AUSSTELLUNG! LAIBACH KUNST : UNTERNEHMEN BARBAROSSA

AUSSTELLUNG! LAIBACH KUNST : UNTERNEHMEN BARBAROSSA
30 August–5 October 2024
MMC KIBLA/KiBela

You are cordially invited to the opening of the exhibition AUSSTELLUNG! LAIBACH KUNST : UNTERNEHMEN BARBAROSSA, which will take place on Friday, 30 August 2024, at 7 p.m. at the KiBela, space for art.

INVITATION (PDF)
ABOUT THE EXHIBITION (PDF)
OPERATION BARBAROSSA (1941-2024) (PDF)

With this total installation, the collective, which has been for over 40 years successfully creating artistic provocations in all media and forms, in all areas and at every neuralgic point in the world, from the West to the Far East, from Nazism to Fascism, from socialism to capitalism, at both poles of the Cold War and on the untrodden paths of all three world wars and from North to South Korea, marches in retrogarde fashion into the period of the Second World War and afterwards, just as Nazi Germany encoded the attack on the Soviet Union on 22nd June 1941 with its Operation Barbarossa.

When a black and white pen and ink drawing is juxtaposed with selected motifs by sculptor, painter and illustrator Nikolaj Pirnat in a constellation with the Afghan hand-knotted rug that translates the painted motif into a woven one, the weavers add color, texture and the role of a useful object. The view from above is opened up, the physical sensation is evoked and new meanings are revealed – artistic, cultural, historical, social, economic and political.

In 1979, at the invitation of the Communist Party, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan to support the authorities in the fight against the Taliban, who were financed and supported by the Americans. After a decade, in 1989, the Soviets were forced to withdraw. What Zbigniew Brzezinski (1928–2017) wrote in his 1997 book The Grand Chessboard: “The defeat and collapse of the Soviet Union was the final step in the rapid ascendance of a Western Hemisphere power, the United States, as the sole and, indeed, the first truly global power,” is being put into practice by US policy. In 2001, Afghanistan was occupied by the US in the name of the “war on terror” to fight the Taliban. Two decades later, in 2021, the US withdrew and left the country in the hands of the Taliban. This was the longest-running US war in history.

The pen and ink drawing by Laibach as a fragile, sensitive structure and base for the rug of the Afghan weavers, as a robust carpet on which one can walk, sit or lie, thus reveals itself in this total of work of art as a unique dialog of cultures and arts – a metaphysical one for us and a physical one for them. At the same time, it underlines the interdependence of the two “civilizations”, as one cannot exist without the other, regardless of the relationship between them. If the symbol of all civilizations is man and our natural evolution and cultural progress, then this kind of cooperation is a way forward that shines through the chaos as red rays on the Slovenian “Guernica”, the anti-war composition by the group Laibach, which contains the partisan motifs of graphic artist Nikolaj Pirnat. Their “Operation Barbarossa” carried the rug out of Afghanistan in 2024, without casualties or deaths.

“Laibach’s work shows that the West and the East are not separate or opposing cultures, but two sides of the same picture. Religious fanaticism and political nihilism go hand in hand, just as the fear of a higher power and cruelty towards the weaker ones appear again and again. That is why we can recognize someone’s present and foresee our future in the paintings from the Second World War. Laibach are not the only ones to draw attention to this, but they are unique because they do not play the card of sentimentality of a personal history, but show that we are not isolated from others and have not risen above collectivism. When we feel fear, guilt, anxiety, but also joy, pride and defiance alongside our ego, these feelings have to do with the part of us that is embedded in a collective, that seeks protection and strength in the community. But when the collective defends us, we inevitably feel the pain of everyone else who is part of it. Resistance is futile, regardless of the fact that resistance is a natural reaction to unimaginable horrors perpetrated in the name of our imagined communities. But just because these communities are imagined, that does not mean they are not real. Not only that, even the communities that are not imagined are real – the fact that people belong to other civilizations, religions and worldviews does not mean that we do not perceive them as close to us. Resistance is futile – say Laibach and add: So lie down and relax. That's why Laibach attract us and get on our nerves at the same time. That's why they are still so important. That's why they belong to all of us, even when we least want to admit it.” (Luka Ostojić)

THE STORY SO FAR

Laibach is a music and cross-media group from Slovenia established on the 1st of June, 1980 in Trbovlje. The name of the band is the historic German version of the name Slovenia’s capital Ljubljana. From the start Laibach has developed a “Gesamtkunstwerk” – multi-disciplinary art practice in all fields ranging from popular culture to art (collages, photo-copies, posters, graphics, paintings, videos, installations, concerts and performances). Since their beginnings the group was associated and surrounded with controversy, provoking strong reactions from political authorities of former Yugoslavia and in particular in the Socialist Republic of Slovenia. Their militaristic self-stylisation, propagandist manifestos and totalitarian statements have raised many debates on their actual artistic and political positioning. Many important theorists, among them Boris Groys and Slavoj Žižek, have discussed the Laibach phenomenon both from an analytical as well as critical cultural point of view. The main elements of Laibach’s varied practices are: strong references to avant-garde art history, nazi-kunst and socialist realism for their production of visual art, de-individualisation in their public performances as an anonymous quartet dressed in uniforms, conceptual proclamations, and forceful sonic stage performances – mainly labelled as industrial (pop) music. Laibach is practicing collective work, dismantling individual authorship and establishing the principle of hyper-identification. In 1983 they have invented and defined the historic term ‘retro-avant-garde’. They creatively questioned artistic ‘quotation’, appropriation, re-contextualisation, copyright and copy-left. Although starting out as both an art and music collective, Laibach became internationally renowned foremost on the music scene, particularly with their unique cover-versions and interpretations of hits by Queen, the Rolling Stones, the Beatles, etc.

In 1984 Laibach initiated the founding of the wider collective of NSK (Neue Slowenische Kunst) together with the painters from the group Irwin and the theatre group Scipion Nasice Sisters. This led to the establishment of a strong platform for social, cultural and political activity within the climate of liberalisation and pluralisation in 1980’s Yugoslavia. NSK existed as a synchronised movement till 1992, later partly changing itself into a virtual NSK State in time.

After the break-up of Yugoslavia in 1991, Laibach continued mostly within the realm of popular music, while remaining a point of reference in terms of artistic cultural criticism. During recent years the group underwent an international re-evaluation of their artistic practice in the course of an emergence of post-structuralist views on worldwide conceptual art production.

More:
https://www.laibach.org/

We would like to thank the non-profit organization A/POLITICAL for supporting Laibach in the realization of the project UNTERNEHMEN BARBAROSSA.

< AUSSTELLUNG! LAIBACH KUNST : UNTERNEHMEN BARBAROSSA, pen and ink drawing and carpet, 2024; photo: Lauba

MMC KIBLA/KiBela, Ulica kneza Koclja 9, Maribor
Opening hours: from Monday to Friday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., Saturday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.