From Russia to Poland and Romania, and from the Czech Republic to Yugoslavia and East Germany, Contemporary Art in Eastern Europe is an ambitious attempt to chart the changing realities of the eastern half of the continent, as seen through the eyes of the artists, critics, photographers and curators. If the iron curtain and the antagonisms of the Cold War era had often kept the richness and diversity of Eastern European art hidden from the rest of the world, the contemporary era has been witness to its unparalleled creative explosion and fruitful dialogue with the global art scene. The work featured in this book explores the correlations between shifts in the political, cultural, economic and geographical realities of Eastern Europe and the region's contemporary art. The artists in this book revisit the region's past to envision a better future, reaching challenging conclusions and creating some of the most powerful and inspiring art being produced today. The book features essays from respected writers in the field and profiles the most influential artists producing work in and from the region today, including Marina Abramovic, Christo, Krzysztof Wodiczko, Zofia Kulik, Komar and Melamid, IRWIN, Natalia Lach-Lachowicz, Alexander Brodsky Ewa Partum, NSK, Group OHO, Stano Filko, Laibach, KwieKulik, Post Ars, Weekend Art, Zbigniew Libera, Marjetica Potrc, and Mladen Stilinovic. The following countries are covered in this anthology: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, East Germany, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovenia and Yugoslavia. AUTHOR: Marina Abramovic is a Yugoslavian artist and pioneer of performance art. Her work has been included in many large-scale international exhibitions including the Venice Biennale (1976 and 1997) and Documenta VI, VII and IX, Kassel, Germany (1977, 1982 and 1992). In 2004, she also exhibited at the Whitney Biennial in New York and had a significant solo show, The Star, at the Maruame Museum of Contemporary Art and the Kumamoto Museum of Contemporary Art, Japan. Christo is a US-based Bulgarian artist. He is world famous for his enormous installations in outdoor environments realised with the help of his wife Jeanne-Claude. His projects have included wrappings of the "Berne Kunsthalee" in 1968, a coastline area in Australia; the Reichstag, in Berlin; and the Pont Neuf in Paris. Krzysztof Wodiczko is a Polish, US-based artist who has held retrospective exhibitions at institutions such as the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, the Center for Contemporary Art, Warsaw, Stichting de Appel, Amsterdam. He represented Poland in the 2009 Venice Biennale. ILLUSTRATIONS 213 colour ab/w illustrations
