently the contemporary art play a small role in the big picture. Maybe from the quantitative point of view, but from the point of view of how power operates, the target of high culture (contemporary art, academic theory, etc.) is tremendously important because it assimilates and addresses the marginal people that are more at unrest, emancipated, unsatisfied, activists, critical, etc. Foucault noticed that the power always focused to assimilate, to integrate or to criminalize/annihilate this dangerous, more marginal, independent subjects.(3)

Art (and Academia) seems to be some of the best solutions for assimilating, absorbing, discharging and disarming in its key points the resistance, dissent, revolt and frustration accumulated in society. It works like a substitution, it swallows real struggles, the real potentiality and transforms them into consumable spectacular cultural products like art. It is an appropriation of struggles. This accumulation of struggles creates the cultural (and artistic) bubble, a luxurious prison where the dangerous people, thoughts, concepts and intentions are domesticated.

ART BUBBLE
(Art is infinitely better than reality)

Ranciere is enthusiastic about the fact that aesthetics were set since the beginning to work on the egalitarian principles:

"The very idea of Art - of the aesthetic experience - as defining a specific sphere of experience was born in the late eighteenth century under the banner of equality: the equality of all subjects, the definition of a form of judgment freed from the hierarchies of knowledge and those of social life."(4)

I think we can spot here a fundamental problem - the fact that art was set since the beginning to answer to this important needs and aspirations in an alternative reality - to function as a substitute that enables an abstraction from the concrete ideologico-political constellation. Religion offered this kind of compensation-refuge further in time, in the next-other life, art seems more efficient and can give a compensation now, but not here - in alternative realities, escaping in spaces of creativity, representation.

Freud considers that "life as we find it is too hard for us; it entails too much pain, too many disappointments, impossible tasks. We cannot do without palliative remedies… There are perhaps three of these means: powerful diversions of interest, which lead us to care little about our misery; substitutive gratification, which lessen it; and intoxicating substances, which make us insensitive to it. Something of this kind is indispensable."(5)

Art/aesthetic seems to be a good "remedy" that plays all this three palliative functions so needed to cope with the inequality, exploitation, domination and precarity of life. Art can be seen as a space in which you can play with "radical" changes in a safe and inoffensive environment - a provided, institutionalized place for critique and experiment in order to keep the status quo outside of it.

Ranciere and with him others artists and theorists, says that art is already political just because it exists and modifies the regime of sensible, producing emancipation, etc. Of course these theories are a big hype among artists because they justify and provide rationalizations for "my art is my activism" attitude. It is very convenient, you just stay in your art studio and work at the level of finesse and sensible, and you are in the same time revolutionary, subversive and so on. You are a radical artist without touching on the power relations. You keep the privileges and you do resistance at the same time.

THE MORBID SIDE OF CULTURE

Everybody is happy - the artist, the State, the Capital. The Power don't want the artists capacities, intelligence and knowledge to be used in real dissent activities or in real protests. So, since ever, the power is friendly with the artists. They always had a privileged place at the King/Capital court.

We can see the cultural component as the domain of biopolitics, where the power invest in the people's capacities for different reasons - to integrate and assimilate dissent, to softly control the critical discourse, the values and references in society or just to harvest the artists productivity after.

The cultural component can be included in what Chris Hedges calls the soft language of power -"the language of beneficence is used to speak to those outside the centers of death and pillage, those who have not yet been totally broken, those who still must be seduced to hand over power to predators"(6).

The brutal language of power, the war component, the morbid capitalism is the domain of necropolitics, where the power is a dis-investement in life, is more an administration of death, war and brutal exploitation. It is reserved to the periphery of capital in the violent expansion zone where things are turbulent and the power is classical, not subtle, not hidden behind benevolent appearances. The morbid component is for the second world a bit and for the third world a lot.

The morbid component for the periphery cannot exist without the consent of the center, without the cultural component.

And the cultural component, all the financial speculations, immaterial labor, etc. cannot exist without a base, without the classical power, violent exploitation, without the war component for the periphery. In a way all the immaterial labor and the cultural component are more a way to administrate and externalize the death politics in the periphery of the capital. The cognitarians are just the administrators of the very concrete and brutal production that happens in the periphery.

But the periphery is coming closer and closer to the first world. The cuts in fundings for arts, humanities probably means also that the cultural component is not so needed anymore - it is not necessary or it is not working anymore to keep up the appearances, the illusion. So there is a move of the morbid component towards the center. Probably it is better to hope that artists will always be rich...

THE FINAL CRISIS

The morbid and the cultural (spectacle) component put a huge pressure on the subject creating an universal capitalist subjectivity which constantly reinforces the capitalist reality. So it is a vicious circle - a constant unbreackable loop.

The capitalist expansion reached all the populations, all the resources and the limits of the earth. The economic-financial paradigm is omnipresent, addressing the totality of life - at the level of the organization of society through the power of the neoliberal dogma and at the level of subjectivity where probably the last fight, for the most intimate human "resources", capacities, sensibility, intimate desires, believes, is happening now. We can say that the ultimate battle is in the cultural domain which is almost entirely occupied by the economic logic.

Probably in this context if we want to produce a change, first of all we have to go out or against the institutionalized art bubble. White cube and black box provided a bit of oxygen in a stable society and a suffocating environment. They played a function then, they were important. But now is possible much more, the times are changing. We should help that art bubble to burst, the crisis to work. Maybe now, in the crisis there is an opportunity for us to go out from the assigned art bubbles and to use our time and skills to intervene on the biggest stages (mass media, politics).

Maybe is time for art to go where things happen. To interrupt the flow of spectacle, the institutional chain of passing the cultural agenda. Not to listen and even sabotage the administrative protocols in art - the artist has to become a cultural terrorist. "Terrorist" is a label that points towards any enemy, potential danger to the establishment. The terrorist and the little brothers, pirates and hackers are the only ones that are not assimilated and integrated in our society.(7)

And there is an another level were we also should go. If capitalism is modelating our cultural core, we should go at that level too - to radically work, experiment with subjectivity. Not just to play safe in the realm of representation with creativity but to experiment with essential human behaviours, values, perceptions, attitudes. If we really want something to change I think we have to go a bit beyond our comfort and alter the core of our identities. If we are Capitalism, the exploitation, the extinction of species, the climate changes, at least some parts of us have to transform radically or even die. In this sense, maybe we have to embrace a bit of cultural (artistic) apocalypse.

1. See Stefan Tiron, 10 years of beautifying misery in Bucharest http://caminultaucultural.blogspot.com/2011/05/premises-10-years-of-beautifying-misery.html
2. Noam Chomsky, Necessary Illusions, Pluto Press, London, 1999;
3. Michel Foucault, Power/Knowledge, random house, US, 1981;
4. Jacques Ranciere, Art of the possible, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0268/is_7_45/ai_n24354911/pg_6/?tag=content;col1
5. Sigmund Freud, Civilization And Its Discontents, Buckinghamshire: Chrysoma Associated, 2000;
6. Chris Hedges, Recognizing the Language of Tyranny, http://jerichorendezvous.wordpress.com/2011/02/07/recognizing-the-language-of-tyranny/
7. See Dorato Action at Pavilion Unicredit as a cultural terrorism example: http://florinflueras.blogspot.com/2011/07/dorato-action.html

The Candidate appearance as a revolutionary Ortodox countryside priest

2011-07-29T05:46:00.001-07:00

Ortodox priest apologizes in the name of the church for the gypsy slaves Churche's markets in the 19 century. Later speaks against the Patriarchy and their antichristian symbols of power, hierarchy and wealth. And ends by speaking about the new hidden religion in which we are immersed.

Discussion with Franco Berardi Bifo about the Presidential Candidacy project

2011-07-23T02:23:00.001-07:00

Bifo: You underline awareness as the "main word". Don't you think that impotent awareness is kind of masochistic? What's the use of awareness when conscious collective action seems impossible?

Florin Flueras: Probably the impossibility of conscious collective action is because too much unconscious collective action - too much production, agitation, too much immersion in the official perception of the reality, too much involvement in the consumerist-capitalist religion.
Maybe for a conscious collective action the first thing that we have to do is to make space by stoping the unconscious collective action. A moment of paralyzing awareness can be good - a total stop, a total silence, a zero moment.

You have announced your presidential candidacy for the next elections in Romania. What's your aim? What's your program? Do you want really to change the political course of Romania?

We are a group and we mainly come from performance/contemporary dance. At some point we couldn't avoid anymore to raise a fundamental question for our art. What is the point to do our performances in the theatre, what is the point to add another spectacle in this society of generalized spectacle? Based on this question we started what we call postspectacle practice, with the intention to go with our skills and knowledge as performers and makers on the main stages - mass media and politics.

The candidacy is a mean to enter in the official debate, to get on TV basically. We don't go on TV to announce an alternative or another program; we go to expose what is behind a program, how a program works, to expose and to play with the spectacle of power and with the power of spectacle.
We don't enter in the political life because we have a solution. We enter more to raise the avoided questions and to deconstruct the official solutions, to make space, to create the premises for collective intelligence to manifest.

We don't have a plan because planning implies a logic of authority that we want to question. We see every day the unhappy results of planning the lives of the people by the state or corporations. People have the capacity to organize themselves if they are allowed to (as the workers that occupied the factories in Argentina proved, and many other communities when a vacuum of power has occurred). So maybe we can say that our plan is to un-plan. As we said in our announce for the candidacy, we want the power in order to dissolute the power.

We are very aware that first of all we cannot win the elections, and if we do, it doesn't matter. You don't do politics in Bucharest these days. You can see constantly how IMF functions as a kind of super ego that regulates the entire political and economical life of the country. So the democratic game doesn't mater as long as policies are made in supra-democratic structures like IMF, World Trade Organization, World Economic Forum, etc. What they call politics in Romania is the following of the directives of the supra-democratic structures and a bit of a provincial mafia administration and fights for the leftovers. Basically they take their commissions by selling the politics and the economics of the country.

The power becomes more and more verticalized and globalized and the authority becomes more and more complex, integrating the means of discipline, control and management of perception (means of producing auto-control - the interiorized authority). There is not a passage from disciplinary society to society of control, to arbitrary power, it is an accumulation - all kind of coercion coexist and amplify each other, shaping a power that reaches the limits of the world and the core of the subjectivity (exploiting or make us to self-exploit our souls, how you very well point out).
It looks like we are definitely lost. No possible plan, no possible solution, no hope. There is nothing to do but something must be done. We give up hope and in the same time we can somehow (secretly) believe in an event, a miracle or at least an apocalypse.

Can you describe the current situation of the young generation in your country? What are the labour conditions? What the average salary of a young worker?

The average fee in Romania is around 360 euro/month. Better for the people that work in informatics (majority young) average 850/month.
It was just voted the new working legislations and they are proud about its flexibility. But basically it is a flexibility for corporations, for employers to dispose even more and easier of the time and life of the workers, to be able to fire them easily and to overwork them. Basically the rights of the workers are decimated.

Romania is a clear case of a Second World country situated somewhere between the first world where the power invests in some people’s capacities in order to harvest their productivity after, and the third world with its brutal exploitation, fordist production, etc. So you can find something close to the third world sweat shops but also the first world immaterial labour.

How large is the space of cognitive work in the Romanian economy? Can we speak of a precarious cognitariat? What is the salary of a school teacher?

They reduced a lot the salaries for education. The perception is that you are a kind of loser if you work in the pre-university education. So the people avoid teaching and the quality of education is going always down. The salary of school teachers are between 180 euro and 380 euro in pre-university education. In the Universities can go much higher, like 4000 euro/month in some cases (they were scandals on this issues).

I don't know statistics about how much cognitive work we have. But I can give you other statistics that I think can say something about this issue. Romania has the highest speed of internet in Europe and the first place for internet illegal activities too. Another curious thing is that Romania is the only country from Europe where the law that oblige internet providers to save personal information from people (emails, etc.) it was not approved.

We can speak about a generalized precarious life here. The people that have a job are afraid that they will lose it. And the others are improvising on the spot, each day, to survive. The official debate is allot around how to get rid of state employees, what is still possible to privatize and how to cut what we still have from education, healt care, pensions, etc. Like almost everywhere we assist at the killing of the social state.

What is the mind-scape of the young generation? Which kind of drugs (legal, illegal) are prevailing?

The main drugs, like everywhere in Capitalism, are coffee and allot of alcohol. Coffee to push the productivity, alcohol to kill the little free time and any possibility of a scary moment of lucidity. For the marginal people there is heroin, and for the very marginal the aurolac (a cheap paint inhaled from a plastic bag). I heard allot about people that take Xanax (anti-panic and anti-anxiety pills) and anti-depressives, but I don't know statistics. But I know a statistic that says that generally Romanians administrate themselves legal drugs when they are sick, without consulting a doctor (too expensive).
In general the mindscape is more and more shaped towards right wing, neocons directions, by money and propaganda that gives astonishing results. There is a very toxic mixture of nationalism combined with orthodox religion, racism, homophobia, etc. And this is growing and growing.

The other big tendency is a more centric one, perfectly represented by people from the creative industries. People that are cynical, not interested in politics, "against any ideology" and activism. They are into a life style copying the kind of Berlin atmosphere, parties, drugs, etc. But in practice they are not apolitical at all, they actually are working in creative industries like publicity, etc. - at the core of neoliberalism. And behind the attempts of cool, fashionable, original appearances, the majority shares a very conventional, mainstream and political ignorant perception. They use social networks mostly just for self expression and party events. This category consumes, besides the coffee-alcohol, also ecstasy, cannabis, cocaine, amphetamine, etc.

The people invested so much in the Capitalism dream during the dictatorship, that now the confrontation with the real is totally overwhelming. The delusion is too big. No more revolutionary energy. It was consumed, discharged in 89. Now it is apathy and depression.
But there are good sides too. From many points of view seems to be more potential, the capital is not so well organized, there are gaps, the reality and capitalism not totally coincide like in the west. And there is a special understanding in some people, because a change in political systems and official discourses like we had after the revolution can create awareness and a distance from any political system - skepticism towards the power and its solutions in general.

Some months ago we heard voices of a student's movement in Bucharest. How did it evolve? What is the condition of school, and of the university in your country? What the effects of neoliberal politics on the educational system? Do you see any sign of student's consciousness and self-organization?

What you heard was the protests of workers and pensioners, when the government cut 25% of salaries of state workers and 15% from pensions. Is an atypical situation, the most revolutionary generation here are the pensioners, they continued the protests for many days. From this point of view the students appear more conventional and conservative than police - while everywhere in Europe students were beaten by police, here one of the most radical action it was the police protest and strike.
The leaders of the student unions are part of a very corrupt system, similar to the leaders of working syndicates, they are in close dubious relations with the political parties and usually they enter in one of the parties structures after they finish school.
There is no sign of political consciousness and self-organization... It seems that the school works perfectly in creating conventional thinking and obedience. The recent neoliberal policies will complete what is already a disaster. A school in which study and education is not possible, only a dressage for interiorizing the authority and a preparation for exploitation.

How can artistic action interfere with the social process? How can an artist or a poet produce changing effects on the social sphere?

After the capitalism expansion reached all the populations, all the resources and the limits of the earth, now the fight is for the most intimate human "resources", capacities, sensibility - we can say that the ultimate battle is in the art domain. So I don't see so much art as a weapon for fighting Capitalism but more as a battlefield. A battlefield that unfortunately is alredy almost entirely occupied by the enemy, the economic logics. The power domesticated and almost entirely integrated the art and the artist.
In Romania during the Communism period functioned what they called "the resistance through culture". In the sense that some artists, writers, didn't compromised to praise the dictator, but at the same time they didn't take any risk, they went with the regime doing their art and now they pretend that they were dissidents. They are very badly judged. They are called 'collaborators'.

But now is it not the artists that legitimize Capitalism? The artist is in a chain of economic-political power relations. He's the subject of a pressure from above - curators, programmers, which are the subject of a pressure from politicians or banks/corporations (a soft invisible pressure via access to funds). From this point of view the artist is a link between officials and subjectivities and their knowledge and sensibility is preferable to work for power than against.

If we really want to do something, it would be a bit less comfortable, less safe - we have to assume the risks of loosing the artistic privileges and to be exiled from the official art, from the court of the Capital. If we want to produce change in the social sphere first of all we have to go out or against the institutionalized art bubble. To interrupt the flow of spectacle, the institutional chain of passing the cultural agenda. To not listen and even to sabotage the administrative protocols in art - from artists to become cultural terrorists.

"Terrorist" is a label that points towards any enemy, potential danger to the establishment. The terrorist and the little brothers, pirate and hacker are the only ones that are not assimilated and integrated in our society. Maybe now, in the crisis is an opportunity for us to go out from the assigned art bubbles and to use our time, skills and knowledge to intervene on the biggest stages (mass media, politics). Maybe is time for art to go where things happen.

Another possible alternative is for us to become saints, prophets, mystics. What I want to say with this is to radically work and experiment with subjectivity. Not just to play safe in representation with creativity and fantasy but to experiment with essential human behaviours, values, perceptions, attitudes, states of mind, sensibility - so radical that it become religious. If we really want something to change I think we have to go a bit beyond our comfort and to alter the core of our identities. If we are Capitalism, the exploitation, the extinction of species, the climate changes, at least some parts of us have to transform radically or even die. In this sense, maybe we have to embrace a bit of (artistic) apocalypse.

DORATO ACTION - PAVILION DISCREDIT

2011-07-16T17:40:00.001-07:00

The 'Presidential Candidate' was happy when it got the invitation to participate in 'Just do it. Branding biopolitics' exhibition in Pavilion Unicredit space.

At Pavilion Unicredit one encounters :

Radical left, comunist, anarhist texts – in reality, corporate atmosphere, clear hierarchy and chain of command;

Exhibiting texts and works which critique authoritative power positions – in reality, using any means of authoritative power – may it be academia, prestige, lengthy self-eulogizing biographies;

Texts which critique mass-media manipulation – in reality, using the same tactics of manipulation, disinformation, denigration, attack against anyone who critiques their institution;

Statements for institutional critique and artists’ absolute freedom – in reality, censoring artists which through their works critique the context in which they were invited - in this case, Pavilion Unicredit.

Texts and works which condemn exploitation and neo-slavery – in reality, the exploitation of artists’ work;

Praise for the bank that funded the art institution - artists are not payed, but they are asked to write everywhere the name of the institution in capital letters: PAVILION UNICREDIT.

It seemed a clear case of anarcho-corporate schizophrenia, the perfect context to challenge the politics behind the so called political art.(1)
But, of course, things started to go not so well after telling Pavillion Unicredit what we planned to do and we sent the following text for the exhibition publication:

The Death of the Romanian Presidential Candidacy

The Presidential Candidacy project is dead! Long live The Presidential Candidacy artistic project!

The Romanian Presidential Candidate is happy to announce that the political project has finally arrived home - Contemporary Art. Here, with the support of the State, corporations or banks, is still possible to be political, to do political art. We are happy to exchange the grey, boring and ugly world of politics for the beautiful, free, open, creative, flexible, progressive, white, clean but also critical, radical and political world of art.
The Candidate

After some attempts to control our work, we were kicked out a couple of days before the opening with an email directly from the director, Razvan Ion, even if he previously stated that he would leave all the decisions to the curator, Simina Neagu.

But we decided already long time ago to not respect anymore the institutional power to mark the separation between invited/uninvited artist. In the Romanian Dance History project we reserve the right to perform on stages or present our work in art galeries without any invitation or approval, we decided to take control of the artistic spaces, to not be always framed, programed, curated, etc.(2)

Now we wanted to go a step further, to make all this dynamics visible by reversing this logic - to reverse the hierarchy in which the artist serves the institution: instead of acting under the institution umbrella. the artists can now be the ones framing the institution.

We anounced everywhere the opening of 'Just do it. Branding biopolitics' exhibition as a Presidential Candidacy event. Basically we took the event, we reframed the opening and the exibhition as ours. We started a promotion campaign and we invited the people to come to celebrate the opening with us and with a glass of Dorato champagne. The Dorato champagne is a good looking bottle but with a very, very cheap and dubious content. (around 1euro/bottle)

Furthermore, we announced that will be a special opening, since people were invited to see the opening as our performance. Fortunately it turned out to be a very interesting spectacle. The tension with the Pavilion crew built up so much before the opening that they exploded when they saw us entering with the Dorato champagne bottles in our hands. The show started with the Pavillion crew, led by its director Razvan Ion, screaming and pushing us out of the door in front of the shocked audience that didn't really understood what was going on. It was a big scandal, at some point the Pavilion director, who coordinated everything as a perfect general, put one of the employees to throw the seized bottles down the street (precisely at the entrance of the underground pasage). Some of the Dorato bottels felt on a car and the driver arrived furious and eager to see who was the idiot that did such a thing. In other words, it was a mess.(3)

A scandal is a moment when something is revealed, something burst publicly. It is a context in which the hidden or unconscious power relations become visible and important: a moment of the real, when things are exposed.

We just created the conditions for the real politics reveal, almost following the classical ready-made principle. All the essence of the anarcho-corporatism schizofrenia of Pavilion Unicredit's directors was there in front of everybody's' eyes. The Candidate accomplished his intention, now the contrast was made obvious: the political art on the walls and on the screens of the gallery and the real politics at work visible in the scandal.(4)

1. Here I wrote more about contemporary art situation: http://florinflueras.blogspot.com/2011/08/morbid-side-of-culture.html
2. See Romanian Dance History project: http://rodancehistory.blogspot.com
3. See Valentina Desideri's description of her experience in that evening: https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1BbrXUGooOqIIlfpZMYy3PIUi68UC0R7b0A7Z7IaPV1A
4. See also another similar cases with artists that tried to collaborate with Pavilion Unicredit: http://art-leaks.org/

INTENSIVE WORKSHOP FOR POTENTIAL PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES

2011-05-22T03:12:00.001-07:00

WITH AKSELI VIRTANEN
@CIV
23.05: 20h00
24.05: 17h00 - 21h00

Akseli Virtanen believes that to identify the 'real problem' is one of the main tasks and one of the main difficulties. And indeed his perspective is a bit different than what we are hearing in the official and critical discourses.

Akseli Virtanen, Critic Atac and the Presidential Candidate invites you to an intensive workshop for potential presidential candidates. And you don't really have a choice, you have to be ready to candidate. Nobody represents the Romanian State better than you.

Dr. Akseli Virtanen is a member of Mollecular organization and the coordinator of Future Art Base in Helsinki (Aalto University School of Art). He is currently working on “Parasite –Investment Fund of the Precariat” and “Kafka machine” film project based on Félix Guattari’s project plan. He also teaches new political economy and philosophy of cooperation at the Aalto University School of Economics. His recents books include the Molecular Organization of Félix Guattari (2011), Economy and Social Theory Vol 1-3 (2011-2012), Introduction to Bracha Ettinger's Copoiesis (2009), The Place of Mutation. Vagus, Nomos, Multitudo (2007), A Critique of Biopolitical Economy. The End of Modern Economy and Birth of Arbitrary Power (2006), Dictionary of New Work. A Map to Precarious Life (2006). He edits "Polemos" and "Memory books of cooperation" book series.

What does the romanian presidential candidate offer?

2011-01-01T08:21:00.000-08:00

-one year of presidential candidacy activity-

What does the romanian presidential candidate offer?

For now a radical practice and some critical thinking.

His 2010 messages and actions were all focused on deconstruction which led inevitable to some cynical conclusions upon the status quo. The practice consisted in breaking the contexts in which he was invited, making shortcuts inside the utopian projects and emulating political campaign representations.

The candidate pushed the reality to those limits that “reality” usually tries to avoid to acknowledge. We (the staff) tried to expose what the system prefers to obstruct, to reveal the ideology behind the nightmare. 2010 was a year of great turbulence and, as never before, the future seemed grim and hopeless. Capitalism seems dead but is sucking everything around just like a cosmic black hole. Though, unlike a black hole, the periphery is the first to go down, the margins have to “adapt” (instantly) to the new coordonates of the calamity driven world, to adjust incessantly to a succesion of singularities that leaves the center much smaller (but stronger) and condemns the concentric circles to total ruin. The 4th world will forever work to that end (Asia as a vast labour camp), in fact the scale of the “worlds” has now become larger, we have today also a fifth world and we are witnessing a sliding of the second world towards a third world condition.

Otherwise we deal only with the present, history has been resuscitated by the current crisis but the official left (blind to cognitive capitalism and imaterial production) is improvising on the spot. Everything revolves around inevitable future predicaments or disasters, the ones that will constantly shift our focus and plans (the 9/11 paradigm). Stability is nowhere to be found, we will ponder on short term projects and wait to be detoured again and again.

There is no movement possible, only some dancing. Improvised, of course.

The collective depression and the global debt are peaking thus leaving us mentally disturbed and bodily fractured in a mega-fiction. It’s a fiction which is meant to control the precariat emotionally through abstraction, art and a lot of fear. Any reaction to the heavy “austerity” measures will be buffered by the local goverments, as a sort of infantry with “multinational” generals ruling from far away headquarters.

Contrary to what neo-liberals fear, we see across Europe (as a mainstream trend) a massive rise of the right wing. The only dim light came from some “leakings”, the only pressure that was taken seriously. It now seems the only political weapon available.

So these are in short some of the conditions in the contemporary society that the presidential candidate acknowledged and tried to aproach in 2010.

The presidential candidate at the mall, during the national day

2010-12-11T05:21:00.000-08:00

The last action/event that the romanian candidacy proposed took place on the 1st december of 2010, the national day of Romania and the anniversary of the biggest mall in eastern europe, AFI Palace Cotroceni in Bucharest. We got permission to enter in the show by cheating the PR of the mall saying that we are going to present a modern dance piece. We send fake images from previous shows that we never did, actually they all came from a youtube search session. One of the videos that we send as "document" to the PR was taken from a Ultima Vez piece by Wim Vandekeybus. Most importantly we told her that we are for free! So they didn't have to burden their marketing budget...

We were kicked out of the stage just before the end. Some of the mall staff got angry with our show although we were officially invited by them. But it was a postspectacle evening anyway. Before us, on stage, were little dancers (at most 12) from the National Opera Experimental Studio. After us acrobats and Holograf (famous romanian rock band) were due to follow, and last but not least in the end of the day there was a raffle "with prizes for everyone".

We just tried to push the show in the same direction, but to the edge. Mixing trash estetics with hardcore critical speeches we delivered something that actually was already there, or it seemed like this anyway. The bigger spectacle that surounded us was absorbing and, as it proves here, it can absorb anything. From here on apparently only violence can shake something up.

For a while, after this action, The Presidential Candidate was depressed.

What’s happening now with the candidacy ? We take a rest and rethink.

Postspectacle Practice

2010-12-10T05:37:00.000-08:00

Postspectacle practice is an ongoing questioning process that deals with performance and its political connotations. It addresses the changes that are taking place within representational arts in particular and in cultural practices in general. In a time dominated by spectacle, performing arts have to reconsider their role - and their power - in society at large. In this world of generalized spectacle, what’s the point to add another spectacle in the theatre?

Postspectacle Practice extends in 2 different directions:

1.In the theater we propose alternatives to spectacle.
- bringing in the theatre the "outside spectacle". The idea is to produce friction between contexts/conventions/languages like we did with the military performance (a military drill on the dance floor). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dICPoZGObQ
- opposing spectacle - if entertainment dominates the mass media and politics maybe we should bring in the theater serious stuff like political theory, critique and cultural deconstruction.
- hacking the big festivals and big art events, as we did with The Romanian Dance History, trying to reveal the logic operating within art institutions and the way values are confirmed and affirmed, as well as the artists value and prestige. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AupKHQL-UgM

2. Performing on the big stages
The second direction is to use our performing skills and knowledge on the big stages of politics and mass media, as we did in the TV performance 2012 - ‘Ultima Apocalipsă’. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6qxqKXoi6Y
Moreover we decided as the third part of the postspectacle trilogy to run for president in Romania. We have, since 2009, already made a few interventions and campaign events. The elections are in 2014 but we need that time to organize, explore political practices and make it into the official realm of power as politics as a legitimate candidate. For the postspectacle practice the most important goal is to gain access to these areas and set up actions which deconstructs rituals and create awareness of these charged contexts and also (with the presidential candidacy) to affirm new subjectivity paths and reaffirm politics as an open field of negotiation.

Postspectacle wants to release the accumulated spectacle. The spectacle locked the creativity, performativity in a far away, safe, distant, inoffensive bubble. Spectacle is a commodity that you can consume, or it can consume you, in theaters, on screens, in politics, etc. Postspectacle is when the bubble is breaking and the reality comes in your face.

The second coming of Jesus Christ, in the Mall

2010-11-29T09:30:00.001-08:00

We are living in a so called post-ideological, post-believe period. But there are two types of ideology: an explicit ideology - one that you are aware of, and an implicit one - one that is unnoticed and expressed in our "free choices", behaviors and attitudes... Like the core of values and beliefs that we all have even if we are not aware of them. So, what is the contemporary religion that runs mostly unquestioned in the background of our attitudes and behaviors?

In the past the Divinity was the dominant force in culture and the soul was the term that pointed towards the core of subjectivity, being transcendent to personal-psychological identity and related with an exterior Divinity.

What happen with the core of subjectivity, let's keep calling it "the soul", when the dominant transcendent force is financial? What kind of subjectivity emerge through this financialization of life? We can speak about the emergence of a financial or financialized soul in our contemporary culture? So the banks and the malls have to be aproached from a religious point of view - as the new churches for this new kind of soul?

Postspectacle - Theaterhaus Mitte, Berlin

2010-08-27T04:39:00.000-07:00

Spectacle is at the core of our Capitalist operating system. Do a radical gesture and go Postspectacle in order to save yourself, the planet and your family! Leave the Empire, the Biopower and the Necropolitics behind..

today, 20.30, the first part of the Postspectacle Trilogy -

tomorrow, 20.30, the second part

Theaterhaus Mitte, Berlin

2010-07-20T17:04:00.000-07:00

"2012, ultima apocalipsa" luni 21 dec 2009, orele 20.00 live @OTV
de Ion Dumitrescu, Florin Flueras si Iuliana Stoianescu

De ce un performance la OTV (specialistii in senzational asa cum se auto-intituleaza)?

Oglinda TV – cel mai tulburator nume de televiziune.

OTV e singurul post tv constient de sine, singurul care declara direct directia si scopul. Te uiti in oglinda, cinismul este perfect, nu exista decat un singur scop: rating, cu orice pret, prin orice mijloace. Analogia cu sistemul politic in care traim este inevitabila. Crimele, ororile, vulgaritatea, profetiile si invitatii care livreaza toate aceste lucruri devin, in aceasta interpretare, produsul imaginatiei noastre. Reprezinta drogul de seara pe care ni-l auto-injectam, cu care adormim in canapea la televizor, ne adormim cu povestile virtuale fabricate in industria perceptiei predeterminate.

Oglinda TV, adica locul unde nu stii exact cine genereaza informatia, imaginarul colectiv al spectatorilor sau invitatii din emisiune sustinuti, intaratati sporadic de moderator?

Spectacolul trebuie sa fie constant, nu trebuie sa "cada", senzationalul trebuie asigurat permanent. O “periferie” a spatiului mediatic din mijlocul careia sa faci un statement critic despre televiziune si lumea reprezentarii. Sa te inserezi in spatiul fizic si virtual, OTV, care a livrat permanent o viziune unica, extrema, asupra realitatii inconjuratoare si a creat in acelasi timp o nisa pe care concurenta incearca acum sa o exploateze. O viziune care revine cu obstinatie in forma care ne displace cel mai mult si care reflecta frust ce propun de fapt “marile” trusturi media machiate cu milioane de euro. (din pacate OTV-ul a inceput si el aceasta cursa spre imbogatire si big media - de la apartament la studio de mii de metri)

Totusi exista consecventa la OTV, o atitudine “indie”, emisiuni imprevizibile care se fondeaza pe flexibilitate si improvizatie, de la profeti, ghicitori si parapsihologi la presedintele Romaniei. Poate capta si reda orice subiect/stire aproape instantaneu. OTV inglobeaza antinomiile si contrastele, nu exclude pe nimeni. Ai impresia ca observi un segment concentrat de povesti, istorii tragice, fantastice si erotice cu care telespectatorii se identifica, se privesc in oglinda. Asistam la fundamentul mediei actuale, la structura elementara, pe ce se bazeaza, din ce e constituita? Realitate sau fictiune, nu mai conteaza.

Military performance during "The Heavy Week", @CNDB

2010-07-17T03:00:00.000-07:00

Looking for the wonderful choreography, the synchronization of movements, the disciplined bodies. It has all the necessary elements of a dance piece, this performance would be a good exam for a student in the U.N.A.T.C. in the choreography section. At U.N.A.T.C. it would be called a good "orchestration" of movement (this is a specific request in the first and second year)

The Postspectacle Trilogy

2010-07-12T16:43:00.000-07:00

Is an ongoing process, within the postspectacle practice, continuously reformed and updated that have concluded in three performances: Come to see our performance, Neocatharsis and The Presidential Candidacy. The trilogy proposes three different perspectives and approaches over the changes that are taking place in the representational arts in particular and cultural practices in general. We will consider these transformations within the political status quo of our society. This is a period in which the artistic paradigms, the patterns of performing and even the way of living are changing almost too rapidly to be assimilated and reflected upon in a social-political-media-crisis context. The performance is always elsewhere, on TV, in politics, in sports, in agriculture, in charity, in religion, on youtube. What's going on in the theatre then, how should we define it?

The contemporary synchronization between the time of an event and its exhaustion in representation (through its image) changes the way we perceive memory and history narratives, thus there is no more stability, all ideological grounds have been compromised. Let's enjoy the collapse!

We need to go beyond the spectacle, but first let's dismantle it. Today, experience has a director, a conductor, a mediator that knows better the conditions of the spectacular dispositif. Propaganda is present as ever before it is just harder now to pin it down to one leader or source. The society of spectacle has reached its peak, its climax, and it seems we've gotten used to it. We just contribute or get hypnotized.

Another set of questions that is important to us: How do you recognize a radical artistic-al gesture/manifestation? What does it mean nowadays to be radical, and what is the point(l'enjeu) of it? What makes a dance piece contemporary art? What are the last borders between arts domains that deal with representation, if any are left?

First Part

come to see our performance
"Staging communication"

Media the new reality. Stronger and more credible, that produces information and consummates it almost simultaneously. The simulacrum wins over the one that it simulates and goes beyond, to "fascination" as Baudrillard would put it. The huge amount of information available every second now is dissolving the traditional meaning, leaving us in a catatonic state. Prearranged, predetermined way of perceiving. The mass media is the new organizer of perception after religion and ideology have been integrated.

We are interested to question the ways in which media evolution affects and transforms human consciousness and behavior: for instance the evolution from tv> internet sites> blogs> facebook> twitter is an evolution from a centralized, hierarchic, propaganda like model of dealing with information to a decentralized, anarchic and free one. from the focus on information to focus on relation between informations.

Youtube performances have captured the imagination of contemporary viewers, and today each one of the spectators is making his own show. This means also that this is the only solution to exit the passive condition of tv and theater spectator. Everyone has become and author, a potential one at least. No more the need for special talents, for discipline and disciplinary activities. Performance is everywhere, is at hand. Virtuosity, as esthetic goal, has no more weight in the process of elaborating a work.

Our intention is to investigate the relations between presence and image, experience and representation with a concern for the modality in which media is framing the perception of reality and is structuring the entire psychological construction (thinking, values, decisions, emotions, language).
We will make use of the "amateur" aesthetics, the Youtube culture of self made performances, minimal means and awareness of context as never seen before at a global human consciousness level.

Second Part
neocatharsis
"Disorganizing perception"

The representation operates in a manipulative way - it sends you from the experience to the translation and interpretation of the experience. We are interested to question and maybe to annihilate the mechanism of representation. We try in a way to search for new ways of producing the same old catharsis, but this time as an emotional experience that in the end you cannot fully trust, or it makes you wonder, once you saw the laboratory of represented emotions. To mix all kind of aesthetics almost randomly in order to make them somehow even and unimportant as content, to focus on their shape, on the image that they produce whether is dance, acting, religion rituals and preaching, conference/lecture situations, tv debates or political speeches.

Other techniques or strategies would be constant awareness of the context, self-referentiality - show or performance that in the same time is a comment to itself - eluding the final message or goal of a traditional performance. It remains in the interrogation and alterable state, in an imposed ambiguous "material" that leaves the impression of an unworked, unrehearsed piece that doesn't formalize itself in anyway.How social classes are represented in the performances, movies and media? How different types of characters are to be found on screen or stage and their extended analogies: robbers/vagrants/vandals/protesters, bankers/serious men/family/god, thinkers/serious/abstract/not practical/easy to defy, artists/anarchy/a few/not understandable, army/obeying/discipline/protection.

Constant manipulation through representation, we will use the same methods and go beyond. A combination performance tactics that are not rationable controllable and have no end(purpose) to the manipulation. The manipulation that we try to produce will attempt to reveal the instrument, deconstruct it, but not use it. Even though the medium is the meaning.

Third part

the presidential candidacy

"leaving the theatre"

The presidential candidacy is real, an authentic political campaign but with a performative attitude. How to get out of the art frames? How to step into a different, in between, artistic practice that juxtaposes art and activism, critical to both of these activities. The candidate is focusing on the exposure of ideology. The political arena is the vital one, and it is the most manipulative spectacle, the most dangerous. Constant awareness of the performing ingredients of a campaign rally, examining the set-up (la mise en scene), using the same tools. The politicians have improved their performing skills, we have to improve our political practice, to parasitize the system by emulating and exposing it in the same time. We need to bring spectacles from "outside" into the theatre and go to the "exterior" (bigger scene) with our "theatre" practice.

The Presidential Candidacy proposes an analysis of the power of the spectacle and the spectacle of power.

Ion Dumitrescu and Florin Flueras

The Romanian Presidential Candidacy in Vienna

2010-06-25T05:19:00.000-07:00

The Candidate speaks to the Vienna people.

The Romanian president Basescu said that everywhere in Europe you can see the gypsis begging in the front of museums but not inside to admire art, is not longer the case, the Candidate took them inside..

Transnational protest - What is the point to protest in your country if the politics are made elswhere?
The Candidate protests for the 25% cuts in the romanians fees in front of the Vienna Parliament on his way to the IMF quarters.

Military workshop with dancers during "The Heavy Week", @CNDB

2010-06-16T15:10:00.000-07:00

The disciplined body, the good training, the premises for a good dancer.

Getting used to power, army protection

2010-06-08T07:56:00.000-07:00

the precariat spectacle

2010-05-30T09:42:00.000-07:00

First Greece, now Romania.. follow the crisis as it gets closer.
The presidential candidate of Romania invites you to the biggest show in town, the spectacle of the angry precariat taking over the parliament in Bucharest. Streets protests and a general strike will start from monday 31st of May. Follow the live broadcast, reports, speeches and debates on PAF-radio.
You can follow the live stream on the blog:
http://blog.paf-radio.net/ or download the podcast: http://paf-radio.net/

Or if you are in Bucharest look for us in the human chain around the parliament, we'll be there.Radio broadcast starts at 13h BUCHAREST TIME / 12h PARIS TIME.

the candidate speech in the romanian dance history shop

2010-05-30T09:22:00.000-07:00

in general our ways of thinking and functioning are very much influenced by the culture, tradition, education and everything that comes from the past. the tendency is to let history answer the problems.. to search for models,values, norms and principles in history, all based on the past..

we cannot allow this anymore.. this model (pattern) works perfectly only in a stable, secured situation in which there are not so many fundamental changes. in a situation in which the grandparents and the nephews share the same world.. there the solutions from a generation can be applied easily to the next generation. in this kind of contexts it was the job of all the religions, cultural and artistic institutions to pass the values, beliefs - the cultural frame, the operating system from a generation to the next.

now we are living something completely different.. something fundamentally new happens, a fundamental transformation occurs.. even if you look at the statistics, almost all the parameters that shape our world are changing in an exponential pace. we are in an exponential accelerating transformation process. so in this case the old pattern of transfering knowledge, values, attitudes and behaviors can be actually the biggest problem, not the solution.. because it stops adaptation and evolution..

the problems that we are confronted with are radical, fundamental and the answers are weak, unaware or with bad intentions. how bifo said - only a mad doctor will propose the problem as treatment, but the mad doctor hapens to be at white house.. so the general frame about the crisis and solutions of crisis is set from the top of the hierarchy. the power try to save itself at the expenses of the periphery.. banks and corporations at expense of the ordinary slaves, the old empires or colonial forces at expense of second and third world.. the capital at the expense of precariat. externalisation or a better term gived by marina grizinic - necropolitics. there is a good point in all this - at least the differentiation between the chosen ones and precariat will be more visible, the true intentions will be manifested..

we are living an apocalypse because everything that we know in an increasing pace will not work anymore, the institutions, the ideologies, the policies are becoming obsolete.. how franco biffo put it - we just entered a catastrophic morphogenesiss.

our subjectivity is constructed and consolidated in the ideology, especially by a neoliberal frame of mind, how marina griznici put it, the reality and capitalism coincide.. the terms biopower, cognitive capitalism, discipline society, society of spectacle, society of control, arbitrary power or the concept of the Empire of Negri and Hardi are trying to catch this new manifestations of power that are so diffuse and are operating freely at the base of our individuality. the power becomes more perverse, more ubiquitous and probably impossible to stop. our core structures are corrupted and the instance of control becomes an interiorised authority.

the human as a construction of history, of the past, lives his agonizing apocalypse.. it is crucial to have the force to see this as a positive fact. the "human" values, beliefs are the cause of the crises.. we have to go further, to surpass the human condition. a radical, basic reconfiguration is needed anyway.. how zizek put it - to accept the apocalypse first and after to see what can be done..

there is not a saving ideology, the problem is overwhelming, we don't know what to do but we know that we have to move on, to change radically. let's start by being aware without having a masterplan, avoiding the corrupted solutions from old ideologies that pop up everywhere. let's see where we arrive, to not be afraid of testing, of risking our obsolete human nature. if you manage to produce a mutation you create possibilities for others too.. there is nothing to hold on to.. we have to produce disidentification when it is still possible.. if it is still possible and we are not completely submitted already.. let's urgently start to create new subjectivities to go posthuman.
so give up hope and enjoy the collapse!

The power of the spectacle and the spectacle of power

2010-05-25T06:47:00.000-07:00

The romanian presidential candidate comes to Vienna, Austria. All raise! 15th of june 2010

http://tqw.at/en/program?date=15.6.2010

The Ark - Bursa Marfurilor

2010-02-28T09:06:00.000-08:00

THE ARK – BURSA MARFURILOR sau care este potopul care ameninta acesta noua arca din cartierul Rahova?

Am luat bilete, suntem la bord, dar ceva nu imi da pace. Cred ca nu e nici o indoiala de ce locatia The Ark este o arca “dinamica, moderna, flexibila si neconventionala”. Insa The Ark se supune unor conventii biblice clare. Prima arca este arca lui Noe, singurul mare investitor si manager antediluvian care a supravietuit potopului universal economic in conformitate cu Biblia supravietuitorilor.
In Biblie ni se spune ca Noe a supravietuit impreuna cu familia lui, carand cu el exemplare din animale alese, un numar selectat de fiinte pure si nepatate alaturi de un numar redus de animale impure care au fost stranse laolata la bordul aceluiasi yacht transatlantic. Practic acesta a fost planul divin de repopulare a unui pamant inundat si curatzit de toate mizeriile si scursurile unei umanitati decazute si depravate chiar imediat dupa creatie.

In articolul sau despre “Floating Utopias”, China Mieville vorbeste despre esecul noilor constructii uriase independente, al insulelor plutitoare si exclusiviste, al paradisurilor fiscale esuate in mintea libertarienilor microutopici. The Ark este diferit dar inrudit cu aceste utopii plutitoare ale capitalismului imbunatatit si remediat. Departe de a fi o realitate SF-ista, repet nu este vorba de planeta Uranus, ci de o locatie aflata langa Piata de Flori, in inima cartierului Bucurestean Rahova. Ca sa fiu transant, arca adaposteste festivaluri de muzica electronica, defilari de moda, targuri de specialitati culinare regionale, expozitii de arta contemporana si un public venit de departe, selectat cu grija si urcat direct la bord.Potopul este insa tinut in afara usilor de sticla si a paznicilor de la intrare. Este potopul celor potopiti deja de santiere in lucru, mall-uri in constructie, si priviti cu condescendenta de la bordul unor insulite urbane paradisiace planificate cu multa grija si atentie. Masurile arcei au fost subiect de discutie constant intre naturalisti critici si literalisti biblici. Arca biblica este si ea o investitie facuta ca la carte, asa ca Dumnezeu ii da masuri exacte lui Noe ca sa poata incape numai atata cat e nevoie sa incapa. Restul pot sa stea pe margine sa manance seminte, sa vanda flori si sa joace fotbal in fata cabinelor cu paznici.

Curios lucru cum defapt arca e amenintata direct de cei pe care ar trebui sa ii salveze, si care parca ii ameninta prin existenta lor pe primii si singurii salvati la bordul ei. Cei care nu mai au casa, sau care incet, incet pierd teren in fata planurilor restrictive de salvare din jur, nu sunt deloc pasagerii obisnuiti ai arcei sau nici macar bursierii bursei de marfuri culturale.Arca The Ark se vrea un model ideal de regenerare urbana Bucuresteana. Asistam insa la bordul ei la regenerarea proprietatii private tabacite si al capitalismului senescent cuibarit in subsoluri betonate si spatioase si prin lifturi cu coduri de access restrictionat.

The Ark este primul loc unde poti sa fi sigur ca totul este marfa creativa si ca defapt creativitatea este marfa pur si simplu. Din pacate nu imi dau seama daca e vorba de un kunsthalle camuflat in club, sau mall cultural camuflat in kunsthalle, sau fatada mall-ului de vizavi oglindit in fatada The Ark, sau daca mall-ul din fata e oglindirea lui The Ark. Astea sunt detalii scolastice care isi gasesc loc doar intr-o viziune care trebuie sa potriveasca locul cu publicul potrivit, si pasagerii cu arca conceputa pentru divertismentul lor neingradit. Pasageri desigur feriti la interior de saracie si de lipsa de creativitate si inovatie care potopeste pe afara prin cartier.

Numai daca ai bilet la bord, si daca poti sa iesi la suprafata ori de cate ori ti se scufunda planurile de regenerare urbana, numai atunci poti sa visezi la bordul yachtului cultural de lux care navigheaza sprinten prin dezastrul economic de afara. Cei care nu au loc la bord sunt tinuti pe niste plute de case si locuinte amenintate si suflate de vant ca niste adevarati “boat people” de pe alte mari si oceane – fie ei haitieni, afgani, cambogieni, indonezieni si alti refugiati mondiali. Bucurestiul are deja aproape toate caracteristicile incintei din Fortareta Europa, inclusiv tendinta de a impinge incet incet locuitorii nedoriti inafara marilor arce care se construiesc chiar in mijlocul comunitatilor sortite potopului.

Dr. Stefan Tiron - consilier si ideolog al Candidatului la Presedintie

cultural activism and subversive actions

2010-02-14T06:31:00.000-08:00

(excerpts from Do It Yourself A Handbook for Changing our World)

Clowning is dangerous because it subverts the protocols of war and policing; where ‘good’ protesters are supposed to obey authority and ‘bad’ protesters are supposed to resist with violence. (...) I still think it’s kind of funny that the state is threatened by clowns.

...

A group known as Fanclub went out shopping. They bought things and then returned them repeatedly, over and over, monopolising the queue, holding shops to ransom with their own logic.

...

the Church of the Immaculate Consumption encourages believers to worship the product rather than buy it. As most people in late capitalist societies understand, consumerism is no longer about getting what you need to survive but about reaching godliness, personal fulfilment, through the purchase of lifestyle. Most people in these societies also understand the iconography of the Christian religion, believers or not. The Church of the Immaculate Consumption in large cathedrals of consumption (otherwise known as shopping centres) started as small groups quietly getting down on their knees and asking for salvation and fulfilment from the product.

...

In early 2003, a group gathered around some frozen chickens and prayed, ‘Asda, thank you for these lovely, lovely, fresh, white chickens at cheap, cheap prices.’

...

Picture This: Rethinking Space. Having the chance to redesign the city where you live, waking up in the morning and changing the names of streets and squares, to imagine bizarre monuments and then the next day see them become real; it’s the dream of every citizen, it’s Nike Ground! This revolutionary project is transforming and updating your urban space. Nike is introducing its legendary brand into squares, streets, parks and boulevards: Nikesquare, Nikestreet, Piazzanike, Plazanike or Nikestrasse will appear in major capitals over the coming years.

Nike, without any consultation of the public, announced that the historic square, Karlsplatz, right in the heart of historic Vienna, was to be renamed Nikeplatz. Nike’s famous ‘Swoosh’ logo would become a giant monument to the corporation and this historic occasion. To mark the event, Nike would open an exhibition centre in Karlsplatz promoting the virtues of having a big name brand as the focus of the city centre. A launch event invited locals to come and learn about Nike’s plans, with freebies and Nike beauties extolling the brand’s virtues. A new trainer was even launched to commemorate the rebranding of the square. The press were notified and, of course, flocked to cover the story.

This would have been an activist nightmare had it been real. It was actually a brilliant prank pulled by the Italian duo known as 0100101110101101. The group had secured permission from the Viennese authorities to install their exhibition by the roadside in Karlsplatz, and the towering Nike ‘Info Box’ looked 100 per cent authentic. Combined with a website, www.nikeground.com, and a few slick press releases, the group had secured an outpouring of hate, shock, disdain and maybe even love, towards Nike for suggesting such an idea.

...

In November of 2004, almost 20 years after the accident, a representative of Dow Chemicals finally got around to apologising on BBC World News. Jude Finisterra said sorry for doing nothing for so long and announced that Dow would pay $12 billion compensation to the victims and remediation of the site and waters of Bhopal, the exact amount that Dow had paid for buying Union Carbide. They also stated that they would push for the extradition of Warren Anderson to India, after he had fled to the US following his arrest 20 years ago. Within minutes, the news of Dow’s policy shift became a major news story. On the German stock exchange Dow Chemicals’ value plummeted, losing the company $2 billion.

Six months earlier another Dow representative, Erastus Hamm, had spoken at a banking conference in London. During his presentation he spoke about a new Dow industry standard known as ‘Acceptable Risk’. This is a statistical equation to determine how many deaths are acceptable in the pursuit of large profits.

...

As you have probably guessed by now, both Acceptable Risk and the apology turned out to be the work of the Yes Men who had impersonated their representatives in the guise of Mr Finisterra and Mr Hamm. Unsurprisingly, Dow Chemicals were not best pleased when it was revealed that a group of pranksters had not only been able to speak on their behalf, but dramatically rocked their share price, and gone on to paint them as a company that doesn’t see any problems in profiting from killing people.

Excerpts from Jonathan Crary "Spectacle, Attention, Counter-Memory"

2010-02-04T02:03:00.000-08:00

The spectacle as a new kind of power of recuperation and absorption, a capacity to neutralize and assimilate acts of resistance by converting them into objects or images of consumption.
....
According to the Nazi director of broadcasting, writing in 1935, the "sacred mission" of television was "to plant indelibly the image of the Fiihrer in the hearts of the German people."
...
Debord outlined two different models of the spectacle; one he called "concentrated" and the other "diffused," preventing the word spectacle from simply being synonymous with consumer or late capitalism. Concentrated spectacle was what characterized Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia, and Maoist China; the preeminent model of diffused spectacle was the United States: "Wherever the concentrated spectacle rules so does the police . . . it is accompanied by permanent violence. The imposed image of the good envelops in its spectacle the totality of what officially exists and is usually concentrated in one man who is the guarantee of totalitarian cohesion. Everyone must magically identify with this absolute celebrity — or disappear." The diffuse spectacle, on the other hand, accompanies the abundance of commodities. And certainly it is this model to which Debord gives most of his attention in his 1967 book.
...
But in 1988 Debord sees his two original models of diffused and concentrated spectacle becoming indistinct, converging into what he calls "the integrated society of the spectacle." In this deeply pessimistic book, he describes a more sophisticated deployment of elements from those earlier models, a flexible arrangement of global power adaptable to local needs and circumstances. In 1967 there were still marginalities and peripheries that escaped its reign: today, he insists, the spectacle has irradiated into everything and has absolute control over production, over perception, and especially over the shape of the future and the past.
...
Are we still in the midst of a society that is organized as appearance? Or have we entered a nonspectacular global system arranged primarily around the control and flow of information, a system whose management and regulation of attention would demand wholly new forms of resistance and memory?

the end of propaganda = the end of the world as we know it

2010-01-23T04:50:00.000-08:00

draft text for tonight debate (20.00 CNDB)

media-politics parallel evolution:
-TV in the beginning - big names, broadcasting, propaganda -one channel. ideal for totalitarian regimes.
-more tv channels and sites - very territorialised, corporate based, unidirectional, individualistic approach, somebody speaks in your name - representative democracy;
-blog - more open more independent, still individual and unidirectional, property, territory;
-facebook - close comunities based especially on real life meetings, not based on content but on a kind of tribal instinct;
-twitter - total open, based on sharing, we are all providers of content, part of a bigger thing, is ethical and nice to contribute. anarchy.

propaganda - the base of our way of life, the political systems strongly based on it.. twitter - the best instrument to kill propaganda.. the possibility to dissolute the propaganda constructed frame of thinking (operating system).. from channeled propaganda model to very free one, everyone is a publisher, an author.. internet in real time now, direct not mediate any more.. changing the governance and the hierarchical functioning of information.. a shift of focus from an individualist centred attitude towards network, relation.. is a new paradigm for communication, instrument that will radically change the brain (how the books, cinema and tv did it before).. humans like cells for a bigger collective consciousness.. questioning the functioning of society - a lot of institutions or business models have to change completely or to disappear (schools, papers, tv, government).. every one is a writer, an artist.. is ethical to share not to keep private.. people meet online and action - they decide to go together in one place and start something based on their common interests, courses on twitter, experiments (al to write about a same issue in a same day).. a tool for direct democracy.

draft text for tonight speech (my presidential candidacy)

2010-01-21T02:58:00.000-08:00

contemporary art wants to be political, but i often find that actually plays safe, all remains inside the bubble.. our intention is to go further, we take a risk and we are going on the bigger scene.. somebody have to do it.. we are anyway aware that, as is written in the constitution, the president represent the state, is just a representation of something much bigger and much darker.. but we are interested in the public appearances of a candidate in the media and important debates.. every candidate to presidency works as a performer, operates as a performer and everything is spectacle anyway.. but is so conventional, so old school, trapped in representation.. they pretend that the illusion, the representation continues to work as usual.. they continue to play the old school spectacle of power.. is time that a contemporary approach of performing to enter the big scene.. now starts the last revolution.. not by taking the power but by dissolving the power..

we are coming to cut the spectacle of power!

a radical solution is needed
looks like the exponential growth is the law for almost all the parameters (climate changes, population growth, debt, species extinctions, energy costs, etc).. the system seems to be close to a limit.. the world is in an accelerating change and they react just by changing the puppet.. they don't change anything, that's why they come to the power to preserve the system.. obama just reinforced the system. printing more money for the banks.. soon we will hit the wall.. follow the money if you want to predict the policy of the president, who supports the campaign..

awareness is the main word:
we feed the all this
you vote when you buy products.. you support some corporations to grow.. and this corporations will made the policies.. and of course the same corporations will control the mass media.. be aware that being in UE we are part of a huge imperial structure that together with US exploits the rest of the world.. be aware that european quality of life is directly linked with the suffering in africa, asia, south america.. we support the imperialistic wars.. everything is connected.. nobody is innocent.. to start to understand deeper the consequences of our actions we need a postnational - the problems of romania are the problems of a global system.. the national or racial separation is the source of conflict.. see the big picture!

the system (propaganda) feed us..
the world, the actual system is sustained by propaganda, (parents, school, mass media).. the models of behaviours, values and beliefs of actual human being are pointed to be the basis of a very complex crisis.. there are unquestioned assumptions reinforced everyday by mass-media.. mass-media and the schools - the main tools for propagating the uncritical thinking.. they provide the collective frame for reading the reality.. even if you don't read newspapers and dont watch tv somebody is doing this for you (your friends, your parents, your colleagues) and the operating systems, the frame come to you.. to be aware that by keeping our operating system we feed the near apocalypse..

change your operating system
stop watching TV, stop reading the newspapers.. use the new media (like twitter)- till now the best implementation for breaking the propaganda paradigm.. personalise your information and be active, have a point of view, dont let the reality in them hands.. lets kill our inner TV, the internalised authority propaganda installed in each of us.. from uniformity to superdiversity..
the end of the propaganda = the end of the world, as we know it.

some practical proposals:
slowly dissolving the institutions.. state is the problem, it functions as a violent, hierarchical and authoritarian structure of oppression.. everything should go smooth. actually is nothing to do in this direction, everything will come down by default if you allow the things to happen.. there is this disintegration of the institutions tendency, they are becoming obsolete.
no political party - there is a strong drive that the political parties to function like oligarchic interest groups, similar with mafia groups. is no need for this hierarchical structure, just independent candidates..
the main education porpose to be the opposite of what now usually hapens - instead of forming to unforming, instead of disciplinate to undisciplinate, instead of listen to the authority to question, critical thinking is the focus - dont trust your teacher..
to abolish the TV and radio tax - and to support the freedom of internet..

now all together - "i represent the romanian state"

the heavy week (saptamana grea)

2010-01-14T14:43:00.000-08:00

21 - 31 january at The National Dance Centre in Bucharest

We propose an extremely fresh perspective towards the rapid transformation of the perception of information related to the development of the social media. Thus, we will speak about the slow disintegration of propaganda as we know it. The end , or rather a radical update to the "society of spectacle". We have acknowledged the fading into oblivion of the old media and the one way transmission of information and we want to declare it in a performative way.

We will invite and expose the spectacles from "outside" in the theatre, we will deal with ideology and fiction, time acceleration, image exhaustion.

We ambitiously propose to test the limits of the traditional theatre conventions, hardcore.

Highlights:

- the announcement of the presidential candidacy of Florin Flueras

- military workshop with dancers, held by an instructor from the romanian army

- military demonstration with weapon

- debate on the future of television with Dan Diaconescu (president and main moderator of the OTV television in Romania)

- apiculture or the end of nature, lecture-performance

- the postspectacle trilogy (scroll further down in the blog for details)

- 24 hour theatre performance

- alpine show, performance at its peak

2010-01-11T06:38:00.000-08:00

some quotations about post-aesthetic art:
the end of the retinal art and the advent of transformative procedures. /elie during
dematerialization and de-aestheticization - art practice is no longer geared towards objects, but towards "investigations" of critical and conceptual nature (..) the question is not: what is art, but: when is art. /sven-olov wallenstein
duchamp change the nature of art from a question of morphology to a question of function. (..)
aesthetics are conceptually irrelevant to art. /joseph kosuth

2010-01-10T03:24:00.000-08:00

The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.

extract from Propaganda by Edward Bernays, 1928

2010-01-10T02:20:00.000-08:00

Spectacol alpin - introducere

extras din Almanahul Turistic, 1968

2010-01-09T13:01:00.000-08:00

2009-12-20T11:37:00.000-08:00

21.12.2009 performance TV la OTV
simti ca timpul se accelereaza, ca tot ce ai invatat si tot ce stii devine tot mai rapid inadecvat, ca tot ce acum un an inca era valabil acum nu mai e - valorile, credintele, reperele, modalitatile de gandire si de actiune nu mai functioneaza. Lucrurile se schimba cu o viteza din ce in ce mai mare.. unde duc toate astea, spre ce ne indreptam?

constientul si inconstientul colectiv al planetei au un raspuns - 2012... indiferent daca apocalipsa va veni sau nu, fenomenul 2012 exista.. au mai ramas 3 ani pana in ultima zi, ultima ora, ultimul minut, ultima secunda.. nu-ti fie frica!! deschide televizorul daca nu vrei sa ramai pe dinafara..

2009-12-17T18:45:00.000-08:00

“Saptamana grea” la Centrul National al Dansului, Bucuresti

21 – 31 ianurie 2010

Unde e spectacolul?

O saptamana de manifestari, dezbateri, spectacole care interogheaza pozitia coregrafului si creatorului de spectacol in societatea contemporana. Raportul inevitabil pe care teatrul (conventia "scena - public", teatron – loc unde privesti) il are cu spectaculozitatea vietii cotidiene asigurata de modul in care informatia este livrata de media traditionala si internet (new media). Cum iesim, sau cum am iesit, din conditia de spectatori pasivi? Ce inseamna “realitate” azi in paralel cu retelele sociale care simuleaza perfect mecanismele si perceptia realitatii? Internetul devine un competitor inexpugnabil in cursa pentru centrul atentiei, ajunge sa fie o noua scena in care ne “jucam” identitatea virtuala.

Evenimentele nu se mai istoricizeaza, nu se mai inscriu intr-o constiinta colectiva in mod traditional, aproape nimic nu mai lasa urme pentru ca este urmat de alte mii de informatii si evenimente. Informatia noua disloca informatia anterioara, nu o urmeaza. Inregistram imagini cu noi si le consumam in acelasi timp. O schimbare, o transformare a societatii spectacolului pe care cu greu o putem evalua, spectatorii devin activi, isi manevreaza in solitudine instrumentele de comunicare in masa. Consencintele social-politice si antropologice ale acestor mutatii in perceptie devin sesizabile dar nu neaparat inteligibile. Suportul/mediul pe care il folosim pentru a ajunge la informatie schimba informatia in sine. Azi, poate singurul criteriu ramas care decide gradul de civilizatie al unei tari sau continent este accesul la internet.

Reprezentarea ramane spatiul predilect de afirmare al ideologiei si al standardului de identitate social-culturala propus de o societate.

Nimic nu a ramas “ne-performat”, pe langa traditionalii “producatori de realitate”(televiziunile, ziarele), astazi viata este inregistrata si livrata in "public", adica in comunitatile virtuale din care facem parte. Toate aparitiile in spatiul public sunt regizate. Toate campaniile politice, de razboi sau caritabile, manifestarile autoritatii (statului) si ale corporatiilor - mediate sau nu – protestele “Greenpeace” etc., folosesc “regie”/strategie, “dramaturgie”/propaganda, “scenografie”/cort electoral,“actorie”/candidati/generali/activisti.

Cum recunosti un gest artistic radical? Ce inseamna radicalism in arta si la ce mai foloseste el? Cum se integreaza dansul in arta contemporana? Please, not another spectacle.

2009-12-17T18:33:00.000-08:00

Media the new reality. Can we become perception hackers? We will try at least, at OTV station. december 21 2009, three years before "the end"

2009-07-09T07:05:00.000-07:00

“In the unimaginable and ordinary case of their copresence, an object and its picture, contending for the center of the spectatorial arena, induce, out of mutual rejection, an oscillation of attention whose momentary frequency is the implicit cantus firmus of our thought. If we understand but poorly our own notion of likeness between paired entities, we understand even less the manner in which entities are like, or unlike, or may come to be like, or unlike, themselves”.  
Hollis Frampton

2009-04-28T08:40:00.000-07:00

tv mode

In sistemul de reprezentare media creierul trece pe tv mode, intra intr-un fel de stand-by similar cu efectul unui drog psihedelic "designed". Nu mai e nevoie sa iti folosesti imaginatia, creativitatea, ci consumi “prefabricate” cu sensuri si emotii explicite, clisee de umanitate. O lume virtuala si fictionala in care oamenii nu mai trebuie efectiv sa ajunga pe alte planete(de exemplu) pentru ca poti construi imaginile si emotiile respective cu o fidelitate incredibila. Nu mai avem nevoie de experienta in sensul fenomenologic. Putem trai intr-o reverie mediatica, ca atunci cand adormi in fata televizorului, nu mai trebie sa-ti creezi povesti ci ele iti sunt livrate, nu mai trebuie sa te adormi ci esti adormit de televizor. Are rol terapeutic intr-o lume care incearca sa depolitizeze permanent evenimentele actuale si sa te distraga de la probleme care ar putea fi relevante pentru modul de viata carent propus de sistemul social contemporan.

Totusi, sub efectul "drogurilor" psihedelice cunoscute(lsd, ciuperci psilocibe etc.)creativitatea este stimulata la nivel individual si perceptia asupra lumii se altereaza imprevizibil. Nu descoperi de fiecare data aceeasi lume.

2009-04-28T08:16:00.000-07:00

"There is no nature" - Slavoj Zizek

In ziua de azi daca ramai in afara lumii media si a internetului(lumea virtuala) te izolezi. A te retrage "in natura" sau a reveni la "natura" nemediata inseamna sa te "deconectezi" de realitate. Expresia "a fi conectat la realitate" capata in sfarsit sens. Ascetismul informational contemporan poate fi atins intr-o luna de pauza de imagini. Informatia azi este produsa si receptata/consumata in acelasi timp, simultan, la o scara globala. Evenimentele se succed cu o rapiditate care face aproape imposibila deslusirea intelesului lor. Astfel apare non-evenimentul, emanatia predilecta a lumii virtuale de azi, progenitura presei si a internetului.

"Astazi daca are loc un accident, un incendiu, o inundatie etc. televiziunile ajung inaintea salvarilor" Jean Baudrillard

2009-04-28T06:50:00.000-07:00

Whether you think that concert halls, theaters, and art galleries are the natural places to present music, performances, and objects, or find these places mummifying, preferring streets, homes, and railway stations, or do not find it useful to distinguish between these two aspects of the world theater, there is someone associated with Fluxus who agrees with you. Artist, anti-artists, non-artists, anartists, the politically committed and the apolitical, poets of non-poetry, non-dancers dancing, doers, undoers, and non-doers, Fluxus encompasses opposites. Consider opposing it, supporting it, ignoring it, changing your mind.

George brecht. 1964