Filmoteka Muzeum

The famous Anti-Election Technodemonstration was one of many rave parties organised at the Forts in Gdańsk as art projects by artists gathered in the collective Technical Culture Central Office (CUKT). The members of the CUKT used that site as their headquarters, a space of ongoing work with other people with a view to promoting a shared set of values. At the Forts, the artists combined rave with art through their own presence as well as installations, performances, discussions and collaborations with others, thus developing a community that they found so significant. In 1995, the CUKT as an institution submitted to the municipal authorities of Gdańsk a complex proposal regarding the transformation of the Forts into a cultural centre that would embrace art, fun and civic activities. Importantly, the CUKT raves were organised as commercial events, which were to offer a return on investment. There was no art market in Poland at that time and public institutions took little interest in contemporary art. Therefore, the artists needed to invent their own funding model. Rave parties opened up the possibility of an encounter between art and young Polish business from the early period of the country's free market transition. On the other hand, as we can see in Technodemonstration, the CUKT artists attempted to test the techno party format as a tool of social mobilisation and a spark of political activity for the new civic community nascent after 1989.

Year: 1995
Duration: 2'44"
Language: no language
Source:

© Piotr Wyrzykowski