Credo Bonum Gallery - Sofia

presents

The Bulgarian Pavilion

curator: Svetlana Kuyumdzhieva

3–23 November 2011

Opening on 3 November 2011, Thu, 6:30 pm

Participants: ULTRAFUTURO, Raya Rayax/Rosie Eisor, Daniela Kostova/Miryana Todorova, Ayodele Arigbabu/Constanze Fischbeck/Daniel Kötter/Andreas Müller, Natalia Mount/Daniela Kostova, Lise Skou, Lora Dimova, Boryana Ventzislavova, Natasha Kyupova, Patricia Reed, Kamen Stoyanov, Iv Toshain and architects Valeri Gyurov, Petar Zaharinov, Iassen Markov.

In sync with the closure of the 54.Venice Biennalein November 2011, the Bulgarian Pavilion opens in Bulgaria.

The Bulgarian Pavilion project started in early 2011 as an independent platform for hosting works of contemporary artists and architects. It seeks to present the changes over the past few decades in the relationship between art and power in Bulgaria, as well as the models, applied locally and abroad, of presenting contemporary Bulgarian culture. The idea was triggered by the sporadic participations of Bulgaria in important international forums of art and architecture, such as the Venice Biennale, and the compromised principles for organizing them.

The plan, conceived by the curators Svetlana Kuyumdzhieva and Dessislava Dimova, included the building of a Bulgarian pavilion in Bulgaria to serve as a monument of absence and as provocation towards active critical actions to take place locally. The concept arose in a series of informal meetings and discussions with contemporary Bulgarian curators and architects, and is the product of the mutual dissatisfaction and desire for concrete steps for a change. The “pavilion” is not a concrete locale: it is a utopian and symbolic place relocatable anywhere and at any moment; it offers the proper environment for art reactions against the institutionalisation and biennalisation, as well as against the power structures of the art world. The “pavilion” provides an open stage for each form of art that’s ready to respond to concrete social problems, engage in argument and put up resistance. Its emblem is an invisible monument – the demolished mausoleum of the communist leader Georgi Dimitrov in downtown Sofia, which serves as a patent symbol of the historical absence and as the hottest point of public protest in the city.

In April 2011 the project extended an open invitation to artists and architects to come up with ideas and designs about the Bulgarian pavilion and how it could function, replacing the former mausoleum. Without setting restrictions as to the works’ means and media, the invitation sought to stimulate an original critical synthesis between architecture and sculpture, as well as a provocation for creating art in a public space. Twenty artists from Bulgaria and abroad responded, most of them focusing on the mausoleum. In May a panel of experts reviewed the proposals.

The current exhibition presents a selection that the curator Svetlana Kuyumdzhieva culled from the submitted projects. The works have been adapted to fit in an exhibition space and include video and photo documentation, installations, prints, drawings, animation, text.

The exhibition will host a performance by Boryana Rossa and Oleg Mavromatti, a workshop of the Danish artist Lise Skou. Further, it will feature a presentation of the German artist Daniel Kötter.

All responses to the invitation, the panel’s commentaries and detailed information about the project can be found at

The exhibition is made possible in cooperation with the Credo Bonum Foundation with the kind assistance of Goethe-Institut Bulgaria.

The Bulgarian Pavilion project is realized thanks to the enthusiasm and assistance of the architects Antonina Ilieva, Maria Baleva and Martin Angelov /FUNKT/, and the curators Dessislava Dimova, Vera Mlechevska, Yovo Panchev and Vessela Nozharova.