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Dialectics of Subjection #2
(color video with sound, 3 min. 45 sec., 2005)
Dialectics of Subjection #2 is a video made especially for the Prague Biennale 2, one of the two biennale for contemporary art that surprisingly took place in the same city at the same time - in the summer of 2005 in Prague. This unusual situation was a result of personal acrimony translated into cultural combat.
In 2003, the original Prague Biennale was co-founded by Giancarlo Politi, the editor of the Milan-based Flash Art, and his longtime friend Milan Knizak, the director of the National Gallery in Prague. The preparation of this ambitious show turned into an avalanche of arguments and misunderstandings that, besides the crucial points - the concept of the exhibition and the selection of the artists -, encompassed also petty fights over the division of the income from the tickets as well as the postage and electricity bills. The conflict gradually escalated in mutually offensive public appearances, vitupertive e-mails addressed to art-world professionals and rude slandering in the lobbies as well as in media. The whole cultural scene became an arena where both males tried to prove their prestige and dominance. As a result of this public duel, both rivals decided to found his own biennale, that would be the final affirmation of their victory.
Thus, in the year 2005, Prague, usually an artistic periphery, hosted two ferociously competing art shows. The International Biennale of Contemporary Art headed by Milan Knizak was presented in the premises of The Czech National Gallery with the imprimatur of the president of the Czech Republic, the minister of culture and the mayor of Prague and a considerable government funding. Across town, in a disused factory building, Giancarlo Politi and his wife, Helena Kontova, opened The Prague Biennale 2, financed by corporations and foreign government resources, blessed by a four-sentence catalogue preface by former Czech president Václav Havel.
Dialectics of Subjection #2 was an attempt to reflect this competition from a different point of view. The video is a recording of our dialogue about Politi and Knizak, taking place in a homey atmosphere. Lying on the floor and drinking wine, our debate develops from judging their physiognomy to us teasing each other with questions like "would you sleep with him?" and "for how much?". The whole discussion then turns into considering trading our sexual favors in exchange for the possible career support from Knizak and Politi and in which we confront not only their sexappeal, but their political and medial power as well as their influence within the art world.
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