Andrei Monastirsky: Winter of 1983-2008

opening: Thursday 20. december, 8 p.m.

Andrei Monastirsky is one of the most eminent and internationally acclaimed figures in Russian art in recent decades. In 1976 he was the founder of the Collective Actions group, which focused on conceptual performances. The performances followed a uniform dramaturgy: they took place in front of a special group of spectators, who took a train to a railway station in the suburbs of Moscow, from where they headed to a large field, which served as the stage for the majority of the Collective Actions esoteric rites. Afterwards, the spectators would describe and interpret the actions, and discuss the works theoretically with the performance practitioners. Monastirsky organized these discussions in his apartment, documented them and filed them, to subsequently bring them out as a special publication. Once made public, the detailed scenarios of the Collective Actions performances finally clarified the original intent of the groups' activities. As Viktor Misiano points out, it became apparent that the audience could observe only a portion of the works, while the salient events happened outside their field of vision. The Winter of 1983-2008 installation is based on documents and materials for the unrealized action entitled "Sound Perspectives of Going to the Country" from 1983 and presents a typical example of the Collective Actions method of work, involving a poetic context and symbolic images and underpinned by the sophisticated theory and special terminology created by Monastirsky and his adherents, also presented at the exhibition (E. Elagina, I. Makarevich, N. Panitkov, S. Romashko and others).

Exhibition curator: Igor Spanjol.

The project is supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia. Special thanks to Teresa Mavica.

Andrei Monastyrsky
Winter of 1983 - 2008
Mala Galerija, Slovenska cesta 35, Ljubljana
Kurator: Igor Spanjol