FUTUROMA Catalogue
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FUTUROMA ABOUT ERIAC ERIAC has a unique and single mandate as the first transnational, European level organization for the recognition of Roma arts and culture. The European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture e.V. (ERIAC) is a joint initiative of the Council of Europe, the Open Society Foundations, and the Roma Leaders’ initiative – the Alliance for the European Roma Institute. ERIAC is an association registered under German law on 07 June 2017, in Berlin, Germany. ERIAC exists to increase the self-esteem of Roma and to decrease negative prejudice of the majority population towards the Roma by means of arts, culture, history, and media. ERIAC acts as an international creative hub to support the exchange of creative ideas across borders, cultural domains and Romani identities. ERIAC aims to be the promoter of Romani contributions to European culture and talent, success and achievement, as well as to document the historical experiences of Romani people in Europe. ERIAC exists to be a communicator and public educator, to disseminate a positive image and knowledge about Romani people for dialogue and building mutual respect and understanding. FUTUROMA Collateral Event of the 58th International Art Exhibition La Biennale di Venezia Curated by Daniel Baker Commissioned by European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture e.V. (ERIAC) Exhibition Site: Fondamenta Zattere Allo Spirito Santo, 417, Venezia, Italy Public Dates: 10 May - 24 November 2019 (Tu-Su 10am-5pm) Exhibiting Artists: Celia Baker | Ján Berky | Marcus-Gunnar Pettersson | Ödön Gyügyi | Billy Kerry | Klára Lakatos | Delaine Le Bas | Valérie Leray | Emília Rigová | Markéta Šestáková | Selma Selman | Dan Turner | Alfred Ullrich | László Varga FUTUROMA is honored to be supported by Open Society Foundations, Federal Foreign Office, Council of Europe, Max Kohler Stiftung, Stiftung Kommunikationsaufbau, Foundation for Arts Initatives, Fundatia Michael Schmidt Stiftung, and Ufficio Nazionale Antidiscriminazioni Razziali (UNAR). CONTENTS FUTUROMA by Daniel Baker ............................................................................................................... 7 The Cultural History of Roma Contribution at the Venice Biennale by Timea Junghaus ................................................................................................................................. 13 National Office Against Racial Discriminationby Triantafillos Loukarelis ......................... 16 We Make Home: A vision for the future by Ethel Brooks ......................................................... 17 On Solidarity by Rashida Bumbray ................................................................................................... 19 Fragments of Appreciation by Angelika Stepken .. ..................................................................... 21 Space and Place by Zsófia Bihari ....................................................................................................... 23 Artworks ..................................................................................................................................................... 25 Marcus-Gunnar Pettersson .................................................................................................................. 26 Delaine Le Bas .......................................................................................................................................... 28 Emília Rigová............................................................................................................................................. 30 Billy Kerry ................................................................................................................................................... 32 Gyügyi Ödön ............................................................................................................................................. 34 Celia Baker ................................................................................................................................................. 36 Selma Selman ........................................................................................................................................... 38 Markéta Šestáková .................................................................................................................................. 40 Klára Lakatos ............................................................................................................................................. 42 Valérie Leray .............................................................................................................................................. 44 László Varga .............................................................................................................................................. 46 Dan Turner ................................................................................................................................................. 48 Alfred Ullrich ............................................................................................................................................. 50 Ján Berky ..................................................................................................................................................... 52 Guest Performance: CHROMA - The future is Roma – We Pass the Mic to Europe by RJSaK ..................................................................................................................................................... 55 Views ............................................................................................................................................................ 58 Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................................ 59 4 Dan Turner, Seeds of Change, 2019. Installation and related artefacts (detail). Photo Daniel Baker. Courtesy and © Dan Turner 5 FUTUROMA by Daniel Baker FUTUROMA is commissioned by the European contemporary, between domestic and Roma Institute for Arts and Culture (ERIAC) as professional artistic practices, and between an official Collateral Event of the 58th individual archives and state collections. These International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di hierarchies of practice, collecting and Venezia. The exhibition proposes an alternative dissemination can otherwise be thought of as vision of the international Roma community emblematic of the relationship between the by re-interpreting their traditions and their marginal and the elite. By looking into the collective past to project into a future where often discriminatory relationship between Roma truly belong. While FUTUROMA marks marginal artistic practices and those that form the third incarnation of Romani artists’ the centre ground we can find new ways of presence at Biennale Arte, it is the first time thinking about relationships between the initiative has been led by Roma themselves. marginalised peoples and mainstream society. The multinational, multilingual, multireligious We know that art performs a variety of and transnational Roma community of over 12 functions including; reflection upon the human million across Europe does not fit easily into condition, as a therapeutic activity, as a way to the narratives of national pavilions and as such critique society, and as tool of Identity politics has remained all but invisible to majority and therefore instrumental within a variety of audiences. FUTUROMA thus sends a strong emancipatory projects. Strategies of activism signal in striving for a permanent presence at toward the attainment of Roma equality have the world’s most prestigious contemporary art been varied in their approach. Artists expand event. There follows an overview of the this array of possibilities by drawing upon rationale for the FUTUROMA exhibition what are often highly personalised perspectives followed by an account of its concept and to develop objects and arguments that can content. Finally the implications that arise from operate in a variety of milieux be they social, the project are outlined. cultural, economic or political. When I would like to thank ERIAC for their courage successful, such objects and arguments allow and vision in commissioning FUTUROMA and expanded insight into complex social questions the ERIAC team for their tireless dedication in by facilitating reflection and debate in a way making it happen. that directly political, scientific or academic arguments may not. One of the values of what we might call Roma contemporary art is its Yesterday potential to act as critique to unfolding At the beginning of the twenty-first century, as developments within wider society as they my attention turned toward the artistic output pertain to Romani groups. It can now be said of my own Romani Gypsy community in the that within this field there are a growing UK, I was struck by the lack of any formal number of Roma artists of significant account analysis of our visual culture—a lack which who are moving us further toward a critical seemed to me to echo our lack of visibility mass of voices which cannot be ignored. within society. This absence of attention The art object is where artist, subject and highlighted for me a direct relationship audience meet — and therefore where meaning between cultural visibility and social agency is shaped and exchanged. Important works and prompted me to find out more about the generate a variety of meanings,