“The idea behind the Artpool project is to create an ACTIVE ARCHIVE built on specific artistic activities. This differs from traditional archival practices in that the ACTIVE ARCHIVE does not only collect material already existing “out there”, but the way it operates also generates the very material to be archived.”¹
The history of the Artpool archive should be traced back to the late 1970s when the two Hungarian artists, György Galántai and Júlia Klaniczay, decided to start an ‘active archive’ project, involving national and international artists to participate in events, projects and exhibitions related to experimental art research (Conceptual Art, Fluxus, Mail Art, Performance Art). Since its founding in 1979, Artpool’s activities have been largely ‘tolerated’ by the cultural politics of the time, although considered illegal and periodically banned due to their nature being too far from the line of art considered official. Only thirteen years later would come the official recognition of the archive, which was inaugurated on March 20, 1992 under the name Artpool Art Research Center, thanks to the intervention of the deputy mayor of Budapest, Miklós Marschall, who was present at the opening ceremony, among others².
An exhibition curated by György Galántai celebrating the archive’s first ten years of legal activity through a series of posters, documents, catalogs, photos, and videos from 1992 to 2002 opened on March 6, 2024 in the new Artpool spaces, following on the heels of an earlier exhibition held at the Hungarian Institute in Paris in 2002 organized by Galántai and Jean-Jacques Lebel.
The exhibition-titled AZ ARTPOOL MŰVÉSZETKUTATÓ KÖZPONT ELSŐ TÍZ ÉVÉNEK DOKUMENTUMAI (Documents of the first ten years of the Artpool art research center)-begins in the entrance hallway, where a series of flyers and small posters of the activities organized by Artpool are placed, some large format canvases by Robert Watts, works by Galántai and Mario Lara, and finally the mail art project HANDS, first presented in 1995 at Le Lieu – Centre en Art Actuel (Québec) and the following year at the Hungarian Institute in Paris. Passing the corridor, one reaches the central hall where the visitor’s path is built chronologically from left to right through a series of documents, projects, posters and photos placed on the walls, while on five central tables are the browsable catalogs of the exhibitions referred to.
The narrative begins with 1992, the year that marks not only the beginning of Artpool’s officialdom but also defines its precise exhibition-project line, characterized by the founders’ choice to devote each year to a theme that will be developed in different ways from January to December. Thus we begin with the year dedicated to the founding of Artpool and of projects promoted by the archive, such as the Decentralized Networker Congress held Aug. 24-26 at the old Artpool premises and the exhibition Flux Flags (Liszt Ferenc tér, Budapest, Sept. 25-Oct. 11), whose photographs and fanzine are on display.
This is followed by: the year dedicated to Fluxus (1993), to the figure of the intellectual Miklós Erdély (1994), to performance (1995), to the Internet (1996) – in which the archive’s website, the first to be opened in Hungary, begins to take shape -, to networking (1997), to installation (1998), to context (1999)-characterized by the international Foot-Ware exhibition at the former, no longer active, Artpool P60 exhibition space (Oct. 18-31)-to the new century, hailed with the themes of possibility (2000), impossibility (2001) and doubt/doubt (2002). On display from these ten years are a selection of archival documents, mainly photographs of the major exhibitions held each year, including, for example, Poïpoïdrome à Espace-temps Réel No. 1 / Real Space-Time Poipoidrom No. 1 (1998), in which Robert Filliou and Joachim Pfeufer’s installation was reconstructed, along with the presentation of other works by artists invited for the occasion, and the remounting of Hungary Can Be Yours! –International Hungary (2000), which opened on January 27, 1984 but was immediately banned by local authorities.
Accompanying the tour are three screens with video selections from the 2002 Paris exhibition, Le centre de recherches artistque Artpool à 10 ans, from Artpool’s inaugural day, the 1993 Fluxus performances, and the Poipoidrom exhibition with a tribute to Robert Filliou (1998).
What emerges from viewing these materials is the absolute interdisciplinarity that characterizes the Artpool, an institution that is probably unique within the European context, together with the constant desire to acquaint an ever-widening public with the art history of the neo-avant-garde, both Hungarian and international.
NOTES
[1] György Galántai, Júlia Klaniczay, Artpool: The Experimental Art Archive of East-Central Europe, Artpool, Budapest 2013, p. 15.
[2] Nel corso della sua storia l’Artpool ha avuto diverse sedi e dal 2015, da organizzazione no-profit qual era, diventa un dipartimento del Szépművészeti Múzeum – Museum of Fine Arts di Budapest. Nel 2020 cambia ulteriormente sede e si stabilisce definitivamente nel campus del National Museum Restoration and Storage Center (OMRRK), dove continua la sua missione quale parte integrante del Central European Research Institute of Art History (KEMKI). Vedi qui il sito per ulteriori approfondimenti.
Artpool Art Research Center, curated by György Galántai, Budapest
images: (cover 1) Selezione di opere dal progetto «Hands» (1995) con opera di Mario Lara, (1999), Cyber-szandál, ph. Dóra Halasi (2) AZ ARTPOOL MŰVÉSZETKUTATÓ KÖZPONT ELSŐ TÍZ ÉVÉNEK DOKUMENTUMAI, exhibition view, ph. Dóra Halasi (3) AZ ARTPOOL MŰVÉSZETKUTATÓ KÖZPONT ELSŐ TÍZ ÉVÉNEK DOKUMENTUMAI, exhibition view, ph. Dóra Halasi (4) AZ ARTPOOL MŰVÉSZETKUTATÓ KÖZPONT ELSŐ TÍZ ÉVÉNEK DOKUMENTUMAI, exhibition view, ph. Dóra Halasi.
