COURAGE

Підключення Колекцій

The BOOM festival in Novi Sad was held in November 1978. Performances were held by the new wave bands Paraf, Prljavo kazalište, Pekinška patka, Zvuk ulice (the forerunner of Idoli) and Aerodrom. Prljavo kazalište was then considered to be the group that had the greatest potential to break to the top of the music scene, which was confirmed by the release of their first album in 1979, Prljavo kazalište. It was this album that marked the beginning of the new wave. Their first studio album, due to its punk style and heavily social themes, led to a boycott by state media in the socialist society of the time.

Artpool organized several shows presenting visual poetic tendencies in other venues and in its own exhibition space (Artpool P60): Pacco dall’Italia (1979 APS no.2, PACCO dall'ITALIA (Italian Package) PIK Galéria, Csepel, Budapest): the exhibition material would have been made up of the visual and sound poetry works collected during the Italian Art Tour (of the previous year), combined with mail art works. The show was banned by the state cultural authorities.

As Artpool did not have a permanent art space during the years when it was functioning illegally, most of the events which were organized at the time were held at different locations, such as clubs and small galleries. These sites were referred to as the Artpool Periodical Spaces (APS). These exhibition events were always accompanied by documentation materials of some kind, including posters, artists’ books and publications, and catalogues in which theoretical texts and translations on correspondence art, mail art, and artists’ stamps were first available in Hungary. Along with György Galántai’s own network art, these publications formed the essential exchange material when it came to the expansion of the archive.

In 1979 the Museum of Czech Literature bought first part of the Dominik Tatarka collection. These materials included his correspondence (22 letters), and manuscripts of his works (more than 1000 pages). This acquisition was mediated by Slovak historian and dissident Ján Mlynárik in cooperation with the employee of the acquisition department of the Literary Archive of the Museum of Czech Literature Marie Krulichová. However, direct purchase from Dominik Tatarka was not possible. That is why the Museum of Czech Literature officially purchased materials from the antiquarian bookshop in Karlova street in Prague that had previously bought them from Tatarka. The Slovak writer then obtained from the bookshop two thirds of the price paid by the Museum of Czech Literature and it was a significant sum. Thus, the willingness and courage of the employees of the Museum of Czech Literature and the above-mentioned antiquarian bookshop significantly helped to improve living conditions of Dominik Tatarka, who was at that time oppressed by the Czechoslovak communist regime.

The Museum of the River Daugava (then the Dole History Museum) was established in order to preserve archaeological and historical items from areas that were to be flooded after the construction of the Riga HPP. The staff of the museum saw their mission as being custodians of the local identity, which was under pressure from the indifferent, at best, and often negligent and hostile environment created by the influx of thousands of construction workers from other Soviet republics, which caused substantial changes to the composition of residents of Salaspils and its environs. In 1979, the museum decided to organise the River Daugava Festival. The idea of the festival was to show how the biggest river in Latvia was portrayed in Latvian folklore. Folklore in any explicitly non-Soviet form was looked on with suspicion by the authorities of the Latvian SSR as a potential source of ‘bourgeois nationalism’, and the situation in Latvia differed in this respect from the situations in Estonia and Lithuania, where the ideologues were more lenient. The event was a great success, due to the involvement of many creative and competent personalities. Nevertheless, the director of the museum was afterwards reprimanded by the authorities. The exact reason for their discontent was never explained, there is only speculation in this regard. It could also be explained in part by the fact that the former political prisoner and poet Knuts Skujenieks wrote the script for the event and participated in the festival. Also, the participation of Skandinieki, an authentic folk group, as well as the repertoire of choirs, was considered to be inappropriate. Among the audience were young people from the Latvian diaspora. Although they participated with the approval of the authorities, the authorities probably believed that the festival was not Soviet enough. Despite the reprimand, the museum continued to be a centre for cultural activity, and with the start of perestroika, it became actively involved in the pro-independence movement. Items in the collection show how the festival was prepared and implemented, as well as its political aftermath.