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- Life ‘After’ the Pandemic: Ethiopia’s Response to COVID-19’s Paradoxical Effect | WCSCD
< Back Life ‘After’ the Pandemic: Ethiopia’s Response to COVID-19’s Paradoxical Effect 15 June 2021 Naol Befkadu It is a conspicuous fact that the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in worldwide lockdowns. But before COVID-19 caused forced lockdowns, Ethiopia was already in a fragile economic state. Moreover, beneath its shaky economic state, the country was fracturing along ethnic and political lines. COVID-19 was not just bad news for the country, it was more like a typhoon or a thunderstorm fast destroying an already fractured building. Both as an ordinary Ethiopian and a medical professional, looking back at the effects of the pandemic on the country, I am left with conflicting views. One is that the supposedly coming typhoon did not happen as was expected, medically speaking, at least as compared to the West and now, the East. Intense restrictions did not last more than six months. Schools opened and government employees returned to their normal work schedules sooner than many nations. Ethiopians started talking about the lockdown as ‘during COVID-19’ and the current time as ‘after covid’ as in, a post-covid era. I work in Tikur Anbessa Specialized Hospital, the largest hospital in the country, which returned to its full function long before vaccines arrived in Ethiopia. Just after the pandemic began, our wards were evacuated and we were told to treat patients via telemedicine. Our medical school, which is by far the largest medical school in the country in terms of both staff and students, was closed two weeks after the onset of the pandemic in the country. We expected nothing less than a plague. Fear and anxiety surfaced within the hospital leadership and our senior physicians. Well, this too didn’t last more than six months—from April to August 2020. Our hospital returned to its full function, the medical school was opened and life continued just as it had before the pandemic, only with a few measures such as wearing masks and using hand sanitizers. Life post-covid seemed to be happening. The other observation I would like to make is that in other aspects, the consequences of the pandemic on the country were astoundingly immense. Although the people did not feel the medical effect of the pandemic as in the Western world or in Asia, the effect of the pandemic was beyond description when other aspects of life are considered. We felt as if the pandemic had mercy on us, but ‘life post-pandemic’ was nothing but a defense mechanism to conceal the damage and the challenges the pandemic posed for the individual as well as for the socio-economic and political situation in the country. This article is a summary of how Ethiopia responded to the pandemic both from a medical perspective and from social, economic and political perspectives. The Ethiopian Ministry of Health and the COVID-19 Pandemic It was shortly after her appointment that Dr. Lia Tadesse, the State Minister of Health, was faced with one of the deadliest pandemics in history. Dr. Lia, specialist in obstetrics and gynecology, succeeded Dr. Amir Aman, at the time the youngest minister to lead Ethiopia’s Ministry of Health, which takes “Healthier Citizens for a Prosperous Nation” as its motto. When the first case was announced on March 13, 2020, Dr. Lia became the headline of local and national television news. Since then she and the office she runs have been updating the daily cases of COVID-19 in the country. [1] Tikur Anbesa Street, Addis Ababa When the first case was announced by the then mayor of Addis, Takele Uma, the news was disturbing to all of us, especially to the residents of Addis Ababa. The city was gripped by a huge fear and depression. Everyone started rushing home. Parents went to schools and nurseries to take their kids home. Government employees stopped their jobs and returned home. I remember being in a seminar with Professor Amha Mekasha at our hospital when the news of the pandemic was announced. Prof. Amha was presenting on the challenges of medical leadership and facilities in Ethiopia. Before he finished his presentation, he took questions from the podium. One of the participants raised his hand and said, “Sir, COVID-19 is in the country!” We all laughed but at the same time we were shocked by the alarm. COVID-19, as if a guest to be welcomed, was in the country already! Immediately on the same day, the prices of surgical masks rose from US$0.15 (5 ETB) to US$6.25 (208 ETB), a 4000% increase within hours. The situation was worrying after an image of people queuing to buy masks appeared on social media. With the rise in the price of medical equipment, economic inflation increased significantly in less than 24 hours. The value of vegetables and cereal showed 20% inflation. Increases are expected in such times, but not that high. The government immediately established a rapid COVID-19 Response Committee to quickly solve inflation and to distribute medical equipment. Within two weeks, schools were closed and working hours for government employees went from eight hours a day to six, with occasional days off and even whole weeks off. Initially, COVID-19 tests were administered at Bole airport after passengers arrived in Addis. That was how the first two cases were found. Testing was limited to the airport because it was thought that the only gateway for the virus was through air travel from countries that were already infected. A month after the first case was found, COVID-19 testing began in border areas, especially at the Djibouti-Ethiopian border where many cases were found. At the beginning, patients were admitted to Eka COVID-19 Hospital, which the Ministry of Health dedicated exclusively to COVID-19 cases. Later, Millennium Hall, the country’s largest public gathering place, was converted into a Covid center holding more than 1000 beds and an ICU with 10 mechanical ventilators. (Fascinating to many, the country had only 400 mechanical ventilators in total.) It is worth remembering that Ethiopia ranked 99 out of 103 on the UNDP Human Poverty Index. Ethiopia is one of Africa’s poorest states, with 45% of its 77 million people living below the poverty line. Hence, the only way the country could handle the crisis was through prevention. I believe that it is fair to conclude that the Ethiopian Public Health Institute (EPHI) did an immense job in the health education and promotion, both in cities and rural areas in the country. Other health organizations also helped in educating people to prevent the disease. For example, the Oromia Physician Association (OPA) regularly held rallies (with social distancing) and other events to educate the people, especially those in the countryside, about how to prevent COVID-19 especially in Oromia, the largest region of the country where Addis Ababa, the capital city is located. In other parts of the country many public actors such as educators and influential people urged the people to take seriously the measures to prevent the disease. People Crossing the Roads in Addis Ababa The rapid response committee that was set up by the Prime Minister’s office soon established rules and restrictions that were supposed to be implemented by the police. Following the restrictions, all public gatherings of more than 50 people were banned. Nightclubs and public entertainment places were shut down (with religious people making an obvious commentary on this restriction as being ‘God’s hand’). Masks were mandatory outside of the house or there would be punishment. Religious gatherings were also prohibited. Mosques and churches were closed. Even the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, the largest denomination in Ethiopia with over 40 million members, shut its cathedral in fear of the pandemic. Knowing the rules and regulations alone would not affect the population, many artists also gathered to make videos and music to teach people to prevent the virus and to stay at home. Religious singers also sang and taught people to stay at home. This is done mainly in Amharic language, the official Federal language of Ethiopia. But government officials, artists and other popular figures also regularly presented on television and on different media in Oromo and other languages to educate the people about the pandemic. The COVID-19 response team also managed and oversaw any unfair increase in the value of goods, especially in the city. The government was able to collect donations from local and international charity organizations. Religious ministries and parachurch organizations were able to collect cash and goods from their respective members and distribute them to the most vulnerable people and groups who were severely affected by the pandemic. While the health promotion and education was carried out by many public actors, as mentioned above, the country’s less than twenty thousand physicians were being trained online by the Ministry of Health in Covid Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) and clinical management of Covid cases. As the disease progressed, every region set up its own Covid center. For a better description of the effects of COVID-19 from a medical perspective, I will use figures related to COVID-19 cases during the initial months and in various places. Bear with me. On Sunday April 5, 2020, 23 days after the first case was announced, Dr. Lia announced the first Covid related deaths in the country. At that time Ethiopia’s testing was limited to travellers passing through Bole airport. Hence, almost all of the reported cases had a travel history to or from a country that had high Covid cases. Very few cases had no travel history. By the end of April there had been 105 new cases, bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 131. The death toll was 3. The number of recovered patients increased to 59, leaving 69 active cases. [2] This was very low compared to other countries at that time. For example, in neighboring Kenya, the number of confirmed cases had reached 396 by the end of April. There had been 17 fatalities while 144 patients had recovered, leaving 235 active cases at the end of the month. One thing to note here is that there wasn’t a significant testing difference between Ethiopia and Kenya at that point. Ethiopia has the third busiest airport in Africa, with around 6 million passengers in 2020 alone, followed by Egypt and South Africa who registered 5,537 and 5,647 total Covid cases respectively at the end of April 2020. One can say Ethiopia did a very good job in preventing the disease during this phase of the pandemic. However, the testing abilities of both Egypt and South Africa were far better than Ethiopia during this time. For most of 2020, the medical burden of the pandemic was not as huge as was expected. At the end of December 2020, the total number of confirmed cases reached 124,264. The death toll rose to 1,923. The number of recovered patients increased to 112,096, leaving 10,245 active cases at the end of the month. Ethiopia’s testing ability had also grown to 7000 people daily. In total, 1.8 million people were tested by the end of December 2020. 10, 245 active cases were managed both at Addis Ababa’s largest Covid center at Millennium hall and Eka Hospital and also at regional hospitals. Private hospitals also offered Covid treatment with a cost that was 100 times higher than the government hospitals. For example, patients who were treated at Hallelujah Hospital, a well-known private hospital in Addis Ababa, were asked for as much as 200,000 ETB (around $5,000) for their hospital stay, while government hospitals charged not more than 1,000 ETB ($25) in total. Since the country follows a mixed economic system, private hospitals are free to charge any amount. Following the ‘low’ infection progress of the disease, schools and universities were re-opened in October and November 2020. Life ‘after’ COVID-19 seemed to be underway. Government employees’ working hours were back to normal by early September. Many restrictions that were imposed by the COVID-19 Response Committee were lifted. Masks became non-mandatory and even government officials stopped wearing masks at gatherings. Public gatherings with more than 50 people were allowed once again. Churches and Mosques were opened. Theatres and cinemas returned to their ‘normal’ state. Nightclubs and other restricted entertainment places opened up again. To many, it seemed that Covid was just flu. Life continued. 2021: What’s New? The infection was expected to follow a similar course in 2021. At the beginning of 2021, this seemed to be the case, with an average of 400 daily cases out of an average 5000 people tested. The number of new cases in January 2021 (13,386) was a little less than in December 2020 (14,190). However, from February to April 2021, the number of cases and COVID-19 related deaths peaked. The table below summarizes the total COVID-19 cases and deaths from February to May 2021. From February to May 2021, the average daily testing was around 5,000 people with daily cases on average 1,500 to 2000 people. The graph seems to go down once again in the month of May, returning to January levels. At the time of writing of this article (June 2021), the average daily testing was nearly the same (5,000 to 6,000) and daily recorded COVID-19 cases were between 300 and 500. Vaccination Campaigns On March 13, 2021, Ethiopia launched a COVID-19 vaccination campaign. [3] The Ministry of Health launched the COVID-19 vaccine drive in a high-level national event held at Eka Kotebe COVID-19 Hospital where frontline health workers were vaccinated to mark the beginning of the vaccination campaign. Following this, health professionals, government officials and influential people received the vaccine. [i] WHO Africa, 2020. https://www.afro.who.int/news/ethiopia-introduces-covid-19-vaccine-national-launching-ceremony (accessed on June 7, 2021) View of Addis Ababa from Mount. Entoto The AstraZeneca vaccine produced by Serum Institute of India (SII) arrived in Ethiopia on March 6, 2021, through COVAX, which facilitated the procurement and shipment of the vaccines. It has been said that in total 7.62 million doses will be shipped to Ethiopia. China also donated over 300,000 doses of the coronavirus vaccine developed by Sinopharm to Ethiopia. It has been said that China has been donating vaccines to 80 developing countries in urgent need, and has provided support under the COVAX global vaccine-sharing scheme. The AstraZeneca vaccines were distributed to every region in the country since they arrived in huge numbers as compared to China’s Sinopharm. Although different studies surrounding the AstraZeneca vaccine say different things, the WHO has been recommending it. Hence, the Ministry of Health did not ban the vaccine from the country. The physicians and medical students at Tikur Anbessa Hospital were among the first groups in the country to take the vaccine. There was a fear as to how our bodies would react to the vaccine, due to a few people getting very sick after getting vaccinated. Myalgia (muscle pain), headache and other side effects were expected. However, thankfully we didn’t encounter severe reactions. In fact the huge challenge to the vaccination campaign did not come from medical studies related to the COVAX vaccines, but rather it originated in religious beliefs and conspiracy theories. Some believed that the vaccines had microchips inside of them which were thought to implant ‘the mark of the beast’. Other conspiracies include the belief that the vaccines were to be used by the West to enslave black people. Some are still saying that the vaccines were intended to limit the number of black people by causing infertility. Challenges to Full Scale Prevention and Control of the Pandemic Of course, since March 13, 2020, when the first positive case was announced, the pandemic has not been without its challenges. We can group the challenges faced in Ethiopia into three categories: the first is related to material and logistical issues. The second is related to the government’s implementation of the rules and restrictions set by the COVID-19 Response Committee. The third is related to popular beliefs and practices. With regards to the first challenge, as described earlier, Ethiopia is ranked among the countries with the worst medical resources. The country does not have the equipment to handle its 115 million citizens, who make it the second most populous country in Africa. The effect of this challenge was seen especially recently (Feb-April 2021) when there was a surge in COVID-19 cases. Critically ill patients were beyond the capabilities of the government hospitals and ICUs. Most patients couldn’t afford to be treated in private hospitals; hence, sadly the critically ill were left without help. Many deaths recorded in those three months have been attributed to this factor. Secondly, the government’s implementation of the COVID-19 related restrictions and laws did not have an entirely positive impact. For example, only a few months after the first COVID-19 cases were announced, the government postponed the election that was to take place in June 2020. This created huge doubts and concerns—especially among those in the countryside—that the disease was fabricated by the government so as to postpone the elections. This became a popular belief in rural areas especially in the Oromia region where a huge contest in the election was expected. On the other hand, the government also fell into the trap of immature and unscientific research, when it claimed through its Ministry of Science and Innovation that they had discovered the cure for COVID-19. [4] This was televised on national television channels and the people received the news gladly. However, the government couldn’t handle its findings leaving the people to take the ‘innovations’ as nothing more than a hoax. The other problem was that government officials themselves did not set good examples to their people with regards to keeping social distance and wearing masks. A photo of Takele Uma, the State Minister of Energy and Mines, went viral on social media. In the photograph, Takele Uma was the only person not wearing a mask, alongside five, mostly foreign nationals, who were all wearing masks. Other ministers and regional presidents appeared publicly without a mask or even held party rallies or meetings without social distancing measures. Thirdly, popular beliefs, originating in religion or myths, were also a hindrance to the collective effort of fighting against the pandemic. For example, in the earliest days most people believed that covid-19 was God’s punishment and if we returned to God the virus would disappear. The government gave free airtime to religious programs on national television every day. This is not just a spiritual explanation to a natural phenomenon, it was a spiritual solution to a natural phenomenon meaning that rather than believing in the preventive measures, people drew conclusions that religious dedications or other means would cure or keep the virus away. Incense was burnt on the streets and their smoke was delivered from trucks all over the city by Ethiopian Orthodox Church followers. Some protestant ministers especially those who claimed to be ‘faith healers’ sold ointments that would keep the virus away. Not only religious beliefs but also traditional myths were propagated by many people. Some believed that white onions would keep the virus away which resulted in the value of white onions skyrocketing. Further complicating the challenges were lower daily COVID-19 case numbers as compared to other countries. Everyone interpreted the lower cases and death rates in their own way. It is common to hear terms such as “government propaganda,” “God’s mercy,” and “God’s judgment” used to describe COVID-19. The Non-Medical Side Effects of COVID-19 in Ethiopia Alongside, or even more so than the medical burden, COVID-19 has affected the lives of Ethiopians in many other aspects. Just as it is true in many places around the world, COVID-19 affected Ethiopia in social, economic and political terms. Impact on Social Life Ethiopia is comprised of many ethno-linguistic groups most of whom can be described as having tight cultures. Mike Rainer, former Ambassador of the U.S.A to Ethiopia, described Northern Ethiopia’s culture as “uncompromising.” What he seems to be referring to is that societal ties and structures especially in Northern Ethiopia, which is dominated by Christians, do not easily welcome or adapt to the ‘foreign’ or the ‘strange’. The same is true for the Somali and other primarily Muslim cultures in Ethiopia who are characteristically described as having tight cultures. When the telephone was introduced in Ethiopia in the early 20th century, people denounced it saying it was a means of talking with Satan. Anyone who was seen talking on the telephone, including the then Emperor, was seen as talking with Satan. It took some time for the laymen and women to be convinced that telephones were not instruments of the devil. This is just one example. Many of our stories speak to the fact that Ethiopians are not early-adopters of a new thing, nor do we easily change our old traditions for something new. It is customary in Ethiopia, across its cultures, for people to hug one another when they greet. In some places, such as in Silte and Haddiyya, people hug more than three times in one greeting. While in the north they hug twice when they greet. Somalis and other Muslim cultures kiss each other’s hands. Touching one another during greeting is seen as honoring the other person. COVID-19 came to break this culture with social distancing. This cultural change was not accepted, as was to be expected. With conspiracies acting as fuel, many people in the countryside refused to give up this custom. People continued to shake hands and kiss cheeks and hands even after social distancing was announced. People waiting for bus in Addis AbabaPhoto by Medhanit A Moreover, social distancing did not seem realistic on some occasions. Looking at the cases of the polygamous groups in our country, social distancing was perceived not only as unrealistic but also offensive. 11% of married women in Ethiopia are involved in polygamous marriages, meaning their husbands have more than one wife. [5] A polygamous father could have as many as 50 children all mostly living under one roof. How can social distancing be implemented in such scenarios? How could a father be distanced from his children, or siblings distanced from each other? This might seem an exaggerated case but it is very real and was often faced. The case for the homeless is also another difficult sociological issue that was faced following the COVID-19 epidemic. There are more than 50,000 homeless people in Addis Ababa, most of whom are between the ages of 15 and 25. [6] Their lives are based on the streets where they beg and sleep. With the lockdown, the fate of these people was in question. The city mayor had already planned to move the homeless young people into a sanctuary where they would get the chance to get educated and trained in order to find a job. Some of those who passed through the process were able to find a job. However, treating all 50,000 homeless individuals, whose numbers increased daily, was a huge task for a country that ranks among the poorest on earth. Of all the groups that were affected by the pandemic, commercial sex workers based in Addis Ababa were the most severely affected. Prostitution is legal in Ethiopia and UNAIDS’s 2016 report revealed that there are around 19,000 commercial sex workers across major cities in Ethiopia, most of whom reside in Addis Ababa. [7] Following the pandemic many of those who work in prostitution lost their clients because of the lockdown. Charity groups, NGOs and FBOs were involved in reaching out to this population. However, since restrictions eased in September 2020, things seems to have returned to normal. At the time of writing this, the sex business in Addis Ababa is fully back with nightclubs, bars, restaurants and pensions once again fully functional. The commercial sex business also received many additional workers, with the return of many citizens who had migrated to Saudi Arabia. The returnees had lost their jobs because of the pandemic and most of the women were forced to enter into the commercial sex trade. [8] It seems that, foreseeing the huge economic crisis that was about to occur in a country of 115 million inhabitants, many chose to believe conspiracies, myths, pseudoscience or their traditions rather than committing themselves to the measures of prevention and control. This paved the way for the wrongly held, ‘life after COVID-19’ belief. The government’s mishandling of the issue also played an important role in aggravating this belief. The Economic Impact The other facet of the effect of Covid was economic. Ethiopia has been among the fastest growing countries in the world for the past decade. Even during the climax of the countrywide protests, Ethiopia maintained a growth rate of 7.7 as per the report by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). [9] That seems to account for why the United Nations report on the impact of the pandemic on Ethiopia starts by acknowledging the country’s ability to maintain economic stability in spite of different challenges encountered over the years. [10] Practically speaking, the pandemic did hurt the country’s economy, and different groups were hit by the pandemic to different extents. The first days of the pandemic showed a marked increase in the value of goods. The Addis Ababa city government as well as the COVID-19 Response Committee tried to stabilize the inflation by taking several measures, the main one being penalizing stores that unfairly increased prices. Since the country follows a mixed economic model, the government had the mandate and the right to stabilize and set market values. This went in favor of the masses in most cases. During inflation seasons, the government intervenes to maintain the economy. Nonetheless, the government’s intervention does not reach all groups. The government’s economic interventions mostly focus on the urban areas particularly Addis Ababa, which has the lion’s share of the country’s market. While Addis Ababa was getting the government’s help over unfair increases of necessary goods by some business owners, other cities and rural areas did not get the government’s help immediately. This was because Addis Ababa took all the attention in the country because of the high rate of COVID-19 cases compared to other towns, with the exception of Dire Dawa, which had also displayed a higher infection rate due to migrants returning home from the nearby Djibouti city. Even in Addis Ababa, not all groups were affected by the pandemic similarly. While the government tried to maintain the economy for working class citizens, the jobless, immigrants and other businesses such as the commercial sex business and entertainment businesses were also highly affected. In order to maintain employment levels, the government’s COVID-19 Response Committee passed a regulation that prevented business owners from firing any of their employees until the COVID-19 State of Emergency was lifted. The State of Emergency (SOE), overseen by the COVID-19 Response Committee, lasted from April to August, totaling five months. This helped citizens working for private companies. The regulations also included the prohibition of rent increases and evictions until the end of the SOE. In the meantime, Ethiopia faced not only the pandemic in 2020 but also a desert locus invasion. The locust invasion has been the worst in 25 years, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). It damaged an estimated 200,000 hectares (490,000 acres) of land between January and October 2020, threatening food supplies. To better understand the significance, a single square-kilometer swarm can eat as much food in a day as 35,000 people. It was no less than a miracle to read the World Bank’s report on Ethiopia’s real gross domestic product (GDP) growth, which had slowed down to 6.1% in 2019/20 due to the pandemic. However, the country was still among the top growing economies in Africa and in the world. The World Bank’s account states that industry, mainly construction, and services accounted for most of the growth. In the meantime agriculture was not affected by the pandemic and, astoundingly enough, its contribution to growth slightly improved in 2019/20 compared to the previous year. At the time of this writing, the value of some goods have increased, or in some instances doubled, compared to just over a year ago. For example, one pack of pasta was 20 Birr when the pandemic began and for most of 2020. However, now it costs 41 Birr in Addis Ababa market. The recent rise in the value of goods can be attributed to many factors including the devaluation of the country’s currency which caused the value of imported products to increase. A year ago $1 was worth 35 Birr, but now it is around 43 Birr. Another reason for the recent increase in the value of goods is the ongoing war in Tigray and the conflicts that are happening in different parts of the country. IMF’s analysis seems also to side with this. [11] More or less, Ethiopia tried to maintain its economy amidst difficult situations with the pandemic, the desert locust plague and the humanitarian crisis that is happening in the country following different conflicts, including the Tigray war. No wonder the government has the power to dissect and heal the economy as well as control most of the aspects of the livelihood of its citizens. This leads us to the final impact of the pandemic on Ethiopians. Impact on Politics COVID-19 has been the most politically abused disease. The political issues relating to the disease have been manifesting in many distinct ways. From the controversial international tension between China and the rest of the developed world, particularly the U.S.A, to the ways in which national and local politics in almost every country have been both affected by the pandemic and used it to fulfill political agendas. Ethiopia was no different. In August 29, 2020, Ethiopia had planned to conduct its sixth national and regional election. It was the most anticipated event in the country, which according to Jawar Mohammed, the politician turned media guru, could make or break the country. Jawar’s analysis could be an underestimation of the situation that would follow the election. At this stage it would be necessary to give a little background on the recent political climate of the country before the pandemic. Covid-19 safety billboard in front of a condominium in Addis AbabaPhoto by Medhanit A In April 2018, Abiy Ahmed Ali, the current Prime Minister of Ethiopia, rose to power through popular struggle that forced former Prime Minister Hailemariam Dessalegn to resign. Abiy Ahmed represented the Oromo People’s Democratic Organization (OPDO), the Oromo faction of the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary and Democratic Front (EPRDF). After he came to power Abiy Ahmed made huge promises, most of which were fulfilled by him or his administration subsequently. He released imprisoned political figures. He allowed exiled political parties and figures to return to the country. Most of all, he vowed to undergo a free and fair election. Ethiopia has seen five national elections since the downfall of the military junta in 1991. All five elections were described as not credible, free or fair by the participants. The most notable being the 2005 election in which it was concluded that the ruling party EPRDF, committed voter fraud. The Coalition for Unity and Democracy party (CUD, ‘Kinijit’ in Amharic) won the election in the capital by a large margin, but the ruling party was not willing to give up power. Hence, some leaders were thrown in jail while others were exiled. Abiy Ahmed vowed to reverse this history by preparing a free and fair election in 2020. Many political parties including the Ethiopian Citizen’s Social Justice Party (EZEMA), the National Movement of the Amhara (NAMA), the Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC), the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) and the Prosperity Party (the reformed ‘EPRDF’) were making preparations for the elections. However, Abiy Ahmed faced huge challenges ahead of the election. The first was from his constituency, the Oromo people, because of other competing political parties who were thought to be on track to comfortably win the election, while Abiy’s reformed ‘Prosperity Party’ did not seem to be favored by the Oromo people. Secondly, the TPLF were also preparing to make a comeback using a loophole after they were pushed from power following the ascension of Abiy Ahmed into the premiership. Thirdly, the rise of the Amhara nationalist parties such as the NAMA, increased the tension between the Amhara and the Oromo, the two largest ethnic groups in the country. Fourthly, Abiy’s Prosperity Party (PP) was immature and not well established and clearly needed some time until a true ideological unity was formed. All these challenges made the sixth national election highly anticipated on one hand, and haphazard on the other. After the first COVID-19 case was announced on March 13, 2020, political parties were warning of a possible postponement of the election if necessary preventive measures were not taken. The government on the other hand, weighed up the necessity of taking preventive measures rather than focusing on the election. However, the issue of postponing the election was not an easy matter. The country did not have a history of postponing national polls. Moreover, the constitution said nothing regarding the authority and assumption of the governing body in the period between the original election date and the date to which it was postponed. Hence, the Council of Constitutional Inquiry (CCI) was established by the House of People’s Representatives (HPR). The Council of Constitutional Inquiry (CCI) is a body of legal experts the HPR established to make recommendations on constitutional interpretation requests to the lower chamber of parliament, the House of Federation (HoF). The CCI made an unprecedented public announcement on May 11, inviting qualified experts to submit to the House of People’s Representatives (HoPR) written opinions regarding the interpretation of Article 54(1), Article 58 (3) and Article 93 of the Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (FDRE Constitution), in light of the COVID-19 pandemic and its effects on the scheduled national election. Accordingly, many legal experts submitted their amicus curiae. [12] The submitted papers were presented to the CCI during a live broadcast. Different arguments were presented in the available time. However, with the election certainly postponed, none of the papers in support of an interim or transitional government ‘convinced’ the CCI. Hence, in May the sitting House of Representatives voted to postpone the election until 2021 and the House of Federation allowed the ruling government to continue in power until then. The ramifications of this decision is a huge topic of study on its own. As of the time of writing, the consequences of that decision is still not fully understood. Many political figures that were getting ready for the election a year ago including Jawar Mohammed and Eskendir Nega are now behind bars. The election is not as excitedly anticipated as it was a year ago. A billboard in Minnesota, USA, reads ‘Free Jawar Mohammed’ Meanwhile, it is also worth noting that Ethiopia was not the only country whose election was affected. According to IDEA, from February 2020 to June 2021 at least 78 countries and territories across the globe have decided to postpone national and subnational elections due to COVID-19, out of which at least 41 countries and territories have decided to postpone national elections and referendums, Ethiopia included. Hence, Ethiopia’s case is not unique. Despite the COVID-19 health education by the Ministry of Health, both the ruling party and other competing parties have held rallies and mass gatherings without the necessary COVID-19 protective measures. It seems Ethiopia has passed the COVID-19 season, living in a ‘post-pandemic’ state, although medical and other ongoing effects of the pandemic say otherwise. Naol Befkadu , MD, is a physician based in Addis Ababa. [1] Wuilbercq, E. (2020, May 4). Q&A: How Ethiopia’s health minister is preparing for coronavirus. Thomson Reuters Foundation. https://news.trust.org/item/20200504172943-5mjaz (accessed on June 7, 2021) [2] All covid-19 related data are taken from https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/ethiopia/ (accessed on June 7, 2021) [3] WHO Africa, 2020. https://www.afro.who.int/news/ethiopia-introduces-covid-19-vaccine-national-launching-ceremony (accessed on June 7, 2021) [4] Ethiopia announced that it found traditional medicine for covid 19. Capital News. (2020, March 27) https://www.capitalethiopia.com/capital/ethiopia-announced-that-it-found-traditional-medicine-for-covid-19/ (accessed on June 7, 2021) [5] Ethiopian Demographic and Health Survey, 2016. [6] International Journal of Gender and Women’s Studies June 2015, Vol. 3, No. 1, pp. 42-50 ISSN: 2333-6021 (Print), 2333-603X (Online) Copyright © The Author(s). All Rights Reserved. Published by American Research Institute for Policy Development [7] “Sex workers: Population size estimate (2016, November). UNAIDS. http://www.aidsinfoonline.org/ (accessed on June 7, 2021) [8] Wuilbercq, E. (2021, March 3). Thomson Reuters Foundation. FEATURE-Ethiopia’s migrants turn to sex work as pandemic sends them home. (accessed on June 7, 2021) [9] International Monetary Fund: The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia: IMF Country Report No. 18/354 [10] United Nations Ethiopia: One UN Assessment: Socio-Economic Impact of Covid-19 in Ethiopia. May 2020, Addis Ababa. [11] International Monetary Fund: The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia: IMF Country Report No. 18/354 [12] Kidanemariam, Mulu & Ghebregergs, Mehreteab & Hadush, Gebrehiwot & Hailu, Gebremeskel & Messele, Abraha & Weldeselassie, Gebreabeggi. (2020). Amicus Curiae on Election, COVID-19, and Constitutional Interpretation in Ethiopia (May 15, 2020). Previous Next
- Cells | WCSCD
Times Museum Guangdong Times Museum is a non-profit institution funded by private sectors, and Times China has been the core funder since the inauguration of the Museum. In 2003, Times Property (former name of Times China) and Guangdong Museum of Art (GDMA) co-founded the temporary pavilion as a branch of GDMA at Times Rose Garden in 2003. When Wang Huangsheng, the Former Director of GDMA and the curator Hou Hanru invited Rem Koolhaas and Alan Fouraux to conceptualize an architectural proposal in the D-Lab of the 2nd Guangzhou Triennial in 2005, the Museum was incubated as a hub for artistic experiments in the region of Pearl River Delta. After the completion of its facility, Guangdong Times Museum became independent and officially opened its door to the public in December 31, 2010. In November 2018, Guangdong Times Museum initiated Times Art Center Berlin as its parallel institution in Europe with the support of Times China. We program up to 4-6 exhibitions in our gallery space, introduce over a hundred artists and art works to the city of Guangzhou, and commission more than a dozen new works every year. We reach out to our audience through curated events on weekly basis. We engage with both the artists and the public to develop ideas, produce artworks and test receptions. We value our public role as a cultural institution, and endeavor to formulate conversations and document social changes. While supporting artists to present their critical ideas and to produce ambitious art works, we also attempt to indigenize the language of contemporary art. After a decade of robust programming, Guangdong Times Museum has become a cultural landmark of the city where people can discover art, connect with each other, feel inspired by unexpected learnings and worldly experiences. ArtCom ArtCom is a contemporary art and public engagement platform, established in 2015 as a non-profit community-based organization. Founded by independent curator, Aigerim Kapar, with support from the art community. Artcom aims to connect local contemporary art practices in urban, cultural and social milieux. In doing so, Artcom unites art practitioners, social scientists, philosophers, architects and urban planners, as well as students and the wider public, to exchange experiences and skills, engage in knowledge production, research local issues, and be involved with and create local art and interdisciplinary projects. Artcom is committed to creating and sustaining the best environment for contemporary art and culture in Kazakhstan and Central Asia. Our mission is to support artists, curators and art professionals; and strengthen their communities, especially the young and emerging among them. Since 2017, we have run Art Collider, an informal school where art meets science and technology. Together with art practitioners and academics, we present a series of public lectures, discussions, and workshops in order to find a language to describe our postcolonial situation and decolonial future. MG+MSUM Moderna galerija is a national museum that works, in accordance with its mission, in the fields of modern and contemporary art. It was founded in 1947 as a museum of modern art. With Slovenia’s independence in 1991, Moderna galerija became the principal national institution of modern and contemporary art and an increasingly active link between the local and the international, in particular Central and Eastern European, contexts. During the transition following the downfall of the Communist regime, Moderna galerija suffered financial problems and personnel shortage. Today’s vision of Moderna galerija is based on its history from the founding to the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia and the downfall of Socialism, on the strong experience of the Balkan wars, the transition period and critical awareness of the increasing globalisation processes. The concept of museum advocated by Moderna galerija follows its own way and resists the existing hegemonic models. In the crucial period of the 1990’s, Moderna galerija refused to become a postmodern museum of sensations and intense experiences; on the threshold of the new millennium it fairly clearly developed the concept of an art museum that advocates the plurality of narratives and priorities of local spaces that intend to enter equal dialogues with other spaces only with their own symbolic capital. Since 2011, Moderna galerija has operated on two locations: in the original building of Moderna galerija (MG+) in the centre of Ljubljana and in the Museum of Contemporary Art Metelkova (+MSUM) located on the renovated premises of former military barracks. The concept of Moderna galerija as a museum of modern and contemporary art was initiated in the early 1990’s, at the time of a strong need to allow more space for the previously neglected contemporary art and form closer links with the international space as well as with the national history and the historical moment then marked by the war and the new political geography of Europe. In contrast to the past decades, Moderna galerija began to show the interest in the present moment, which involved a different, but no less responsible addressing of the past. This initiated the processes that acquired their first tangible form in the Instrument of Constitution of Moderna galerija (2004) that defines the difference between the museum of modern art and museum of contemporary art as follows. As a museum of modern art it systematically explores, collects, and presents the art of Modernism and its traditions. It deals primarily with Slovenian 20th century art from the beginnings of Modernism around 1900, but also with contemporary artists who continue the tradition of Modernist trends. As a museum of contemporary art it covers contemporary practices in the field of the visual arts. It presents new contents in and new ways of expressing, exhibiting and interpreting contemporary art. By regularly purchasing works by Slovene artists, it is building a permanent collection of the 21st century art and adding to the international Arteast Collection 2000+ by purchasing works by foreign artists. The museum of modern art is defined as a museum devoted to the notion and tradition of Modernism as a historical style. Although established as a museum of contemporary art, the museum of modern art had gradually turned into a museum of the past that accumulated through time and eventually opened the door to the museum of contemporary art. But even if the art displayed in the museum of modern art is mostly from the previous century, the ways of addressing it are determined by the present time and its priorities. A museum of contemporary art does not necessarily differ from a museum of modern art in terms of historical period: in this respect, the two may even overlap as the tradition of Modernism is still alive while contemporary art draws from different art traditions. The programme of the Museum of Contemporary Art Metelkova thus reaches back to the new art practices of the 1960’s although its social and political contemporaneity begins especially with the crucial events from the early 1990’s. Moderna galerija addresses both the museum of modern art and the museum of contemporary art from the aspect of multi-temporality derived from the critique of linear time and its universal validity. Different activities of both museums point out antagonisms rather than cover them by different virtual pluralities. Moderna galerija attempts to develop a different model of museum based on the criticism and redefinition of democratic institution. Its priorities include the construction of a local context and dialogues with different localities that follow especially similar priorities and interests in developing different institutionality and new models of cultural production. Rockbund Art Museum Inaugurated in 2010, Rockbund Art Museum is a contemporary art museum located on the Bund in Shanghai. With a strong reputation for our innovative curatorial approach, we look to conceive different art projects from research to alternative learning programs, from exhibition-making to unexpected para-performative formats. By supporting bold contemporary art practices, we aim to continually remake local histories, whilst also responding to global art challenges and social mutations. We regard the role of exchange as an essential process required for a wider transformation to occur by building up a network of multi-regional, international and cross-disciplinary partnerships. Through this process, we aim to cultivate a diverse and deep-rooted connection to our audiences, communities, and also different social and cultural organizations. More on www.rockbundartmuseum.org As you go… the roads under your feet, towards a new future collaborates with Rockbund Art Museum through Curtain project initiated by museum director Larys Frogier and number of collaborators Mathieu Copeland, Biljana Ciric, Cosmin Costinas, Hsieh Feng-Rong, Billy Tang. Initiated in 2020, CURTAIN is a long term research project, which will be articulated through a series of exhibition formats, discursive platforms and cross-institutional collaborations spanning a three-year period. Seeking to go beyond the fixed definition of an exhibition, the project looks to expand the dialogue with artists through the gathering of critical thinkers and practitioners from other social and cultural fields. The Public Library Bor Library and information activity in Bor and its environs dates back to 1869 when the first public reading room was opened in the village of Zlot. Since then, many libraries and reading rooms of various types were opened and closed in the town and its schools, factories, organizations, and nearby villages, especially in the above-mentioned Zlot, where the first workers’ or so-called socialists’ reading room was also temporarily opened in 1909. The purpose of the workers’ reading room was not just the acquisition and distribution of the reading materials, but also agitation against and awareness-raising of capitalistic and political exploitation of human resources among the villagers-workers. During the Second World War, the town of Bor was a forced labour camp, due to the large and valuable copper mine, and there was no public library institution. Books and other reading materials were allowed to circulate only among the Nazi occupants. The Public Library Bor (‘the Library’) was founded in 1962, when several smaller suburban public libraries and reading rooms were combined. Since then, it has been the central library for the District of Bor. Since 1972, the Library has been located in the House of Culture, in a dedicated space across four floors. The Library has changed its organization several times, and today it consists of six departments: Department for the Acquisition and Cataloguing, Information Services Department, Children’s Department, Department for the Adults (with two sub-departments – Languages and Literature, and Non-fiction), Local History Department, and Special Collections and Periodicals with the reading room. There is also a special broad and well-equipped hall for exhibitions, projections, concerts and other programs on the first floor. The Library has four branches in the nearby villages, too. Right now, 18 librarians work in the Library and its branches, with six of them being senior librarians and one of them an advisor. The Library continually acquires, catalogues and lends various print and non-print materials and sources of information – books, periodicals, non-book materials such as photos, maps, movies and videos, multimedia etc. The collections are mostly available for self-service and the majority of materials are for use outside of the library. Membership is obligatory for those who want to take the materials home, but the fees are symbolic (1.5–3.5 euros per year) and many categories of citizens, such as pre-school children or the unemployed, can become members free of charge. The Library collections are regularly renewed, according to the analysis and evaluation by staff of the collections and their purposes, the publishing production, and the users’ needs and demands. The acquisition is selective but non-discriminatory, because the main goal of the Library is to provide access to the reading materials and a variety of reliable and checked sources of information to all citizens who need them in all possible formats. The other important aim of the Library is to promote reading interests, knowledge, valuable fiction and non-fiction works, sources of scientific information, and literacies of all kinds, including media and information and digital literacy. In order to do that, library staff organize various programs such as book talks, literary evenings with the authors, lectures, panel discussions, workshops for kids, young adults or librarians, and photo-exhibitions, especially those designed to present and promote the Local History Department Photography Collection and/or local photographers and other visual artists. In addition to the materials, the users have 6 PCs with internet access at their disposal. Recently, the Library acquired a VR headset, so that new materials – educative VR content – have become available. There is the possibility of interlibrary loans, too. The Library participates in the national and international Cooperative Online Bibliographic System and Services (COBISS), so that the information about collections (catalogue records) and a user’s own history of loans, reservations, search terms, and organized saved records are online and freely accessible, searchable and personally manageable for the user. Since 1999, the Library has published „Beležnica“ (The Notebook) – a journal dedicated both to library and information science activities, especially the activities of the Public Library Bor, as well as the local scene, history, literature and other issues of local significance. The publishing activity of the Library also includes several books (edited collections) as the final results of the various projects. < About Curatorial Inquiries Activities >
- Reading of the biggest image in Belgrade | WCSCD
Events Lecture Series Participant Activities Reading of the biggest image in Belgrade Wednesday, 20th of November from 4 pm, Generalstab building and November 21st 6pm Ostavinska panel discussion. The event “Reading of the biggest image in Belgrade” will mark the end of the three-month international curatorial course “What Could/Should Curating Do?” starting on Wednesday, the 20th of November in front of the Generalstab building at 4 pm with a public performance led by Nemanja Boskovic. On 21st of November at 6pm in Ostavinska a panel discussion will commence. Participants will be members of The School for History and Theory of Images and curators of the project. During the event, an artist intervention by Bojan Đorđev i Siniše Ilić will be presented. The curatorial team of this final project of the WCSCD course, which is running for a second year in Serbia and gathering young curators from all over the world, includes Sasha Puchkova from Russia, Aigerim Kapar from Kazahstan, Martina Yordanova from Bulgaria, Mateja Smic from Croatia and Zulfikar Filandra from Bosnia and Herzegovina. They point out that the final event is the outcome and of their three-month stay in Serbia. Through the research of the School for History and theory of images, they had an opportunity to get to know the art scene in Belgrade. “Our research of The School for History and Theory of Images remains the signature of our time spent in Belgrade. Through it, we got to know aspects of the local art scene and its historical and geopolitical context. They were the first ones to, through this alternative educational programme, attempt to encourage critical thinking, questioning and critique of ideology, political situations and problems of the academy, with the goal of improving the quality of visual culture studies. The School soon became some sort of a forum and epicentre for discussions which ‘by their range define new modes of interaction between culture, politics and theory in the broader social field.’ (Editorial, Prelom Magazine #1, 2011). Somehow, we felt that the situation of that time and the one of today have a lot in common and thought that there are valuable lessons we could take from the past, reflect on them in relation to the present, and try to project the learnings onto the future.“ The young curators add that the research of the school opened up new views and served as an inspiration for the final programme of the WCSCD course: “The two main discourses of the School – Critique of Ideology and Reading of the image, have inspired us to think about the current situation in relation to that of 20 years ago, revive the School’s approach and attempt to apply it to the current setting. To mark the School’s 20th anniversary and test their methodologies in the contemporary context, we have decided to curate ‘The reading of the biggest image in Belgrade’ in relation to the image covering the Generalstab building. Surprised by the quantity and nature of the political discourse in the public and media, startled by the presence of armed defence bodies in the city and prompted by the fact that the biggest image in Belgrade promotes army recruitment, we felt that this would be an interesting and urgent topic for research.” The event is organized as part of WCSCD 2019 curatorial program
- Untitled
< Back Untitled Madina Gasimi When I finish my essay, I will become obsolete for the world. This is a joke that becomes the truth and concerns literally everyone. I am not able objectively to discuss self-isolation and the global consequences of a pandemic. I am not a politician, I’m a curator and most of the time I work at home. It’s kind of an isolation, but it’s a freewill. In this essay I try my best to describe my thoughts on the situation after the pandemic of COVID-19. There is an epidemic storm in Europe and the USA, and it is growing in Russia. Many people, among them my friends, believe that COVID-19 is harmless and there are different conspiracy theories that say it is built to destroy the economic system of the whole world. But the majority is still afraid to get sick and die. Then I have a question. What is the main problem revealed with the start of the pandemic? Is it a fear of death? But it’s not a problem, it is a primal feeling we always have, and it escalates in individual cases. I think that the main problem concerns the changes in relationships between people, and these changes are affected by fear. Fear to die, fear to get sick, fear to lose a job, fear to become vain. Different kinds of fear between people have become a driving force. The virus has changed our relationships and is changing the planet. In the face of a disease whose origin still causes controversy, globalization has proven powerless. Coronavirus gives a chance to individual nation-states and is a catalyst for the birth of dictatorship. For example, the state of emergency introduced in one of the European countries provided the current Prime Minister with almost unlimited power, which could lead to restrictions on freedoms and human rights. Let’s see what has already happened with freedom and human rights. I could never imagine such a thing, but the people of Europe instantly and voluntarily gave up their rights and freedoms in the face of an unknown disease and obvious danger. Museums, theatres, restaurants, cinemas, parks are closed, people are self-isolated and are waiting for the vaccine. In Moscow people only can go outside on passes and no further than 100 meters from the house, and they pay fines if they break their self-isolation. There is a new reality in which there is a coronavirus. People of the whole entire world are not used to living in a new reality. This is the reality where familiar and favourite places (bars, restaurants, cinemas, museums) have turned into places that can cause COVID 19 and therefore kill people. The urban environment is collapsing, and our usual way of life has crushed. It’s amazing how people reacted to this. What is happening now looks like a dystopia. It seems like people have thrown away several centuries of cultural development, locked themselves in their houses, have given all their rights, and are waiting good times. This is a manifestation of animal fear of an unknown infection, the symptoms and parameters of which change in the media every day. I am happy being alive and healthy. I appreciate free time that has appeared, I spend it with my family and, surprisingly, to work more. I am happy to see all the people who support the doctors, who are the true heroes of our time. If people still can help each other, then nothing is lost. But I think we should not forget the one thing. If we want to remain human beings and save mankind, one day we will have to open the borders, go to theaters again, shake hands and make friends. The one who first removes the mask after the quarantine is finished, and open the doors to other people, will be a hero. We just have to survive! It’s hard for me to imagine what activities will be void or unnecessary. We observe that digital support has appeared in every realm. It turns out that you don’t need to go to the office 5 days per week in order to work well, you have an ability to work directly from home, and it turns out that if you are a responsible one your efficiency is bigger. Utility and optimization are becoming the main characteristics of the work, regardless who you are – a programmer or a methodologist in a museum. We are fully transitioning to online life. Digital is possible everywhere, but should it be everywhere? Where, for example, will the Tretyakov Gallery collection go after it is digitized? Will offline museum occupations become online, and will other museum offline ones be excluded? That is the question. Perhaps after the pandemic people who create content will be included in the system, competing for the attention because the attention will finally turn into a new currency in the world. People will sit at home and watch Netflix, and screenwriters will tirelessly come up with new stories. People will be able to visit the museums not leaving their homes. There are online exhibitions curated online by online curators. And you absolutely do not need to make physical contact with anyone. Sounds weird, doesn’t it? Honestly I am not worried what should I do as a curator when it’s over. A curator is a person who creates ideas and meanings, a curator can form an agenda for today. I’m sure the curator can do anything and work in existing circumstances. I am concerned more about the issue of how homeless people, people with disabilities stay alive against the virus, how the environment will develop for such people, what will happen with palliative care? So many questions, and so few answers. We live in interesting times, and only those people who are able to change and adapt will survive. We are now united in the struggle for life, but we have forgotten that dying and disappearing is normal. I would like to recall the concept of Timothy Morton: the world changes regardless of how a person wants to see it. We should not fear such uncertainty, but it should be perceived as something positive. No one knows what is going to happen next, but arts and culture always rise up after every major epidemic. Madina Gasimi is a curator and cultural project manager based in Moscow, Russia. Previous Next
- Which Side Have You Chosen? A Response to Bruno Latour [1]
< Back Which Side Have You Chosen? A Response to Bruno Latour [1] Anna Mikaela Ekstrand Left: Protesters kneel in front of New York City Police Department Officers as they violate curfew, Plaza Hotel, 59th Street, New York City, June 3, 2020. AP. Right: From left, ex-police officers Derek Chauvin, J. Alexander Kueng, Thomas Lane, and Tou Thao. All have been charged in the on-duty killing of George Floyd. AP. In the early days of the Corona crisis, I strongly felt the intensity of the online art world – viewing rooms, podcasts, article series, and more launching during the first week of quarantine. The most successful initiative engaging both the art world and mainstream audiences in practices of deep looking, but more importantly revising and restaging, was the Getty Challenge with participants across the world recreating artworks. [2] Etty Yaniv, an independent publisher, has interviewed over 125 artists on how they are coping during Corona times – some of them are published on my platform Cultbytes. [3] The Immigrant Artist Biennial, a project that I am working with, has shifted programming online hosting studio visits on IGLive, and on Zoom, a roundtable on Anti-Asian Racism and an immigration law clinic. [4] The online sphere quickly became a place for reflection and communal support but also a more rigorous competition for visibility, one that artists, many who already work with self-promotion to manage their careers, excelled in. In “What protective measures can you think of so we don’t go back to the pre-crisis production model?” [5] Bruno Latour, a French philosopher, anthropologist, and sociologist urges his readers to sacrifice their opinions to rely on descriptions and research to devise systemic solutions to stifle climate change through his call-to-reflect questionnaire. On March 12th I began writing a response to Latour’s text: [6] In America, COVID-19 has provided further magnification and broadcast of racial divides, which has been a hot topic with push back against rampant police violence in recent years, but also class divides – which in the seat of capitalism is not regularly a hot topic. Major companies, like Amazon, are experiencing strikes by their workers, unrelated to unions. In times of crisis, the needs of the people are magnified. Latour and I, and many others, anticipated a shift. We just could not put our finger on what it would be. Before the four now ex-police officers, Derek Chauvin, Tou Thao, Thomas Lane, and J. Alexander Keung, brutally murdered George Floyd by restraining him, preventing onlookers from intervening, and, the former, pressing a knee on Floyd’s neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds during which time he called-out for his mother and uttered the words “I can’t breath.” [7] Before the arrests of Gregory and Travis McMichael’s some two months after they fatally shot Ahmaud Arbery, a black man out for a jog. Before these events that would trigger yet another wave of protests against state sanctioned violence against people of color many of us busied ourselves with increased levels of self-care, care for others, and issues of personal finance, while in confinement. Countrywide stay-at-home orders provoked an increased reliance and engagement with government entities, local and state politicians, healthcare providers, or within the American context, insurance providers (or a distancing from them as it were to not override hospitals), Department of Health (for information), and the Department of Labor (to register unemployment) also made these entities more visible in our everyday life. Little did we know that this work would prepare us and offer us tools to carry out the revolution. In America, the Black Lives Matter movement has urged citizens to look beyond their own experiences to see facts; there is rampant systemic racism that violates black people in this country every day. Activist groups, protestors, influencers, democrats and republicans, politicians – basically people of all races and walks of life, many who normally would not have the time or interest, are all chiming in in solidarity for change. In the art world, influencers, galleries, institutions and the media are highlighting black artists, and some have quickly created grants and financial support for arts education for black people. Anti-racist resources are being widely shared to help institutions shift away from tokenizing to truly become more inclusive. [8] Latour’s first question is ‘What are some suspended activities that you would like to see not coming back?’ In solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement, my answer is: The Police. His second question is why? My answer is: Shifting funding from the police, a racially biased and broken system and the industrial prison complex to education, housing, healthcare and community engagement would help the black population, POC, LGBT community – groups that endure frequent policing aka systemic harassment, murder, and disenfranchising through mass incarceration. Dismantle lobby groups like ALEC that support and are largely funded by companies that profit from mass incarceration. Re-integrate ex-convicts into society by allowing convicts to start and complete degrees and work for minimum wage when they are incarcerated. Create a probation system that supports instead of restrains, and give ex-cons their democratic rights back, the right to vote. The Prison Policy Initiative estimates an annual cost of $181bn for mass incarceration in America. [9] Defunding the police and dismantling the industrial prison complex will leave many out of work. As my response to Latour’s third question: [10] superfluous prison guards, police, parole and probation officers who truly care about reform, rehabilitation and community building can be fast tracked into becoming social workers and educators. The rest can be put on Unemployment Insurance (or how about Revolution Unemployment Assistance? RUA) until they find work in other industries. Maybe Elon Musk ( not Claire Denis) can find a way for them to explore space? [11] The companies that profit from convicts and their families can be allocated federal and state contracts to ideate, create and lobby for environmentally sustainable law-changes (perhaps taxing car and oil production, companies with high carbon footprints, or America’s wealthiest 1%) or just continue selling their goods to other consumers, however, with a mandate to employ at least 70% ex-cons. If they fail or are unwilling, they too can be put on assistance until they find work in other industries. I believe that the longevity of the current wave of the Black Lives Matter movement has been reliant on the government indirectly funding its supporters and participants. It was fueled by an increased proximity to government entities and officials moderated by the Corona crisis in addition to our lived experiences enduring personal sacrifice to curtail the crisis. The police murders of Trayvon Martin, Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Philando Castile and Breonna Taylor [12] have provoked countrywide protests and actions of solidarity, however, none as encompassing as now. With the suspension of local businesses, the ‘closure’ of states and work stop orders, many people are out of work and are eligible to receive between 21 to 39 weeks of benefits. [13] 40 million Americans are currently enrolled in these financial assistance programs. Without a job to go to and financial assistance (stimulus checks at the very least), it is easier to continue organizing against and protesting the American governments repression of its people to provoke real change. [14] Similarly, the wide-spread protest movements, Fridays for Future (FFF), Youth for Climate, Climate Strike or Youth Strike for Climate, essentially carved out protected time during the school day for protests to occur as children, protected by various laws stating that they must go to school, were let back into school on Monday after returning from protesting on Friday. In March, America’s market economy became overhauled by federal and state sanctioned regulations to alleviate the healthcare system to tackle the virus outbreak bringing the need to remedy mass unemployment and aiding struggling corporations. Mayors and governors crowded the stage many addressing their constituents directly on a daily basis. Andrew Cuomo’s daily press briefing was broadcasted on most local TV channels across the country. When Cuomo pleads for New Yorker’s to stay at home and social distance, even offering through the NYC Health Department tips for safer sex during COVID-19 [15] and addressing intimate and personal matters, it is not surprising that people feel empowered to speak directly to politicians to advocate for and vocalize defunding a police force that is killing their friends, family and neighbors. Lastly, regulations, fear of infection, death and the uncertainty of what will happen in the world has impacted people. Social media platforms offer spaces to process, discuss, and engage with the Corona crisis and our current situations both through information sharing, critique, humor, and holding others responsible for their actions. The crisis has forced many to (re)learn and spend more time communicating and broadcasting. According to the New York Times, we are ‘internet-ing’ differently and using a wider range of apps and services [16] – Zoom usage climbed from 10 million daily meeting participants in December to 300 million in April. [17] We are also spending more time on our immediate environment, local neighborhood and families. We have all become better at communicating online – thus more people are participating in digital forms of protest to broadcast, negotiate and further the Black Lives Matter movement. Simply put, in the past months, we have moved from recreating our favorite art works to fend off weary in the confinement of our homes to collectively with love, in outrage, despair, hope, and solidarity protest racism and police brutality and reimagine the society we live in; the Black Lives Matter movement has brought us out of our homes back into the streets [18] and, hopefully, to the voting polls. Latour’s appeal to reconsider how we can use this slowdown of capitalism to renegotiate existing production models to better protect our environment is valid. Yet, environmental policy is more mature and developed than anti-racist policy. The former is institutionalized, carried out by a complex system of national and international bi- and multilateral agencies and partnerships pressurized by activists, like Greta Thunberg. We must make sure that the Black Lives Matter movement in America and anti-racist policy across the world continues to develop – like climate change, this is an issue that belongs to us all. We must stay the course. Anna Mikaela Ekstrand is a Swedish/Guyanese independent curator based in New York City. [1] Latour, Bruno. Translated by Stephen Muecke. What protective measures can you think of so we don’t go back to the pre-crisis production model?, 2020. http://www.bruno-latour.fr/node/853.html , accessed June 22, 2020. [2] https://www.buzzfeed.com/louisekhong/getty-museum-challenge-recreate-artwork , accessed June 22, 2020. [3] “Artists on Coping” published on artspiel.org and cultbytes.com . [4] “Artists Respond to Anti-Asian Racism, Xenophobia, and Immigrant-Bashing in the Time of COVID-19,” April 22, 2020, co-hosted by EFA Project and The Immigrant Artist Biennial and “Visual Artists’ Immigration Clinic,” April 23, 2020, co-hosted by the Center for Art Law, EFA Project Space, and The Immigrant Artist Biennial. [5] See footnote 1. [6] As one of their curatorial residents I was asked by WCSCD? to participate. https://old.wcscd.com/index.php/2020/05/31/series-of-texts-developed-by-participants-of-wcscd-2020-2021-program-as-a-response-to-bruno-latour-text-what-protective-measures-can-you-think-of-so-we-dont-go-back-to-the-pre-crisis-producti/ , accessed June 22, 2020. [7] On July 14, 2014, Eric Garner said the same words under duress before he was killed by David Pantaleo, a New York City Police Department officer, who had put him in a chokehold (despite them being banned in the NYPD since 1993). So, what happened to Pantaleo? In 2019, the U.S. Department of Justice declined to bring criminal charges against the officer who had been relegated to desk duty and after disciplinary hearings in an administrative judge recommended that he be fired, which he was on August 19, 2019, five years later after the murder. The system is broken. [8] One example is “Racism in the Arts” created by @rhearhea__ and @paintherlex, two Chicago based artists https://www.instagram.com/p/CBTZeXClSJS/ , accessed on June 23, 2020. [9] PPI includes the cost of operating prisons, jails, parole, and probation, as estimated by the Bureau of Statistics to $81bn — in addition to policing and court costs, and costs paid by families to support incarcerated loved ones. Least we not forget the private entities like bail bond companies, which collect $1.4 billion in nonrefundable fees from defendants and their families; phone companies that charge families up to $24.95 for a 15-minute phone call; and commissary vendors that bring in $1.6 billion a year and the companies that use prisoners as low wage workers (sometimes $0.13-$4/hour) to produce goods “Made in America.” https://eji.org/news/mass-incarceration-costs-182-billion-annually/ , accessed June 22, 2020. [10] “Question 3: What kinds of measures do you advocate so that workers/employees/agents/entrepreneurs, who can no longer continue in the activities that you have eliminated, are able to facilitate the transition to other activities?” [11] High Life (2018), directed by Claire Denis, is set in a dystopian future where convicts are involuntarily sent to explore deep space in space ships designed by the Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson. In 2018, with more idealism, Elon Musk launched Enoch, a satellite by the Bahamian artist Tavares Strachan, into space. The artwork is a 24-karat gold urn featuring a bust of Robert Henry Lawrence Jr., the first African-American NASA-trained astronaut. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/13/arts/design/spacex-enoch-tavares-strachan.html , accessed June 22, 2020. [12] The list goes on. The police killed 1,098 people in America in 2019. https://mappingpoliceviolence.org/ , accessed on June 22, 2020. [13] Number of weeks varies by state. https://www.cbpp.org/research/economy/policy-basics-how-many-weeks-of-unemployment-compensation-are-available , accessed on June 18, 2020. [14] Realizing that state and government had money in their coffers to sustain monetary assistance to curtail a financial crisis but not to help struggling communities with education and healthcare is also a provocation. [15] We have decades of work by the HIV/AIDS activists to thank for its frank, clear, and non-judgmental tone. No rimming please. https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-sex-guidance.pdf , accessed June 22, 2020. [16] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/07/technology/coronavirus-internet-use.html , accessed June 22, 2020. [17] https://www.theverge.com/2020/4/30/21242421/zoom-300-million-users-incorrect-meeting-participants-statement , accessed on June 22, 2020. [18] Police across America have arrested and detained peaceful protestors and members of the press. As an effort to curtail looting, but let’s be real, in an effort to assuage protests, New York City implemented a city-wide curfew during the first week of June. In our fifth week of protesting the slogan Whose Streets! Our Streets! still rings loud. https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/protesters-rights/ , accessed June 22, 2020. Previous Next
- The Sustainable Museum | WCSCD
< Back The Sustainable Museum Ljubljana 12 Apr 2020 Zdenka Badovinac Drawing by Nika Ham In September 2018, I wrote “My Post-Catastrophic Glossary” ( [ My Post-catastrophic Glossary , 305–326]), which was in essence a kind of glossary of memory relating to my professional work. At the time, I never dreamed that, a year or so later, a pandemic would force museums into a situation not unlike what I was describing in my glossary. The key questions that stand behind the entries in the glossary, which were illustrated by the artist (and Moderna galerija museum guard) Nika Ham, are: How should museums function in times of extreme limitations? and, How can we create fairer and more equal cultural exchanges on the global scale? The impact of the pandemic is already apparent: museums all over the world are reporting enormous losses. The world’s major museums are facing huge drops in revenues, in some cases as much as several hundred thousand euros a week. Big international exhibitions are being cancelled, because, given insurance issues, the redistribution of public funds, and scheduling conflicts, preparations are too risky for these times. A museum’s revenue losses are nominally proportional to its financial strength: institutions with an annual budget of €10 million or more are seeing losses of several millions, while the Moderna galerija, which receives €2 million annually, foresees in one month “only” some €18,000 less than in “normal” times. Despite these numbers, institutions with smaller budgets will draw the short straw. Not only are museum activities affected, but, everywhere, so are the people who work at museums, both salaried employees and, most severely, their external co-workers, who almost overnight are finding themselves out of work. Small-budget institutions, which themselves are barely able to breathe, cannot do very much to help such workers. But at the Moderna galerija, we are at least drawing attention to the ever more precarious position of our external co-workers through the project Several Flies at One Blow , in which we have continued to employ a number of our museum guards/students for a while longer by having them deliver food and other necessities to artists infected with the coronavirus and our pensioners. Also, like many other museums, we quickly developed several online projects, most of which link to our collections and archives but there are some that also respond to the current situation. Of course, everyone is wondering how long the pandemic will last and what its long-term consequences will be. Museums will undoubtedly have to operate under greatly altered conditions. It will be probably be some time before we are again able to go to openings, greet each other with friendly hugs, and exchange our impressions face to face. And almost certainly, we will be working under worse conditions than we did before; even now our funders are advising us to focus primarily on our collections and archives, in other words, what we have under our own roof. And what about artists? How in the future will we be able to support them and other threatened groups – not only professionals such as writers, translators, and designers, but also refugees, the homeless, and other marginalized communities? For a long time now, museums have been more than just places for housing and presenting art; they have become important sites for critical discourse, social sensitivity and solidarity, and the imagining of a better future. Certainly, the catastrophe in which we now find ourselves is also an opportunity to think about an even stronger social role for the museum. At a time when public space is reduced to balconies and windows and we are increasingly becoming captives of the virtual world, museums should be contemplating an even more active social role for themselves. The fact that the economic aspect of our work will only become more difficult obliges us to think about and propose an alternative economy, an economy of solidarity, one that is based not primarily on a market economy but on the direct exchange of services and the results of work, as well as donations. Museum associations throughout the world are warning governments that funds must be made available for the revitalization of museums after the present crisis. Italy’s museums, for example, have recently asked the Italian government to establish a National Fund for Culture. It is also incumbent on us to refocus the priorities within our existing programmes. Living artists must come first; we must develop acquisition funds intended primarily for working artists and in this way help them to survive. It is necessary to respect our resources, not just in terms of our collections and archives but also in terms of people – everyone with whom we collaborate and together produce meaning for our work. For the most part, these are people from our own environment, from the environment in which our museum is situated, but also from the environments of our “trans-situatedness”, by which I mean all the spaces where people work with whom we join in the effort to respond to the dilemmas of the global world. Through our “trans-situatedness” we can develop more equitable exchanges of ideas on the global level. All these things are conditions of the “sustainable museum”, which, indeed, is one of the entries in “My Post-Catastrophic Glossary”. But I first wrote about the sustainable museum in connection with the exhibition Low-Budget Utopias , which was drawn from the Moderna galerija’s own collections. Among other things, I presented a diagram showing four museum models (besides the sustainable museum, there was also the universal museum, the global museum, and the meta-museum). The essence of the sustainable museum is that it actively operates within the framework of a certain community and does this by working with others – with artists, various kinds of stakeholders, and socially engaged groups, individuals, and organizations – people who, in the L’Internationale confederation of museums, we refer to as “constituencies”. The constituencies of a museum are those resources without whom the museum, as a museum of its time, could no longer survive today. It goes without saying that the sustainable museum is also a “green” museum, but more than this, it is first and foremost a museum of its constituencies, for whom and with whom it is continually transforming. The sustainable museum, therefore, lives the same life as its community, who are shaped by a multitude of constantly changing relationships and interests. The sustainable museum is grounded in the resources of its environment, in people and their work, and in nature, and as such it connects with other environments. It does not address its public from any exalted position of expertise with only the “weapons” of its collections and archives; on the contrary, it is open to interaction. In “My Post-Catastrophic Glossary” I describe a situation in which all museums have been destroyed, along with their collections and archives. Only people and their memories remain. And these are not just the memories of the experts, but also those of museum guards, visitors, and everyone else. Maybe one of the priorities of the post-pandemic museum should be work on developing a future collective memory that will include all of the museum’s constituencies. Translated by Rawley Grau Click to read Slovenian version Zdenka Badovinac is a curator and writer, who has served since 1993 as Director of the Moderna galerija in Ljubljana. Previous Next
- The stories behind the lockdown: Kazakhstan against Corona | WCSCD
< Back The stories behind the lockdown: Kazakhstan against Corona 28 July 2020 Anvar Musrepov During the quarantine, Kazakhstan became the first country in the world to return to a full lockdown in a post-Soviet authoritarian manner. On March 19, lagging two weeks behind the actions of EU countries, quarantine was announced in Kazakhstan. Schools, universities, and shopping centers were closed. Armored soldiers with military equipment and machine guns were placed in front of city entrances, as police checked all passerby’s, asking each person about their purpose for simply walking. Considering the low number of coronavirus cases at the time, many people agreed that the government reacted with unreasonably strict protocols. There were few infected patients, yet the military marked those territories, cordoned off neighborhoods at the foci of infection, and in some cases even sealed entrance doors to apartment complexes containing dozens of residents. Kazakhstani citizens didn’t have the opportunity to go outside, exercise or even go for a walk. Quarantine adopted an extremely totalitarian style, and for many, it seemed that the Coronavirus was merely an allowance for the performance of an authoritarian power. The special local consciousness of people, based on the mythological perception of reality, gave rise to a large stream of fake news: from disinfection through a pagan shamanic ritual of fumigating the space with sacred grass, to conspiracy theories denying the existence of Coronavirus, and connecting the quarantine with the prolonged transition of power in the country. Back in the Soviet period, political mythology was a part of the folk art. The Kazakh state system of making decisions behind closed doors lead to a conspiracy vision of the world among many of its citizens. One of these myths, for example, tells of secret meetings in the underground halls of the President’s palace, where Nazarbayev conducts mystical rituals with the cabinet of ministers, before levitating at the moment of worship. The mythologization of power and undermined trust also impacted the effectiveness of the information campaign of COVID-19, leading many people to simply deny the existence of the virus, linking the quarantine to political manipulation. For a local economy built on the sale of crude oil, the beginning of the quarantine also marked the beginning of an economic crisis, caused by negotiations between Russia and the OPEC+ countries to limit oil production. The lack of work due to quarantine was accompanied by a sharp fall of the national currency, and an increase in the prices of goods and services. Under these conditions, the art community of Central Asia consolidated and created an alternative art market within a Facebook group. Initiated by Kyrgyz artist, Meder Akhmetov, Art Bazaar was inspired by the Russian community, Ball and Cross ( Шар и Крест ), but with a focus on artists from the Central Asian region. The principle of this self-organized art market resembles the schemes of financial pyramids common in the 1990s. When selling a certain number of works, a requirement is to purchase other art from the online bazaar, as well as transfer several works to the fund. In this way, artists bought and sold works from each other, creating a self-organized environment of collective care, while effectively excluding galleries and art market middlemen. It is fair to say that as such, the art market, as well as the institutional environment within the Central Asian region, is still in the process of formation.So-called underground art in Soviet times emerged from cramped apartment exhibitions with the fall of the Iron Curtain in the 90s. The state, inheriting the Soviet mentality, has never represented culture by itself, and thought of art only in connection with the goals of biased propaganda. Artistic ideas that do not respond to the cultivation of sports or strengthening patriotism, won’t find their place among the bureaucratic “argumentation” of projects. The legacy of the Soviet art education which focused on socialist realism continues to present a major issue in academies and art schools. For a long time in these conditions, the community of artists developing an alternative to conservative art, in which the driving force were not institutions or the art market, but the enthusiasm of the community itself, remained in the margins. Art Bazaar But Art Bazaar was not the only reaction of the art community to the new reality of the pandemic. The curator of the Artcom platform, Aigerim Kapar, organized open workshops with a Georgian artist, Wato Tsereteli. Participants practiced collective drawing, which later resulted in a virtual exhibition organized by the participants themselves, presenting a webpage with the results. Kyrgyz curator, Aida Sulova, conducted an educational program with children. The final works were accompanied by audio messages from authors, and were also presented in the virtual halls of the Artstep platform. I also decided to invest my part in the #stayhome movement and created an exhibition on the iada-art.org website; my idea was that an online exhibition should not mimic a real space, but could well remain in the webpage format, at the same time using the logic of an exposition construction. The name of the exhibition, Cybernomadism , reflected its main theme of examining the future from a decolonial perspective through the nomadic Kazakh culture. On the animated deforming grid background as a basic form of a space markup, works of 8 artists respond to the idea of technological utopia in the Kazakhstani context. Cybernomadism A. Kasteyev State Museum of Arts , which before the quarantine was a fairly conservative institution, has also gone through a transformation associated with the need to continue working online. The main exposition of the museum consists of Socialist realism paintings, and exhibitions of contemporary art were rarely held, unless in conjunction with other institutions. The need for a presence in the media prompted the museum staff to create exhibitions and record video tours. Realizing quickly that traditional art did not attract a new audience on the internet, museum curators quickly changed their strategy and began to focus on contemporary art. One such exhibition, dedicated to Rustam Khalfin, an artist who is often described as one of Central Asia’s contemporary art pioneers, was the first in the last 20 years. Isolation and a complete transition to online platforms have made many processes more transparent. This undoubtedly also influenced culture, as state museums moved away from the representation of the discourse of power and turned to the audience. While the media space repeated like a mantra that “the world will never be the same”, by the end of April people were allowed to go for a walk, and by the end of May, cafes and shopping centers had begun to open. Simultaneously, repatriation flights were organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Kazakh embassies in different countries. Because of the bureaucracy and the general situation, many had to wait for two months to return. After arriving home, people were signed to a 14 day self-isolation, but no appropriate supervision was conducted and the arrival of citizens took place before getting out of hand. Towards the end of June, the situation changed dramatically and got out of control. The dissidents’ opinion changed, and arguments such as, “show at least one patient,” ceased to flash on social networks. Instead, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and all other social media platforms became filled with requests for help; people looked for medicine, advice, or tried to call for ambulances. Subsequently, the Coronavirus hotline and paramedical services were left immobile due to overload. Hospitals stopped accepting patients, and even the simplest antipyretic drugs were in short supply. Pharmaceutical humanitarian aid from different countries were sold through corrupt channels at inflated prices. No more advertising was needed. The virus had touched every family in the country, and even Nazarbayev himself became ill. The media space became filled with obituaries of deceased celebrities, politicians, and relatives. Huge queues of people spilled out of employment centers and morgues, despite the danger of infection. On July 5, Kassym – Jomart Tokayev, the new president, conducted an online conference wearing a mask, in order to announce a second lockdown. Later it was revealed that the shortage of drugs and overpricing were associated with corruption within the Ministry of Health, and several high-ranking officials were removed from their positions. After almost a month, the situation with drug supplies stabilized, and several new field hospitals have been opened. Statistics of deaths from pneumonia, after a long period of denial, nevertheless, were combined with the statistics of deaths from coronavirus. Now, people are used to wearing masks, and they are much less likely to sabotage quarantine rules, but many still hold secret weddings and funerals, despite the strict measures (which includes imprisonment for 10 years). Kazakhstan was the first country in the world to return to a full lockdown. When the private becomes public, and health issues are no longer too personal a topic for discussion, the local becomes global and the deadly second wave in Kazakhstan is, in essence, a threatening warning to the entire world. Anvar Musrepov is an artist and curator from Almaty, Kazakhstan. Previous Next
- Bishkek – Addis Ababa, notes from the journey through space and time | WCSCD
< Back Bishkek – Addis Ababa, notes from the journey through space and time Addis Ababa 28 May 2020 Gulnara Kasmalieva & Muratbek Djumaliev Our trip to Ethiopia for a partner institutions meeting happened at the beginning of February 2020, at the time when coronavirus began to spread globally. It added some extreme flavour to our trip, but we did not expect that a real extreme for us would begin upon arrival to Addis Ababa airport when the border guards refused to grant us a tourist visa. After a long negotiation with officers, we realized that it was our fault. We were not careful in our research of internet sources, which were pointing out that citizens of Post Soviet countries are granted tourist visas upon arrival at the airport. Actually, we’ve missed important information: only Russians are allowed to obtain a visa upon arrival, and the rest of all Post Soviet countries were excluded from this list, for unknown reasons. Finally, we were recommended to apply for an online visa despite official information from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ethiopia that the visa takes three days to be made. But we were so exhausted by the 24 hours trip and endless negotiations that we were ready to be stuck in the airport to wait for our visas, just like Viktor Navorski (Tom Hanks), the protagonist in The Terminal movie. Having had a hard time finding Internet access in the lounge, we applied for an online visa at night, taking urgent photos of each other and passport copies on our smartphones and fell asleep immediately in the lounge… We were awakened by a crowd of tourists arriving with early morning flights. Hopeless, we decided to check the status of our online visa applications, and, thank God – found the visa approval notice! The operation took just several hours! We passed passport control in a half an hour without any problems and were at the hotel by 9 in the morning, where we happily met Biljana Ciric, curator of the project As you go… This case made us think about how despite globalization and multiple similarities of contexts, cultural ties between Africa and Central Asia are almost invisible today. Our knowledge about Ethiopia, fragmented and partly based on African diary written by Russian poet Nikolay Gumilev in 1913, and our memory of 1970-80s when African military pilots, and Ethiopians amongst them, walked down the streets of Frunze [1] . We knew they were from a pilot school in a suburb of the Capital of Kyrgyz Republic. News on Soviet TV usually began with a story about official delegations from different countries, and it was often about the visits of African leaders. The words “friendship and collaboration”, “countries of non- alignment movement” [2] , “dear comrade Mengistu Haile Mariam” [3] , “brotherly support”, were part of a routine discourse on the three Soviet TV channels. Later, during our study in Soviet art academies in Moscow and Saint Petersburg, we met African students and gained some knowledge about the real situation in Ethiopia at that time. The collapse of Socialist Bloc [4] dramatically affected our histories, breaking already thin connections between our realities. The term “The Third World” became our commonality in one day. This somehow explains the absence of visible connections between Africa and Central Asia today: South-South traces are no more relevant in capitalism. Limited intersections between these parts of the World raised a certain amount of ignorance and clichés. During our preliminary online research on Ethiopia in particular, there were many recommendations on the health situation there. These included the requirement of quite expensive yellow fever vaccination, strict hygiene on arrival and use of purchased drinking water only. The justification of this kind of “Western” attitude towards the local context is a common occurrence in our economics and culture. Our visit to the National Museum of Ethiopia raised controversial emotions of awareness of a unique place, and example of modernist architecture. At the same time, it made us dive into dark thoughts about the similarities of poor conditions of museums in both of our countries. Neither the famous Luci [5] , the proof of cradle of mankind in Africa in the collection of the museum in Addis Ababa, nor Golden Collection in State Historical Museum in Bishkek [6] , the former Museum of Lenin, recently renovated but constantly postponed to open due to corruption scandals, could not hide a real sad situation with the official cultural policy in Ethiopia and Kyrgyzstan. National Museum of Ethiopia “Luci” Mifte Zeleke, who is in charge, as a director and curator, of Guramayne Art Centre, became a guide during our four days in Addis. Guramayne is a typical space familiar to our art scene. There are several institutions of this type in Bishkek and one of them is our organization, ArtEast. It is grass rooted, low budget, co-working, exhibition space and art studios. Guramayne is located in a two-floor house made of volcanic stones and a mixture of mud and straw – our favourite ancient construction technology spread over huge territories of Africa and Asia. Our group, together with Biljana Ciric, initiator of the partner institution meeting in Addis Ababa, and Zdenka Badovinac, director of the Moderna galerija in Ljubljana, was introduced to artists in an art residency at Guramayne Art Centre. We were completely impressed by the art that we have seen there, especially by the work of Tamrat Gezahegne. Guramayne Art Centre Studio of Tamrat Gezahegne The Guramayne Centre became our space for discussions about visions of the project As you go… , about contexts of Balkans, Ethiopia, Central Asia and China. During the meeting, participants defined our main commonalities like the socialist legacy, non-alignment movement, new geopolitical settings, agents of our own culture. Days were busy with doing interviews, screenings of videos and partner’s presentations. As you go… roads under your feet, towards the new future project and partner presentation, Guramayne Art Centre Performance by remarkable Ethiopian artist Robel Temesgen. There was some time to visit an exhibition of contemporary art in Modern Art Museum of Gebre Kristos Desta Center [7] named after Ethiopian modernist artist educated in Germany and University in the former Palace of Haile Selassie [8] . Top: Modern Art Museum Bottom: Guenete Leul Palace Visiting the Art Academy in Addis Ababa reminded us of official art education in Kyrgyzstan, based on a mixture of western modernist style and “socialist realism” remained since Soviet time. This kind of education is typical for most Post-Soviet territory, except Baltic countries. During the last 30 years, art education in Kyrgyzstan still does not accept contemporary art and western post-war version of art history. Addis Ababa Art Academy On the way to the next meeting, we managed to find a time to visit a local bazaar, taste the national dish “injera” [9] and, of course, famous Ethiopian coffee! Local Bazaar In the late evening, we visited Fendika Cultural Center [10] . It is a combination of a jazz club, exhibition space and a pub, with the high quality of music and visual art. We went there twice: the first time with our group, to listen to jazz, and the second time with Mifte Zeleke, just to look at the process of exhibition installation. We had a chance to be at the preview of Surafel Amare panting solo show. The entrance of Fendika Cultural Center Exhibition settings During our conversation with Mifte, he mentioned that Guramayne Art Centre will most probably be demolished, due to its positioning on the riverside, one of the areas that are a part of the new controversial plan initiated by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed [11] . Officially called Beautifying Sheger [12] , the project runs along the rivers Entoto and Akaki, developing 56km of green spaces. The project aims to clean up these rivers, make the city a model of green development in the process, construct concrete walls, bridges and plant regular parks with a new infrastructure. But it is still far from the real sustainable development of the city infrastructure, due to many reasons. One of them is a critical situation with the pollution of the river and seasonal difference of the flow. Another big concern is ignorance of the voice of inhabitants of the riverside. Riverside development area next to the Guramayne Art Centre Our group saw the construction of the riverside during the long walk from the National Museum with Helen Zeru, an impressive young performance artist. An endless green iron fence along the road interrupted by the standard white plate of China Aid [13] . 12km section of the 56km project, as the first phase of the project, will be built by the China Communications Construction Company (CCCC) [14] with a grant secured from the Chinese Government. Riverside construction area Other ambitious plans to erect the highest skyscraper in Africa, invested and developed by China Jiangxi Corporation [15] for International Economic and Technical Cooperation [16] . This situation is now typical for Kyrgyzstan too. The building of the roads in our country is also mainly invested in, and implemented by Chinese companies. This often does not follow basic ecological terms. For instance, Bishkek city administration has cut down thousands of trees just to enlarge city roads, without notification or discussion with the public. Ironically, by the warning of urban activists, it would not solve the problem of traffic jams. By statistics, enlarging roads would only increase the number of cars in the city. Besides, trees that have been planted in the city over the last century solved the problems of semi-desert climate and protected against city pollution. This movement of planting trees in Bishkek began at the end of the 19th century, during the colonization of Central Asia by the Russian empire. It was obligatory for every citizen of the town to plant and take care of 25 trees nearby its house. Regular planning of the county town, including parks and the irrigation system, was established in the late 19th and early 20th century. This process continued in Soviet time by building new parks and botanical gardens. The more careful and thoughtful case of development of the riverside is the project of Zoma museum. It is a private project and it looks like a very well organized oasis in a quite chaotic life and landscape of Addis Ababa. Zoma Museum The owners of the museum, curator Meskerem Asseguedand artist Elias Sime completely changed the landscape of polluted riverside: they took out tons of waste from the ground and brought new soil to plant a garden. They followed principles of permaculture [17] , our favourite philosophy of working with nature. Thoughtfully organized irrigation canals, planted bushes, herbs, vegetables and fruits trees, buildings including a gallery, café, library, museum shop, a school for children, amphitheatre and cowshed are parts of the ecosystem. The style of the buildings is based on vernacular architecture, the surface made of mud and straw in a very capricious manner. Together with landscape design, all have some special charm. Zoma Museum Partners meeting in Zoma Museum library with Sarah Bushra and Sinkneh Eshetu We had our last group meeting in a cosy library with Sinkneh Eshetu, the remarkable Ethiopian writer and Sarah Bushra, a multi-disciplinary artist and writer. Having had lunch in the Museum’s cafe, it was possible to order tee with fresh Lemon Verbena directly cut from the garden – a combination of tropical and mountainous climate in Addis Ababa allowed growing multip plants almost all year round. Our last days were surprisingly spiced up with Bekele Mekonnen and Eshetu Tiruneh Feleke, two Ethiopian peers from Surikov art academy [18] in the 1980s. Both of them succeeded in art but in different directions. One of them is a successful sculptor and performance artist; another one is a former employee of the Ministry of Culture and currently dedicated director of Enlightenment Art Academy. The meeting was emotional, nostalgic and thoughtful. It was like a real journey through space and time. Interviews with Bekele and Eshetu allowed us to learn more about the post-socialist history of Ethiopia, about their challenges and desires. In Bekele Mekonnen studio Visiting Eshetu Tiruneh Feleke Gulnara Kasmalieva and Muratbek Djumaliev are artists and curators from Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. [1] Frunze is a former name of Bishkek during the Soviet period and the capital of Kyrgyz Republic. [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-Aligned_Movement [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mengistu_Haile_Mariam [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Bloc [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucy_(Australopithecus) [6] https://24.kg/english/80929_Opening_of_Historical_Museum_in_Bishkek_repeatedly_postponed_/ [7] http://www.gebrekristosdestacenter.org/ [8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Palace_(Ethiopia) [9] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Injera [10] https://fendika.org/about [11] https://www.climatechangenews.com/2020/03/12/addis-ababa-riverside-project-gives-priority-development-resident [12] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beautifying_Sheger [13] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_Aid [14] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_Communications_Construction [15] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jiangxi_International [16] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_Shandong_International_Economic_%26_Technical_Cooperation_Group [17] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permaculture [18] http://www.china.org.cn/top10/2014-02/07/content_31394806_3.htm Previous Next
- School-In-Isolation | WCSCD
< Back School-In-Isolation Isolated in Bishkek 18 Apr 2020 Bermet Borubaeva Kyrgyzstan is a small country of the post-soviet bloc, impacted by corruption, where one third of the population lives at or below the poverty line. Many people live day-to-day without savings, on as little as $30-$50 USD per month, and there is no governmental support for low-income families. One third of the GDP derives from the wages of workers who have migrated to Russia to earn money to send home to their families in Kyrgyzstan. Intellectual workers, freelancers and artists face similar issues as other vulnerable workers as their employment is often precarious and irregular, with income often dependent on foreign grants and international projects. Kyrgyzstan went into isolation mode after confirmation that three pilgrims who came back from Saudi Arabia on 12 March 2020 tested positive for COVID-19. Very soon all schools, universities, and private companies (except for enterprises of strategic supply, shops, pharmacies) were closed and transformed for distant work. The government declared a State of Emergency and closed the borders. People were only allowed to go to shops and pharmacies during the day, with a night-time curfew from 8pm to 7am until 14 April, however this has now been extended until the end of April. Visiting the park for some exercise. The sports parks in Bishkek are almost empty. 4.4.2020 In the beginning there was some kind of euphoria, people were not used to sitting at home and not going to work and school – usually this is only possible during New Year vacations when, for one week, we stay at home most of the time, meet with friends, eat and drink. But this is not Happy New Year and Christmas time. Most of the time, workers are busy at work and don’t have the opportunity to stay home with their families and dedicate time to reading books, hobbies or cleaning. I think it would be nice if people had access to a universal basic income for this period and could just use the time to reboot. The parking spaces near my apartment are full. Everyone sits at home. 24.3.2020 I had been very busy for the past six months, including exhibitions, many street rallies, protests and rights protection activities. And in one moment it all stopped. It was as though almost everything I was working for as an arts professional or activist became useless somehow. I had no idea how to behave, what to do, and how I could help. Initially, I was just travelling along the tracks as I had before, working on current projects as if nothing had changed, even though I knew this route had already been disconnected. I find it difficult to be optimistic about the current situation – without a universal basic income and with the corruption of the government, I feel it is impossible to solve this situation adequately to avoid a deep human crisis. For the past 7 years I lived in Moscow but returned to Bishkek for the exhibition “ Death. Yearning. Love ” by Laboratory CI that opened in November 2019. During my stay in Bishkek, I attended the Conference of Green Mobility, where I learned that Bishkek had the highest air pollution rating in the world, which lead to my decision to move back to Bishkek and join the Green Party and run in the parliamentary elections in October. I was also aware that there was no plan for a new group of students in the ArtEast School of Contemporary Art, so I decided to take on the role of coordinator to ensure that the school would continue. The view from my apartment window. 10.4.2020 ArtEast was founded in 2002 by Gulnara Kasmalieva and Muratbek Djumaliev founded, with the aim of developing the contemporary art scene in Central Asia in various ways, including through the curation of international exhibitions and arts festivals, creating artworks, and conducting educational projects. ArtEast’s School of Contemporary Art launched in 2009 and I was part of the first group of students to attend. The school was non-formal, with the aim of providing an introduction to art history and expanding the worldview of students. After graduating, we did many projects together, with some of the students moving into filmmaking, design etc, and some founding their own institutions. My desire to keep the school going was inspired by research that took place during the What Could Should Curating Do? curatorial program in Belgrade last year, when I was a participant of the program. The research focused on the informal education program “School of History and Theory of Images” that was initiated 20 years ago in Belgrade by curators and theoreticians and made a huge impact on the art scene. Thinking about this school, I realised how important it is to keep art schools and programs running. This year, the school evolved to include a curatorial team consisting of the founders and a number of graduates and their own platforms – Gulnara Kasmalieva and Muratbek Djumaliev (founders), Alima Tokmergenova and Oksana Kapishnikova (ArtBus), Kanaiym Kydyralieva, Ravshan Ta Djing, Diana Ukhina ( Laboratoria CI ), Nellya Djamanbaeva ( Capacity Building Foundation ) and Bermet Borubaeva ( Cooperative PreobraZHenskiy ). We even had three spaces to conduct classes in – the underground space of Laboratory CI, the ArtEast Studio, and our partners Ololohouse. We had lessons every Sunday, lasting between 3-5 hours, with sandwiches, fruits and sweets, and, several times, someone cooking for the group. It is an ArtEast school tradition to gather and celebrate holidays together. We had planned to organise an informal party in the style of Dada but were not able to do so before the quarantine began. As we do not have any governmental or non-governmental educational institutions in the sphere of contemporary art and culture the school is very important for the region. We do not receive any state funding, asking students to pay a small fee (approx. $70USD for the whole 5-month program) to cover basic expenditures, which gives us the opportunity to keep the school autonomous and to continue without any grants. This year’s group of students were excited to be learning about contemporary art. Some of our students had a background in art, while others did not, but we saw this as a good thing as we wanted to have a multidisciplinary program. Among the students we have musicians, an IT specialist, architects, designers, a Yoga trainer, criminalist, feminists and urban activists, anthropologist, teacher, philosopher and even medical worker. We had a really nice atmosphere every time we met, with students involved in a number of projects before the quarantine began, such as the exhibition-protest #BishkekSmog 20.02.2020 against air pollution, in front of Parliament House. Some of the students were involved in working on an exhibition to take place inside a bus, called “Kiyinky Aiyaldama” (“Next Station” in Kyrgyz language), curated by student Rada Valentina Kyzy and two curators of the course – myself and Oksana Kapishnikova. We had permission from the city Mairie, had selected works through an open-call, and had the opening planned for March 29. The exhibition has been postponed, rather than being moved online. For the ArtEast School it was tradition to make informal parties together, celebrating New Year or other events and we, with the students, had planned to make a party in the style of Warhol’s Factory or Surrealist’s dreams, but has not been able to happen yet. For the School, we made the decision to shift to an online format even before isolation officially started, after the students requested this, and in order to provide security for everyone. The first online session of the school was extremely complicated as nobody was used to such a format – the noises, the order for people to speak, lack of eye-contact and direct attention for speakers, microphones switched off, people out of visibility of their cameras, and so on. However, one of the positives to come out of this new format is the possibility of inviting guests from other countries to participate in the school and conduct lectures and discussions. Knowing this, we added a fourth topic to the program. In addition to Modern Art, Contemporary Art and Contemporary Art in Central Asia, we have added Meetings with International Curators and Theoreticians. In this way, we have been able to move beyond the borders, even when the borders are closed. School activities before the quarantine began – discussing the “Next Station” exhibition that has now had to be postponed. 9.2.2020 Lessons have now moved online, which has taken time for everyone to adjust to. 1.4.2020 The question of one of our students – what is the final result of our school now? – is very poignant. We have very little understanding of how things will be after all of this ends – what the role of artists will be, how they will be able to impact society etc. But for the moment, all we can do is develop our imagination and use a critical approach. We had planned, as the final stage of the achool program, for students to participate in our Festival of Public Art, “TRASH III”, dedicated to environmental pollution, and held in the ‘Straw-bricks Belt’ of Bishkek’s Novostroikas, where there is no infrastructure or arts events. As part of this, we planned to hold a workshop-laboratory event called “Art of Co-participation”, conducted by Anton Valkovsky (a curator from Volgograd/Berlin). He has said that it’s better to conduct this workshop offline, rather than trying to change it for an online platform, and so we have postponed the workshop and the festival for an indefinite period. Online Zoom Lesson: Moscow Conceptualism. 29.3.2020 Online Zoom Lesson: From Sculpture to Installation. Muratbek Djumaliev showing Festival of Public art Art Prospect. 5.4.2020 Another ArtEast project is the construction of an energy-efficient Residency building at the famous lake Issyk-kul, working with local community. It is important for our ArtEast community to decentralize art practices and run projects outside the capital. Spring is the time to plant trees, to work with the earth, to mobilize the community and collaborate in these ways. We had also discussed plans to organise students to hold some workshops or a festival at the lake. But now the road to the Issyk-kul region is closed and there is no possibility to work in that part of the country. The salary from the TRASH III festival was to be my main source of income, so now I find myself with no income for the foreseeable future. I live with my family – my mom and grandmother – and my mother, a hairdresser, has almost finished working as hair salons are not allowed now. We have only pensions, which are very small in Kyrgyzstan, but we are very privileged because we have our flat that we live in. If not, it would be extremely tough now. My brother just went to Moscow to work in a taxi service to send money back, but the percentage of the promised salary is extremely low now and he has to work for Yandex.taxi (like Uber), with his earnings only covering food expenses. There are millions of migrant workers in Russia who send money back to families in the Central Asian regions and I am very sad because it is now the only income for many Kyrgyz families and these workers will be exposed to even more exploitation than before as they try to find any job in any conditions. There are some discussions among art practitioners in Kyrgyzstan about how isolation can affect the country in general and us. Our museums and art institutions have started to open their archives and make e-shows. Meder Akhmetov from ‘Studio Museum’ suggested to open an e-gallery to support artists. Many art practitioners are just staying calm and working on their projects waiting for when the current situation ends. Some said that in such situations they think it is better to live in a country other that Kyrgyzstan – if you catch the virus here, you are almost incurable, you’re on your own and, even if you do the right thing and stay inside, there are no social guarantees or support from the State. Actually, so many people have already migrated and those who stayed were mostly those who wanted to work on developing culture, however given the current situation, maybe they will change their minds and decide to migrate too. I cannot image that it is possible for such a large-scale pandemic to disappear in the next few months. I believe that after the quarantine period ends, people will still be afraid to go out and will remain at home if possible, so many online activities will continue. Even now, activity in Bishkek has not completely stopped – someone has started online art challenge and online art schools, such as the School of Artistic Gesture in Kazakhstan. We have even had our first experience of an online exhibition – our annual event, 1st April Art Competition – where works were exhibited online and the jury even published a play-discussion of the selection process in a Whatsapp chat group. As for me, my life has not really changed a lot except that I am not going out. Work is progressing, there is still a schedule of meetings (albeit e-meetings) and the same deadlines, and so I just keep going. I will continue to work on my art ideas and now just have more time to write the concept and programs, apply for financing and find partners. I believe more now in what I am doing in art and my other activities in relation to drawing attention to global risks of environment pollution. I would like to experience more live practices in art like gardening or cooking, cooperating, saving. The dream is to create space as a prototype for an alternative way of living, and perhaps now, for the next half a year at least, we can start to build this platform. Class preparation involves a special guest now. 29.3.2020 I have also started home improvements, which are going very slowly. 6.4.2020 Bermet Borubaeva is an artist and activist from Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. Previous Next
- THE CULTURAL INTERWEAVING OF CHINA AND THE BALKANS: A TEXTUAL ANALYSIS OF ARTISTIC EXCHANGES UNDER THE BRI | WCSCD
< Back THE CULTURAL INTERWEAVING OF CHINA AND THE BALKANS: A TEXTUAL ANALYSIS OF ARTISTIC EXCHANGES UNDER THE BRI 3 Nov 2021 Marija Glavaš This text is the second in a series of close studies examining the cultural exchanges between China and the Balkan region under the BRI, taking art [events and exchanges] as its main focal point. In the first text , I focused on the ambitions and challenges of artistic exchanges in general, using contemporary Slovenia as an example of bad praxis. In this text, I will focus on Chinese art and provide a textual analysis of some artifacts and archives from the events and exhibitions previously mapped in my first contribution. As an anthropology student, I however lack the proper knowledge and tools to read these images adequately. Thus, I held an open-ended interview with colleagues Xu Tiantian and Ke Qiwen from Rockbund Art Museum and Nikita Yingqian Cai from Times Museum. Both of these museums are committed to presenting and researching contemporary art and they are partners of the As you go… inquiry. They have deep insight into the contemporary art context of China that I am learning about. Together we have read some of the images and they kindly shared their personal thoughts on these projects with me. I must note that these museums did not participate in any such projects under the BRI – most of the analyzed exchanges were happening through public Chinese institutions. As stated in the introductory text my main question was whether these exchanges live up to their potential of shifting away from classical national narratives and providing a common ground for different cultural identities. Before we dwell on the individual artifacts, events, and exchanges it is important to understand the context in which they are taking place. The BRI is mostly known for Chinese infrastructure investments in Asia, Africa, and (Central and Eastern) Europe. It is an initiative that is striving for both economic growth and economic connectivity amongst participating countries. These activities are usually in the spotlight raising both praise and condemnation. However, these investments are not the only activities under the BRI. Another important aspect of it are the artistic and cultural exchanges which are rarely discussed, praised or criticized. This may appear trivial at first as most people simply consider art as a form of entertainment and not much more beyond that. Art, however, when shared internationally, plays an important role in our perceptions of one another – it has the power to bring us closer together, realize our common points, and appreciate our differences. Considering the ever-rising xenophobia this is not negligible. On the example of China specifically, we are currently witnessing a concerning growth of hate towards the country and its people because of the Covid-19 pandemic. The novel coronavirus outbreak that could’ve happened anywhere played perfectly not just into many stereotypical narratives about the Chinese people, but also into political conspiracy theories brought up by cold war propaganda. These feelings of hate are not coincidental – they are the product of intentional alienation, lack of cultural worldliness, and apathy towards who we consider an Other. In this context, intercultural artistic exchanges can help bridge the divide and this is what the artistic exchanges under the BRI are ought to do. Namely, the aim of these exchanges is to form deeper bonds amongst participating countries and their citizens. As noted in my first contribution where I mapped cross-institutional artistic exchanges between China and Balkan countries, it is overtly stated in most exhibitions that their goal is to bring their cultures closer together through knowledge and understanding. However, they [artistic exchanges] often appear as a mere political masquerade with no real content to them, as the images presented don’t really represent contemporary Chinese identities. This opens up very important questions – do they live up to their supposed potential? Are they adding to positive societal change? Is there space for improvement? Below are my thoughts after conducting a workshop with a few colleagues from the Rockbund Art Museum in Shanghai and Times Museum in Guangzhou who shared their impressions with me. Due to limited visual material not all exhibitions could be used. The first thing one notices when looking at these exhibitions is that they are heavily centered around tradition. For instance, let us look at the Chinese Festival of Lights held in Belgrade in 2020. “Chinese Festival of Lights”, picture by Đorđe Tomić, 2020 These lantern festivals appear to be some of the most popular Chinese exhibitions all around the world. The lanterns are placed as theme parks and as such attract audiences that wouldn’t necessarily enter museums and galleries, giving them much more reach than your usual exhibition. The concept of lantern festivals reaches back to ancient China, and while the lanterns exhibited in Belgrade don’t resemble traditional Chinese lanterns, they portray very characteristic Chinese symbols. We see dragons, bamboo, hand fans, pandas etc. These festivals aren’t necessarily bad for one’s first encounter with Chinese art, especially since they are very inviting for broader audiences, but they don’t provide much more substance than what the average person would already think about when thinking about China. “Exhibiton of Contemporary Chinese Painting”, picture by Tanjung/Tanja Valić, 2019 Even when we look at the exhibitions of contemporary artists, such as the Ink Imagery exhibition held in Kuća Legata (Belgrade) in 2019, we see a lot of traditional influences. While some techniques, shapes, and perspectives presented in this exhibition aren’t traditional, the symbolism is. In the picture above we see a waterfall, the red sun, and a pine tree. In the picture below we can see cherry blossoms and other floral symbols. All of these symbols are very common in traditional Chinese ink painting. For foreigners whose eyes aren’t trained in Chinese art these could easily be understood as classical Chinese paintings and not paintings created by contemporary artists. “Exhibition of Contemporary Chinese Painting”, picture by Tanjung/Tanja Valić, 2019 Such images are usually exhibited in state-owned institutions following narrow and strict narratives. From religious motives to mythological creatures – these paintings present an image of China that is very one-sided and static. We see a lot of bird-and-flower paintings and mountain-and-water paintings. Ever repeating compositions. We don’t get to see any diversity, just strictly canonical images, which have, through repetition, lost all of its meanings. Foreigners who are only subjected to this type of art very easily fall into the trap of thinking that this is all there is to China. And this is common to most of the Chinese art in these exhibitions held in the Balkan region. It is important to note that in the Balkan region, knowledge of Chinese art is very limited. We don’t see much of it exhibited in our museums and galleries, we don’t watch Chinese movies on television, we don’t hear Chinese music on the radio and we don’t learn about it extensively in schools. These limits make it hard to look at the art we do encounter critically. We don’t question the images that we see, the stories they are telling, and the gaps present in them. “Enthusiasm for Ink Wash Painting”, picture by T. Saletović, 2019 “Enthusiasm for Ink Wash Painting”, picture by T. Saletović, 2019 Some of the exhibitions were also historical in nature, showcasing historical art and important artifacts. Such exhibitions naturally bring tradition and historic culture closer to their audiences and for building intercultural understanding and empathy this is just as important as getting to know the contemporary identities, ideas, and characteristics. Yet, it seems that these historical images remain the only accessible knowledge of China and the Chinese people. Lord Baopu explains how to stay away from heat, 1644-1911, ink on silk It appears that what is provided in these artistic exchanges is just one fixed image of China. An image that hasn’t changed in ages, that’s full of gaps and that’s suppressing diversity. As such it cannot adequately represent Chinese identities, especially to foreigners who often lack the knowledge to separate reality from a constructed image. As mentioned above, in the Balkan region most people are very distanced from Chinese culture.They only discuss China in the context of politics which only distorts their views more. Exhibiting these ancient, historical, mythological and religious symbols furthers this mystification instead of providing knowledge and consequently enabling understanding. As Xu Tiantian, Ke Qiwen, and Nikita Yingqian Cai noted there is a big disconnect in these exhibitions from what China really is. There is not just one China and one Chinese identity. Based on carefully selected and distinctly narrated historical images, this forced oneness perfectly resembles classical nationalistic narratives, just served on a nicely decorated plate. This disconnect between representation and reality makes it hard for these exchanges to bridge the divide between the Balkan and Chinese people since knowledge always stays limited and carefully directed. To truly grasp the essence of a different culture the free transmission of knowledge is of utmost importance. And not just knowledge on history – also knowledge on the day-to-day lives of the Chinese people. In conclusion – these exhibitions, although presented as bridges between nations, only further promote nationalistic narratives. These may not enter the realms of radical nationalism, however, they also don’t surpass national conservatism. While the exhibitions held under the BRI provide audiences with entertaining and educational art, they don’t appear to fulfill their purpose of bridging the divide they acknowledge. Marija Glavaš , student of Culturology at the Faculty of Social Sciences in Ljubljana Previous Next