An open editorial session will take place in Labor with the participation of the current editors of tranzitblog (Eszter Götz, Sándor Hornyik, József Mélyi, Levente Polyák). Besides the screening of a film, the editors will introduce their proposals for further topics. The editors are open to questions  and suggestions about their work.

On this event, József Mélyi and Levente Polyák will introduce  their conception of a new blog idea, which has struck during tranzitblogging. This evolving new conception, which is in formulation will have the name „Spanyolviasz” (a Hungarian phrase for inventions already invented) and will be about the archeology of the public spaces, art and architercureof the Kádár-regime (1956-1989).

„Zsebből Mozit” Movie out of the pocket

2010.02.24. 17:25 | blog | Götz Eszter

The film, „Előttünk az élet” (we have the whole life to live) by Andor Szilágyi was screened last week at this year’s Hungarian Film Week in Budapest. According to its striking advertisement, this is the first movie made with cell phone. Of course, this is not entirely true so. As most of the teenagers had made films with their mobiles, professionals has also started to fashion this matter. In 2007, a cell phone film festival was arranged in Paris, and in this year, the fourth such event was held in the Centre Pompidou. The latest pieces are on the net ranging form a music clip in rococo style and a film about a journey to a two-character drama, in which the second person singular is the cell phone itself. This shot suggests an ironic transformation of the philosophy of Martin Buber. All in all, there’s a great variety.

Attracted by Buildings: Architectural Icons and Object Sexuality

2010.02.09. 12:23 | blog | Levente Polyak

In the middle of December I arranged a talk titled „Architecture and Obsession”. By this talk I tried to circumvene the topic of the Artchitectureal Film Review, for which I selected films plotting extereme emotions, attachments and also superhuman endeavours connected to buildings. At the beginning of the talk I played a part of the film titled Berlinmuren by Lars Laumann. The film introduces Eija-Riita Berliner-Mauer who, driven by her irresistible affection, married the Berlin Wall in 1979. Though my intention was rather to inspire than to provoke, the reaction of my partners was dismissive: they interpreted the confession of the Sweedish woman as an artistic action, especially the fact that she had documented them in her internet achive: „If somebody has so intimate relationship with a building, they will not expose these to this extent.”

Images and spaces in motion. What is tranzitblog going to be about for the next three months?

2010.01.28. 21:22 | blog | tranzitblog

Levente Polyák: Architecture is a branch of art which everybody can feel some connection to – buildings surround us, structure our everyday life, help and hinder our activities.  In spite of these, some technical contexts of architecture are hidden an uninterpretable for the public. However, architecture do not only mean the actual raising of the buildings because, as a discipline dealing with spaces and social interactions within these spaces, architecture reaches beyond the structuring of the physical objects. According to Michael Hays, architecture is the intervention in symbols and semiotic processes on the margin of social order, a particular way of the social production of symbols, the main role of which is to generate conceptions. Thus, it is not accidental, that the questions of architecture and the architectural environment has been examined as much by the creators and theoreticians of visual culture as by the architects. Inspired by this broad definition of architecture, we try to observe the recent problems of architecture in connection with psychology, social relations, film, fine arts, cartography and internet as well.

Eszter Götz:  After the political transitions in 1989,  not only the new political, economical system was a task to be learned but the use of urban spaces have also changed radically. Instead of the political demands and regulations, actions, opportunities and, of course, traps were opened, but it is certain, that subjective topography became a question for several generations  simultaneously. The mental map of Budapest, that was valid before 1989, was now closed, petrified, and it has come to loose its connection with the places and structure of the city today. The contemporary gesture searching for the places and non-places of the city finds its inspiration in various art-forms. Among them there are the city-interpretations of the latest Hungarian films presented in the Hungarian Film Week in Budapest, but also exhibitions, actual ideas which shape the city, as well as the manyfold relationship of  houses, streets, and men.

Sándor Hornyik: Twenty years after the political changes in Hungary, it is still an interesting question in our transitional region, that how different aesthetic and political ideologies mingle in the practices of the creation of images, objects and spaces. It is also a crucial question that how these particular ideologies (eg. Modernism, postmodernism, aktivism, nationalism) exploit the various forms of art media. A related essential problem is that according to which ideologies can art media, like film, photo or architecture, examine critically their own products or certain systems of society and politics. Perhaps the prime task of contemporary criticism should be the analytic disassociation of these ideologies as well as their analytic interpretation within their system of values. Such  criticism would perhaps contribute to make a clear vision of the objective and theoretical spaces and possible functions of art.

József Mélyi: Some films presented at the exhibition about the history of Balázs Béla Studio show the art sites of Budapest of the sixties and the seventies, sometimes in the focus, sometimes on the periferies. These places range from flats to the exhibition spaces of the Iparterv, from public spaces to studios. It is difficult to grasp why these places are different form others, or if they did have less or more freedom than the places of art today. It is also difficult to designate what the most important places of art today are and if there is an overlap with the places of 30 or 40 years ago. So hard it is to forecast the artistic map of Budapest of 30 or 40 years later. Will the recently planned museum quarter come to realization? Will the Museum of Fine Arts merge with the Palace of Arts or with the National Gallery? What will happen then with the Labor Movement Museum?