The Post-Communist and Socialist World

Many members of Atlantika Collective have a close personal connection to the parts of the world that have transitioned away from Communism and Socialism, and many have produced artwork on diverse topics in these locations. Here is a collection of work that offers insights into art and culture, diversity and borderlands, and the environmental problems plaguing these nations. There can be no question that there is an incredible dynamism in these lands, that they are still evolving in ways that are both promising and threatening, and that they remain critically important to the world’s future.

Special Statement on the War in Ukraine

As a collective that has close connections to the nation of Ukraine and is devoted to “social responsibility, community, and nurturing a contemporary humanism through art,” Atlantika vehemently condemns the Russian invasion of Ukraine and calls on governments and people all over the world to do everything possible to assist the people of Ukraine, stand up for its right to democracy and self-determination, provide urgently needed humanitarian assistance, and prevent the further tragic loss of life in that nation, including attacks on civilians. Atlantika Collective members are in ongoing touch with artists, academics, and writers in Ukraine, and undoubtedly, these individuals and their allies will prove essential not only in resisting the aggressors but in revitalizing and rebuilding Ukraine once democracy and freedom are restored.

Amnesty International has verified that Russian forces have fired indiscriminately at targets within Ukraine, killing civilians and destroying civilian infrastructure. These actions likely constitute violations of international law. You can access their verified report here.

Russian forces have captured the Chernobyl exclusion zone, spiking radiation levels locally, and they attacked and set buildings on fire at the largest nuclear power plant in Europe. According to Beyond Nuclear, this is the first time in history a war is happening in a region where there are operating nuclear reactors. Ukraine’s 15 operational reactors are all vulnerable to catastrophic meltdown, even if they are not directly attacked or accidentally hit.

At the moment, significant humanitarian aid is needed to assist Ukrainians who remain in the country and those who have been forced to flee. Here are several organizations that can be trusted to deliver this aid in a reliable and effective manner: People in Need, Who Is Going to Help Ukraine?, Ukrainian House Warsaw, and Friends of Ukraine.

In addition, Atlantika Collective urges all people worldwide to contact their own governments and demand the strongest sanctions possible against Russia and their isolation in the world community. Those in the United States can find their representatives and their senators here.

The war in Ukraine is one of the most pressing humanitarian crises of our time. It is also one of the most important challenges to the rule of law and the future of democracy and self-determination. For these reasons, we all have a stake in this war, and we all must do what we can to bring an end to this brutal, unwarranted and illegal use of military force.

THE environment

God’s River

by Gabriela Bulisova & Mark Isaac

God’s River is a short documentary film and a collection of still photographs on a critical environmental issue in Ukraine. Energy producers and environmentalists agree that climate change has significantly reduced the flow of the Southern Bug River. But the two camps differ dramatically on how to respond. The state-run nuclear conglomerate, EnergoAtom, proposes to flood a portion of Buszky Gard National Park. But a unique coalition of veterans, academics, ecologists and students opposes the plan because it will threaten endangered plants and animals, submerge precious archaeological digs, and destroy Gardove Island, a place that is sacred to Cossack heritage. While some urge compromise, others claim concessions could permanently kill the river. Veterans from the Donbas region forthrightly embrace the struggle as a new patriotic cause. If the plan is approved, they have pledged to protect Gardove Island “by all means necessary.”

Fluid Borders

by Gabriela Bulisova, Billy Friebele, and Mark Isaac

Fluid Borders is a diverse artistic project focused on the the world’s most international river, the Danube. It is a quintessential “borderland,” or a space that divides culture, languages, and history, and it flows through a substantial part of the post-Communist world. But it is also a “Fluid Border,” carrying the impact of the pollution and climate crisis freely across national boundaries.

During an artist residency in Ruse, Bulgaria, Atlantika Collective Member Billy Friebele created one of his kinetic “writing machines” from discarded plastic materials found on the riverbanks. These materials flow freely from one country to another, as do a variety of dangerous pollutants that still threaten the river’s water quality. Friebele’s uniquely inventive drawing machines bob up and down on the current as they compose a permanent record of the river’s ebb and flow and carry debris and pollutants through 10 different nations and into the Black Sea. You can learn more about this work, titled SloshCypher.

Atlantika members Gabriela Bulisova and Mark Isaac began investigating the Danube River more than a decade ago as an intimate look at the Bulisova Family in the tiny village of Chl’aba. Eventually, that project, titled The Shadow of Smoke, gave birth to a new offshoot, Fluid Borders, focused on the Danube itself, which is increasingly suffering from pollution and global warming. As part of the project, they create experimental photographs using “supplemental lenses” of plastic and other refuse found on the shores of the river. They also document drought and fish kills that have plagued the river in recent years. And they use the data of international scientists to create original music, giving their findings an added dimension of meaning.

Together, the artists’ work gives rise to a more fluid understanding of the significance of the Danube River’s border regions — one that encompasses the personal, political, cultural, linguistic, economic, and environmental.

Post-Industrial Edens

by Todd Forsgren

Since 2004, Atlantika member Todd Forsgren has been photographing urban and community gardens. He’s traveled widely, with the hopes of creating a global survey. In these seemingly humble spaces Forsgren finds an enticing edge of our culture: gardens are a formal, conceptual, and practical bridge between today’s cities and the wilderness landscapes of our hunter-gatherer ancestors.

His work includes many locations in the Post-Communist world, including Mongolian urban and community gardens, and Cuban gardens. His work also includes European Urban Allotment Gardens. Although he has photographed all over Europe, many of his photographs were captured in the Czech Republic, where these gardens are called “zahrádkářské kolonie.”

Some of these gardens are purely utilitarian, such as the subsistence agriculture tied to maximizing productivity, while others are purely aesthetic, i.e. the urban allotments of the developed world which are often made for leisure. But in these spaces, Forsgren has found contexts that seem to redefine expectations in terms of what is urban/rural, public/private, modern/primitive, nature/nurture, and global/local. 

The sites Forsgren chose to photograph often portray horticulture at an intimate scale: found along the margins of human settlement, these patches of earth are normally separated from the surrounding landscape and the observer by a flimsy fence. Land ownership is often tenuous, between our ideas of ‘public space’ and ‘private land.’ He aims to weave together these plots of land around the world as he portrays the many stark contrasts he has found in these sites. Through these photographs, he strives to relate the spaces of these gardens to the world beyond the garden’s fence and his photograph’s framing. He hopes to depict a world where the natural and the civilized are not thought of as mutually exclusive dichotomies, but as ideas and places that can sustainably coexist.

The Second Fire

by Gabriela Bulisova & Mark Isaac

The Second Fire is an immersive look at Lake Baikal, the world’s oldest, deepest and most voluminous lake, located in Eastern Siberia. The project places a special emphasis on the Lake’s ecological problems, including growing levels of pollution and rapid climate change. The project includes experimental photographs, multi-channel video, essays, original music, installation and performance. It plunges us into what noted Siberian author Vladimir Rasputin called the “eternity and perfection” of the Sacred Sea, capturing its vastness and majesty, the intimate moments of its resilient people and quirky sites, and the urgency of the dangers that threaten them. In many cases, it uses an abstract approach to universalize the subject matter and make clear that Baikal’s problems affect everyone around the globe.

DIVERSITY AND BORDERLANDS

Where the Rivers Come Together

by Gabriela Bulisova & Mark Isaac

Where the Rivers Come Together is a photography and writing project that explores the surprising diversity that exists in Mykolaiv, Ukraine, east of Odessa, which is home to as many as 133 different national communities. Created as a shipbuilding center during the days of the Russian Empire, the city is dominated by Ukrainians and Russians. However, its spirit and public life are defined by the much smaller groups whose influence extends well beyond their actual numbers, creating an unmistakable heterogeneity in the city’s language, culture, and cuisine. In an article accompanying the photographs, the artists highlight the very personal, face to face approach of Mykolaiv residents as a key reason the city has been able to maintain peace and friendship over the years.

Open circle: other voices on the post-communist world

Superfluous Women: Art, Feminism and Revolution in Twenty-First Century Ukraine

by Jessica Zychowicz

Superfluous Women tells the unique story of a generation of artists, feminists, and queer activists who emerged in Ukraine after the collapse of the Soviet Union. With a focus on new media, Zychowicz demonstrates how contemporary artist collectives in Ukraine have contested Soviet and Western connotations of feminism to draw attention to a range of human rights issues with global impact.

In the book, Zychowicz summarizes and engages with more recent critical scholarship on the role of digital media and virtual environments in concepts of the public sphere. Mapping out several key changes in newly independent Ukraine, she traces the discursive links between distinct eras, marked by mass gatherings on Kyiv’s main square, in order to investigate the deeper shifts driving feminist protest and politics today.

You can learn more about the book and its author.

Contemporary Ukrainian and Baltic Art: Political and Social Perspectives 1991-2021

with an essay by Jessica Zychowicz

This volume focuses on political and social expressions in contemporary art of Ukraine, Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia. It explores the transformations that art in Ukraine and the Baltic states has undergone since their independence in 1991, discussing how the conflicts and challenges of the last three decades have impacted the reconsideration of identity and fostered resistance of culture against economic and political crises. It analyzes connections between the past and the present as seen by the artists in these countries and looks at their visions of the future.

A chapter titled “A New Dawn at the Centennial of Suffragism: Artistic Representation in Transeuropean and Transatlantic Kyiv” was penned by Atlantika Collective member Jessica Zychowicz. This exceptionally insightful essay skillfully weaves together the evolution of International Women’s Day, the events of the 2014 Maidan Revolution of Dignity, a landmark 2018 feminist exhibition in Kyiv titled “A Space of One’s Own,” and the trial (and acquittal) of a women’s rights banner unfurled at a 2018 march to tell a story of feminist activism and accomplishment that has implications for artists, scholars, and progressive activists well beyond Ukraine’s borders.

You can view a recorded book launch discussion and also learn more about the book and its author.

New Empire & Far East

by Victoria Crayhon

Victoria Crayhon has been making photographs in the Russian Federation since 2011. Her work examines the intensity and omnipresence of Russian nationalism as reflected in its architecture, public space, historical sites, holiday rituals, and culture in general, which, like any form of nationalism, is essentially the glorification of one’s own culture and country. Nationalism has historically, at least in the west, led to two world wars and most American wars since 1945. Her two projects, New Empire and Far East, ask the questions: How long can a society hold onto and/or reject ideas from its own history? Which facts and stories are being told? How is history wielded and for whom?

Post-Socialist Landscapes & East/West

by Matt Moore

Post-Socialist Landscapes is an exploration of memory sites in countries that were at one time occupied by the Soviet Union. The photographs in this project fall into two main groups. One set of images depicts the exact location where statues of Lenin and Stalin once stood. A second group of photographs focuses on the fate of the discarded communist monuments that once stood throughout Europe’s Eastern Bloc states. Together, these two groups of photographs speak to the way local governments and municipalities control historical narratives through the manipulation of public and private space. While some societies go to great lengths to eradicate the unwanted reminders of their past, others are willing to let them slowly disintegrate.

Moore’s project East/West presents images of the abandoned checkpoints that separate former eastern bloc countries from the West, particularly the Czech Republic from Austria and Germany. As remnants of the Iron Curtain, each checkpoint carries with it its own amount of history and aura. Today, each structure stands vacant and serves only as a hollow reminder that one is moving from one country to another. Moore is interested in them as symbols of the perpetual change that takes place in Europe and beyond. Ultimately, the images in this project function like time capsules. They give us a glimpse of the past, while also hinting at the potential for greater change ahead.