The number five in the artistic usage of Artpool is connected most of all to number four; in the same way as number four was earlier connected with three; number three with two; number two with one; and number one with zero (the omniscient void).
Number one is the possible impossible; void is the impossible, where the possibly existent (the unthinkable things) can be found in great numbers.
The span of human attention is limited; one considers all the existent, that one does not take into consideration, non-existent - a void. Although in this void, there is an unthinkably greater number of components that are capable of organising themselves in organic self-constructing systems, as opposed to that limited existent that one is able to grasp.
As soon as its concocted relationships have vanished, the existent that was declared possible falls into the void, disintegrates into its constituents and becomes reusable.
The telematic worldviews of art forms re-creating human cultures, come forth from the void. Culture as network existence may be verified through the eternal desire for discourse, with its continuous re-creation demanding attention and discipline - up to the point where change is recognised. Recognition is the moment of freedom. Cultural freedom is existence in the networking life; it is the competence of dialogue, the program of creative states of all types, in which even the most remote things are able to assemble themselves within the space of maintained attention. To put it more simply, in the void, things tell you what should be done.
“Art” (the all-art), when it began to exist from the void, functioned as an act related to coming to know and endure existence, as a magical tool against evil forces. Subsequently, this “all-art” turned into culture, religion, politics, and science, in order to develop further and/or deteriorate.
In the information society, a dialectic balance between development and deterioration is made possible by the program of telematic art’s evolution, by the re-creative retrieval of the magical function of art.
“[...] The difference between the old and the new magic may be grasped as follows: pre-historic magic is the ritualisation of models termed “myths”, whereas contemporary magic is the ritualisation of models termed “programs”. Myth is a model that is orally transmitted, with its author – a “god” resting outside the communication process. As opposed to this, a program is a model that is transmitted in writing, with its author – the “functionary” – being in the communication process. (Vilém Flusser)
ART REGAINED – THE WAYS OF RE-CREATION
(Four exhibitions at Artpool P60)
Absorbed into everyday usage, art has become secondary. The endeavour to incorporate it again into the primary sphere of art is what provides a common element in the works of the four artists presented here, despite their dissimilar motivations and cultures. At first glimpse, their works (their working processes) are typically suggestive of a consumer society attitude (c.f., Pop Art, Fluxus, etc.). Actually, however, they transcend this attitude, exposing a new form of behaviour: that of the “functionary” of information society, who does not perform what the “apparatus” allows for, but changes the program instead, by which s/he creates (brings about) new information in the form of images.
The four exhibitions have largely come together by mere chance, and to a lesser extent were they consciously planned.
The story of chance events
Ryosuke Cohen (Japan) visited Artpool in early August 2004; his “Fractal Portraits Project” documents, which he made at the location, were very soon presented - at our autumn exhibition entitled “Telematic Society: Art in the Fourth Dimension”. By mailing the participants of his project the pictures that he had begun to create in Hungary and finished after his return home, Cohen launched a process to culminate into this exhibition ensemble . As soon as the first pieces that he had made at Artpool arrived, I had the idea of the exhibition in mind; thus, I asked each Hungarian participant of his project whether they had received their assigned pieces and if they would loan the artworks made of/with them. I decided to only have the exhibition with the consent of each participant. Hence the next chance event: everybody agreed.
Two further chance events:
We have received a CD-ROM with images and sound material, as well as two artists' books from György Bp. Szabó, who lives in Los Angeles, and have become almost entirely forgotten here. The consignment proved to be a complete material for an exhibition: lots of information in a tiny virtual space, packed and unpacked and adapted to a real space - demonstrating the relationship between the apparatus and the functionary. Anything is possible: tiny, worn out objects - which György calls his emblems - projected in a cinematic manner, the music consisting of the voices of people conversing about the objects made by means of a noise-making software. It reveals a perplexing possibility, belonging to the ways of re-creation.
An invitation to an exhibition of works by a young artist I did not know yet, Zsolt Gyarmati, invited me to the Műcsarnok/Kunsthalle, an exhibition venue in Budapest that I am usually reluctant to visit, since I usually cannot sleep afterwards. This invitation card, however, with its disrespectful treatment of the usual aesthetic value systems, incited me to meet the artist. So we met, and he immediately agreed to my exhibition plan. Then we started an e-mail correspondence and met, at this time at Artpool. Soon after, I visited his studio where we discussed that he was completely free (or responsible) to select the material for the exhibition, as well as to mount his show, since he was the most competent in this regard.
When one tries to find antecedents to Zsolt Gyarmati's method of image construction and installation, there are only archaic examples to refer to: Endre Tót's street actions , Sándor Altorjai's photo installations, or certain paintings by Miklós Erdély. While designing the web pages, both of us discovered a point of commonality in the works of György Galántai (i.e., myself), in the simultaneity of meanings, multiplication, and re-utilisation. I believe, however, that it is very important to remark that these previously unfamiliar links, along the possible references to the relationships among the exhibiting artists, are not bound by any causality. These connections emerged from the void. Surprisingly enough, however, there is hardly any kinship to be found with those antecedents that have already been referred to, such as Manga, or the eyes. At the same time, one is able to observe the most interesting and important, extremely rare phenomenon, the identity of the age, the place, and the artist; in other words, the ideal appearance of artistic autonomy, since Zsolt Gyarmati has created autonomous art of a wide spectre, one that establishes good connections, and that can be valued both globally and locally. This may account for my attention and relentless pursuit to perform a cultural task I have created for myself: striving to understand Zsolt Gyarmati's ideas to the best of my abilities, to interpret and integrate them into the exhibition project, by utilising the internet-based opportunities given at Artpool.
The fourth artist, Mike Bidner, the forgotten one to whom we owe a lot since 1989 (as Galántai-Artpool) for his global collection of artists' stamps he had bequeathed to us. The chance element connected to Bidner within this story is the fact that his name just came to my mind as I was contemplating on the other three artists; they “invited” him to be the fourth artist. Thus, the exhibition title has been inspired by him, since Bidner always fabricated his artists' stamps from newspaper cut-outs as if he wished to regain the wild nature for his cultivated plants.