[artinfo] Gypsyism, Balkanism-Through a glass, darkly

[e-flux]

Gypsyism, Balkanism-Through a glass, darkly

V4 joins RomaMoMA

May 16-November 30, 2023

Opening: May 16, 6-7:30pm

European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture Serbia
Majke Jevrosime 51
Belgrade, Serbia
eriac.org

Artists: Ma½gorzata Mirga-Tas, ªubo” Kotlár, Mara 
Oláh Omara, Vera Lacková, Zoran Tairoviç

Curated by Bratislav Mitroviç

The same degree and intensity of generalization, 
reductionism, and stereotyping apply to imagining 
the Balkans and the Roma. Maria Todorova's 
concept of Balkanism provides a sound theoretical 
framework to explore the deployment of Balkanist 
stereotypes against Roma in Eastern Europe and 
Western Balkans. As explained in her foundational 
text, Imagining the Balkans (1997): "By the 
beginning of the twentieth century, Europe had 
added to its repertoire of Schimpfwörter, or 
disparagements, a new one that, although recently 
coined, turned out to be more persistent over 
time than others with centuries-old 
tradition."Both the Roma and the Balkans have 
been described as the "other" of Europe. It is in 
the field of the visual where epistemic and 
physical violence is the most obvious. Kotlár, 
Lacková, Mirga-Tas, Omara, and Tairoviç engage in 
intimate dialogue with the history of-frequently 
hurtful-representations of Roma. The 
participating artists do not care to conform to 
the standards of behaviour devised as normative 
by and for the "civilized world," they choose 
artistic strategies which directly and 
consciously subvert the objectification, 
feminization, and sexualization of the Balkan and 
Roma identities. So, no wild nature, no savage 
locals, no guns, or other clichés. Instead of the 
gorges of the Balkans, we focus on here and now. 
Zoran Tairoviç's Va”ari”te, Omara's Mogyoród, the 
idyllic landscape by Mirga-Tas, and Vera 
Lacková's depiction of Roma partisans during the 
Second World War present an updated picture of 
Roma, seen by Roma masters. ªubo” Kotlár's series 
case study: Jerusalem provides an ironic 
commentary on the Instagrammability of Otherness.

Belgrade, the gateway to the Other, is also a 
silent participant of this exhibition, 
pinpointing Serbia's liminal position between 
"Europe" and the "Balkans" as a potentially ideal 
standpoint from which one might challenge the 
binary oppositions of Gypsyism and Balkanism and 
begin to reimagine the Roma and the Balkans, 
redirecting these categories as a site of 
political engagement and critique.

The project is co-financed by the Governments of 
Czechia, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia through 
Visegrad Grants from International Visegrad Fund. 
The mission of the fund is to advance ideas for 
sustainable regional cooperation in Central 
Europe.

Follow the RomaMoMA Blog 
<https://email.e-flux-systems.com/campaigns/jm622m2amfba6/track-url/rl482sqxhp5a5/40733b12642760dfcca4fbbc7e151778d94d841a>here.