Performative Interactions with the Past

Abstract

Reinterpretation and recontextualization… play an important part in the work of the Hungarian artist group Little Warsaw. In the fall of 2005, they invited Tamás Szentjóby to repeat his action entitled Exclusion exercise. Autotherapy to prevent punishment in their studio as a public event. The original action was realized in 1972 in the context of the “chapel shows” in the lake-side resort of Balatonboglár, a series of underground art exhibitions that was monitored by the secret police and forbidden the following year. Of particular interest here are Little Warsaw’s motives for asking Szentjóby to repeat this action and his reasons for agreeing to do so. As he had done thirty-three years previously, he sat on a chair, placed a bucket over his head, hung a piece of cardboard round his neck bearing the words “Exclusion exercise. Autotherapy to prevent punishment” and subjected himself to questions from the audience for two hours. The action included a piece of paper nailed to the wall with suggestions for possible questions. They included the following: “Is it really the task of art to raise awareness, is our destiny identical with history?”’