So, I haven't written for quite a while because over winter break I was in Prague for 2 weeks with an additional few days in Vienna. I was so lucky to be the trip assistant for SAIC's Prague Study Trip. I actually lived and studied in Prague for the whole of last year, so I have become somewhat knowledgeable about the Czech Republic and Eastern/Central Europe in general. My accumulated “wisdom” naturally, specializes in the arts scene. It seemed to me that Prague's professional arts and exhibitions are lacking. Especially when it comes to quality exhibition production, such as installation techniques and innovations. Even the simplest things, such as presentation: the pieces are crooked or hung so that they look unstable, they haven't been dusted in years, the walls are dirty and waterstained, the lighting is bad and some of the pieces even look recently faded in their horribly rickety frames. The museums kinda suck for these reasons, plus there is a limiting, a filtrating of the contemporary work coming into the country because there is still a bit of a power struggle amongst the older members of the art community in Prague. This power struggle lies within the remnants of a system that still lingers from communism.

So, as people have been frequently doing in areas not so dense nor diverse with quality contemporary art, my friends and I opened and produced projects in a squat gallery for 6 months. This was a pretty incredible experience, as running a space that is always temporary and isn't fully in your control (think water, electricity, legal battle tie-ups, keys and authority being passed around, etc.) can be pretty nerve-racking and hectic. But it is really crazy fun.

New and internationally inspired energy is slowly trickling into the exhibition scene thanks to these squat galleries and independent projects like the one I got involved with. Both students/emerging artists and longstanding artists are active which gives birth to a wide range of ideas and art being shown. And although the exhibition process is pretty informal, it is still well thought out and innovative. Good installation and presentation techniques are still practiced, its just that experimentation is greatly utilized due to the quirkiness of many of the spaces. Gallery A.M.180 of the Vinohradska neighborhood featured one of my good friends and Norwegian artist, Anders Gronlien. Here's his show flyer and some work:

This is why its really exciting to be involved with one of these projects because the scene is small and these ideas of facilitation and self-motivation/promotion are still pretty new there. The experience was great especially because of being American, since sometimes it seems as though nothing is ever considered new here, it seemed revolutionary there AND it was because I am still young and learning and I got to do so with a variety of types of people and artists. My show flyer for a solo show I had in a squat gallery called Independent Creative Space was purely a digital scan:

And then here are some pictures of various installed works and artists looking and hanging out within some of my favorite squat/alternative space projects.

So it was really interesting to go back to Prague after having been gone for just 6 months and to see all of the new cool obstacle hurdling spaces. It felt really great to have been and still be part of something thats small but important. Especiallly when its halfway across the world!