[artinfo] the return of repression, Pavilion Unicredit, Bucharest

[e-artnow]

Exploring the return of repression

Pavilion Unicredit

Sos. Nicolae Titulescu nr. 1 (Piata Victoriei), Bucharest
Phone: +40311034131
Fax:  +401031216
Contact: <mailto:pavilion at pavilionmagazine.org>pavilion at pavilionmagazine.org
<http://www.pavilionunicredit.org>www.pavilionunicredit.org

September 10 - November 22, 2009

Opening: September 10, 2009, 19.00 hours

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).

Curator: Razvan Ion

'The return of the repressed' 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 gone', writes 
Hanif Kureishi, British writer of Pakistani 
descent. 'Then 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: 'the 
connection between the income maintenance 
programs, the labour market and profits is 
indirect, but not complicated'. 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: Ra˜zvan 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 Cra˜ciun (RO), Tatjana Greif 
(SI), Daraka Larimore Hall (NO), Ra˜zvan Ion 
(RO), Rolling Thunder (USA), Ronald F. King 
(USA), Urban Larssen (SE), Jose Louis Meiras 
(AR), Suzana Milevska (MK), Naeem Mohaiemen (BD), 
Maria Eva Blotta & Diego Posadas (AR), Eugen 
Ra˜descu (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>www.pavilionunicredit.org/publicatii.html

Assistant curator: Silvia Vasilescu