Adam Cuhorka Pter Langmr Mrton Gazs Martos

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Adam Cuhorka Pter Langmr Mrton Gazs Martos

3 points
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Kiminusa Gallery, Budapest 2010. Curator: Zsuzsanna Kemenesi Mrton Gazs Martos, Adam Cuhorka

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The center of the universe can be anywhere we like to imagine it to be we stopped approximately somewhere here at this thought with dm Cuhorka and Pter Langmr at their 1 m2 exhibition within the European Cultural Capital program. It's not just 1 m2 now but 70, not a housewarming but gallerywarming, furthermore the Kiminusa Gallery embraces works from Tokyo to New York giving a comprehensive approach to contemporary art. The sources from the Cork-garden to the World Wine Web, in other words, from Your Pictures throughout Flicker Family history to the Image Googling For Art. It's not about who has more tanks, if the center is not militarypolitical but geographicaldemographicalsociologicalartistic concept, if the subject is not the question of the power or might as well the hierarchy by valuation, if the discussion is not about confronting cities (...) We simply compress the world for you. The Earth is nowadays a onedaylong planet as Mrton Gazs Martos stated. The furthest point could be reached within a day or so. Maybe it's only about the distance you accomplished yesterday. Unfortunately the recent past is not canonized yet as a heritage to defend. We wish to keep a remarkable distance to the ephemeral character of the din of extremity. Nevertheless, the Kiminusa Gallery welcomes the one, the Jeff Widener character of the Unknown Rebel who faced the machinery of tanks, as well as the sidewalk that gives the ground silently for all to happen.

Zsuzsanna Kemenesi

Adam Cuhorka New York: Red Rush

New York: Red Rush is nothing but a collection of sketches taken in the everchanging City during the period of two months. In the ostentatious New York, where visuality is everything, I was making notes with the intention to capture the smallest things which this city is about. Making it as personal as only photography can be. Titles: Twilight / Crossing Chinatown / Prince Street station / Coffee with Paper / Central Park / Harlem Underpass / Grand Opening / Bus stop / Parade of the Ox / Red Steps / FDR Drive / Red rain / Curtain /

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Pter Langmr Cultural Democratization in the Web Environment; User: the Powerful Actor
A hegemonic high cultural canon exists, this is what is called contemporary art. Is this acceptable? The role of the state is to lower the entry barrier of the cultural market to make it competitive. With the ideal zero entry barrier all cultures would be able to appear on the market. It is not the non-marketable products that need to be supported, but more the entry barrier needs to be lowered to form a democratic environment. Public cultural institutions should also play an important role in lowering the barrier by hosting nonmarketable popular culture and allowing citizens to participate in the creation. Much of the content appears as high cultural but can not be scientifically verified. This questions its state subvention and its appearance in public institutions like museums, cinemas, theaters, TV and radio stations. This content should be verified on the market. High cultural content is not economically, physically or intellectually accessible to the wide public. It is only available to the professional scene because it is centralized and its codes, aesthetics and techniques require scientific knowledge in the field. The high culture, as it is in case of all other scientific fields, should be interpreted in public cultural institutions and public education. The concept of public cultural institutions from the 18th century needs to be realized. To implement the idea of public cultural institutions and education with a widely accessible interpretation of scientifically-created high cultural content, new curatorial, artistic, institutional and communicational forms and practices are needed. In this case the role of the state is to support this way of creation because it furthers public good. The high cultural actors should be scientific and in deep cooperation with other disciplines to reflect contemporary issues. The power to verify is not in the hands of the public. In a democratic system it is not the state nor monopolies but rather public opinion through the market that should form the cultural canon. The state should decrease its own impact on the hegemony of the existing monopolies. The cultural market and the hegemonic public actors are not regulated in a competitive and democratic way, so public opinion does not appear in the creation and verification. To keep the market diverse and competitive no monopoly can be allowed. 24 25

Another, more open cultural platform exists. The Web. The possibility of democratic culture is being offered partially. However it is better than in the past, developed by the web and by the widely reachable digital mediums. This environment has to be developed and regulated to be the perfect space of cultural access, creation and verification. The changes of the cultural market need to be understood in the complexity of the whole contemporary cultural market, and not as a separated cultural sphere. The possibility to be a part of the internet is more and more widely given. Not all people have access to the Internet, however the number of users is continuously and rapidly increasing. The earlier hegemonic high culture is losing its power, but cultural democracy still has many weaknesses. Citizens turn to be users, and the network appears as the framing network. Users have access easily to more content than ever before. Consequently user-generated content has become more influential. Users are able to create content with digital devices and are able to share the userfriendly and free web 2.0 sites. Citizen with internet connection has more cultural capital than ever before and appears as a powerful actor of the cultural market. This vast access to content has dramatically increased. The most revolutionary effect is that the user appears in the web environment as actor both in creation and verification. Therefore, usergenerated content based on sites is the platform for access, creation and verification. Users have the possibility to reach a wide scale of content, are able to add content and they verify with their interest. The users are not the only new actors of cultural creation, the sites in themselves also have immense influence on the cultural market. Computing companies, offering online services, are in the position to change the cultural market. The following artworks are statements against cultural hegemony, are critiques of the canon. Your Picture This project is supposed to give an overview of the web shared contemporary visual culture. A software was used to download a statistically random selection of web shared pictures. These pictures are interpreted as art shedding light on the weaknesses of the canon formation. I argue that these pictures are representing the relevant contemporary democratic visual culture. 26

What is Relevant? Search engines are widely used to find relevant information, also in case of our profession. The results are widely accepted as trustable knowledge which reforms our relationship to cultural content. This project shows what is relevant art and photography for internet users.

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In front of... Tourist shooting pictures in front of a building gives significance to it. The socialistic architecture of the 60s and 70s is not part of the canon, is not part of the cultural heritage, so these are destroyable without any difficulty. As a pseudo tourist I have formed my own architectural canon to show the weaknesses of the demarcation of the cultural heritage.

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The Visitors With this work I show the place of the canonized culture on the cultural market. Visitors have slight connection to the artworks. They are physically there but intellectually they do not have real access. This shows the weaknesses of the institutional practice, of the interpretation of art.

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My Private Sphere This project shows the private sphere through my pseudo amateur vision. I have used a cell phone as the most basic but widely reachable device. The pictures technically and aesthetically do not fit into the common criteria of the canon. The representation of the private life usually appears in the contemporary art. Many similar stories are shared on the internet.

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Mrton Gazs Martos Training

Thirty six photos about train service. Not about the hungarian train service, not about the late trains, not about the filth. These pictures tell the story about trains clasping time and space. These photos aim to show a hypothetical aura around the rails. Among the prefigurations of this essay there are W. Eugene Smith, Balzs Grdi and my first photographer icon Sam Abell. I use Smiths editing principles to build the story, I separate the inner universes like Grdi, and I share Abells obsession of picturing everyday life. On one hand I got the aura idea from Walter Benjamin. On the other the thought came as I watched Robert Howlets portrait of Isambard Kingdom Brunel. That photo pictures the leading figure of the first industrial revolution. Its aura originates not only from the archaic technique and not only from the enormous chains in the background but from the legends connected to Brunels person. The essence of my essay lies in the legends. In the stories born during trips, in the stories we hear after a long journey, and in the stories we tell after one. These stories are best phrased in Egon Erwin Kischs novel wherein his fellow journalists make a joke about him because he always tried to get reporter assignments: Kisch buys a train ticket for five coronas. Where to? asks the ticket clerk. It doesnt matter, responses Kisch, for me there is something to do everywhere. On the train we have the time to listen to these stories. We hear them from the next seat, we see them, then we tell them after arriving. We build the aura again and again.

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