EXPLORING THE RETURN OF REPRESSION
September 10 - November 22, 2009
Opening: September 10, 2009, 19.00 hours
Curator: Razvan Ion
Participants: Luke Fowler (GB), Jean Genet (FR), Hanif Kureishi (GB), Thomas Hirschhorn (CH), Renzo Martens (NL/CG), Alex Mirutziu (RO), Naeem Mohaiemen (BD), Sebastian Moldovan (RO), Taller Popular De Serigrafia (AR), Colm Toibin (IE), Michel Tournier (FR), Pavilion Resource Room (RO).
âThe return of the repressedâ is a crucial theme, a key to understanding recent history. "The project of the West, the Nietzschean project, has been to drive out religion and to produce a secular society in which men and women make their own values, because morality is goneâ, writes Hanif Kureishi, British writer of Pakistani descent. âThen suddenly radical religion returns from the Third World. How can you not laugh at that? How can you not find that a deep historical irony?"
The return of the repressed is the process whereby repressed elements, preserved in the unconscious, tend to reappear, in consciousness or in behavior, in the shape of secondary and more or less unrecognizable "derivatives of the unconscious." This return of the repressed, of ideologies forced to marginalization, of sexuality subject to forced secrecy, has resulted, in recent years, in an almost dramatic change of a society filled with anguish, hallucinations, repression imposed by unnecessary regulations that serve to the repressive violence of governments against their own citizens.
Repression as a conscious and voluntary psychological process, consisting of giving up the fulfillment of a desire which is not in full accord with the moral being, leads to the annihilation and alienation of the simplest desires and rebellions.
The main apprehension is now the model of a new international division of labour. This concept has apparently been borrowed by the capitalist leaders from the old socialists, and it is actually hiding something even harsher, something that will bring forth the strengthening of the state as instrument of repression. The new international division of labour is a more important issue to discuss than others, because it is, perhaps, the most important cause of both the political and the civil repression.
On the other hand, if we examine carefully the present legal system, it is reveal itself as a revolting system, supporting the class exploitation, the radicalization of the chasm among social classes and the supremacy of the white heteronormative and macho-patriarchal majority. The legal system supports the creation of the political obedience and it deals with the adjustment of the value of work. Actually, it protects the capital creation and a type of legal inequity.
In order to understand the main effects of the state violence, we also have to consider the alternative: the social assistance for the poor and for the working class. Frances Fox-Piven and Richard Cloward wrote in New Class War: âthe connection between the income maintenance programs, the labour market and profits is indirect, but not complicatedâ. Too much social democracy will make people stop being grateful for low wages and poor work conditions. Thus, even with the converse, the link between state repression, labour market and profits is not complicated at all.
Repression manages poverty. Poverty depresses wages. Low wages increase the rate of exploitation and create profit. Which is the main purpose of the state. (Excerpt from: RÄzvan Ion, "Exploring the return of repression" in the newspaper "Exploring the return of repression").
Discursive Events: Urban Larssen (SE), Sina Najafi (USA), Alex Mirutziu (RO), Cosmin Marian (RO), Sebastian Moldovan (RO).
Publication/Newspaper: 32 pages, 31,5 x 42 cm, b/w, english. distributed for free.
With texts by Andrei Craciun (RO), Tatjana Greif (SI), Daraka Larimore Hall (NO), Razvan Ionâ(RO), Rolling Thunder (USA), Ronald F. King (USA), Urban Larssenâ(SE), Jose Louis Meiras (AR), Suzana Milevska (MK), Naeem Mohaiemen (BD), Maria Eva Blotta & Diego Posadas (AR), Eugen Radescu (RO), Michel Tournier (FR).
With special booklet insert by Taller Popular De Serigrafia (AR).
Free PDF download of the publications at http://www.pavilionunicredit.org/publicatii.html
Assistant curator: Silvia Vasilescu
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Friday, October 2, 2009
17.00 Exhibtion tour with Razvan Ion (curator)
Friday, October 23, 2009
17.00 Exhibition tour with Silvia Vasilescu (assistant curator)
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Image: Thomas Hirschhorn, âWhere do I stand ? What do I want ?â, publication, 96 pages, 2007 (detail).
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PAVILION UNICREDIT
center for contemporary art & culture
Sos. Nicolae Titulescu 1 (Piata Victoriei)
Bucharest 011131 Romania
T: + 4 031 103 4131
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PAVILION UNICREDIT este un centru pentru arta si cultura contemporana, un spatiu independent work-in-progress, spatiu de productie si cercetare a vizualului, a discursivului si a performativului. Este un spatiu al gandirii critice care promoveaza o Ãntelegere implicata socio-politic a artei si a institutiilor culturale.
PAVILIONâUNICREDITâis a center for contemporary art & culture, a work-in-progress independent space, a space for the production and research in the fields of audiovisual, discursive and performative. It is a space of the critical thinking, and it promotes an artistic perspective implying the social and political involvement of the art and of the cultural institutions.
PAVILION, BUCHAREST BIENNALE and PAVILION UNICREDIT are projects devised and founded by Razvan Ion and Eugen Radescu
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Supported by: UniCredit Tiriac Bank
Strategic partner: Pilsner Urquell
Media partners: Radio Romania Cultural, 22, Alternativ.ro, Feeder.ro, 24Fun, Modernism.ro
Production partner: UpDate Advertising
Printing partner: First Advertising Agency
Audio-visual partner: Sony
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Supported by: UniCredit Tiriac Bank
Strategic partner: Pilsner Urquell
Media partners: Radio Romania Cultural, 22, Alternativ.ro, Feeder.ro, 24Fun, Modernism.ro
Production partner: UpDate Advertising
Printing partner: First Advertising Agency
Audio-visual partner: Sony