Artists in a special project of the Moscow Biennale explore the impact of oil on culture, politics and society.
One of the exhibitions at the Second Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art is sponsored by Maserati. Unsurprisingly, "Petroliana: Oil Patriotism," an artistic survey of the influence of oil on the environment and geopolitics, failed to attract any sports-car manufacturers. But the exhibition, which opened Wednesday, is a golden opportunity to catch up on Bruce Willis' performance in "Armageddon."
The works filling the third floor of the Moscow Museum of Modern Art's main building on Petrovka range from complex maps of the world's oil pipelines to striking wordless images such as "Black/Gold," a modern version of Kasimir Malevich's "Black Square" that features oil flowing endlessly across a gold frame. It was made by the French art group BP, which named itself after the oil company.
Probably the least intellectually challenging work on display is Michael Bay's 1998 action film "Armageddon," which plays on a video screen in the museum corridor. Willis plays the world's best deep-core oil driller in the disaster movie, which led a New York Times reviewer to quip that Armageddon was the longest word in the script.
Couch potatoes will also enjoy a 2001 film by U.S. artist Sean Snyder about a Romanian version of the Southfork Ranch featured in the oil-themed soap opera "Dallas." The Romanian ranch, designed as a leisure complex, is 20 percent larger than the original and includes a replica of the Eiffel Tower.
Making a more serious point is "Contraband," a film by a group of Kiev students named REP, or Revolutionary Experimental Space. The artists "smuggled" Ukrainian oil and gas across the border with Poland. One of them, Nikita Kadan, warned that viewers should not try to copy the method used in this art prank: filling dozens of children's balloons with gas from a pipe in their dormitory. "You have to be careful," Kadan said in an interview at the opening. "It's best not do it at home."
They also acquired crude oil from a chemistry institute and poured it into hot-water bottles -- a traditional method of smuggling vodka into Poland, Kadan said. Border officials didn't spot the oil or gas, but did find one of the hidden cameras. The students lost half their footage, but still managed to shoot an eight-minute film.
"We used the traditions of Ukrainian folk contraband to take into the countries of the EU a certain quantity of natural resources that cost more there," he said. The students then sold the balloons in Poland.
St. Petersburg-based artist Sergei Bugayev-Afrika shows a ready-made work called "Stalker-3," a film shot by Chechen fighters in 1996 showing the ambush and killing of Russian soldiers.
The film, which the artist said was discovered by Russian special forces, was first shown by the artist in 2001 at the Valencia Biennale and later exhibited in Vienna and New York. "This is the first time it's come back to Russia," Bugayev-Afrika said. "Hopefully there will be some form of reaction here."
"I don't think it's directly related to ideas of petroleum or oil as much as other works here," he said, explaining that he finds the film's images and editing reminiscent of Andrei Tarkovsky -- hence the "Stalker" title.
"I was not trying to support ... the idea that the war in the Chechen republic was totally dependent on the oil problem," the artist said.
The grainy one-hour film is accompanied by a series of calligraphic drawings made by China scholar Bronislav Vinogrodsky, who used chopsticks to apply hot bitumen. "It gives you a structure, because it's the heaviest part of oil refining," Vinogrodsky said, calling the works "petroglyphs."
The works filling the third floor of the Moscow Museum of Modern Art's main building on Petrovka range from complex maps of the world's oil pipelines to striking wordless images such as "Black/Gold," a modern version of Kasimir Malevich's "Black Square" that features oil flowing endlessly across a gold frame. It was made by the French art group BP, which named itself after the oil company.Probably the least intellectually challenging work on display is Michael Bay's 1998 action film "Armageddon," which plays on a video screen in the museum corridor. Willis plays the world's best deep-core oil driller in the disaster movie, which led a New York Times reviewer to quip that Armageddon was the longest word in the script.
Couch potatoes will also enjoy a 2001 film by U.S. artist Sean Snyder about a Romanian version of the Southfork Ranch featured in the oil-themed soap opera "Dallas." The Romanian ranch, designed as a leisure complex, is 20 percent larger than the original and includes a replica of the Eiffel Tower.
Making a more serious point is "Contraband," a film by a group of Kiev students named REP, or Revolutionary Experimental Space. The artists "smuggled" Ukrainian oil and gas across the border with Poland. One of them, Nikita Kadan, warned that viewers should not try to copy the method used in this art prank: filling dozens of children's balloons with gas from a pipe in their dormitory. "You have to be careful," Kadan said in an interview at the opening. "It's best not do it at home."
They also acquired crude oil from a chemistry institute and poured it into hot-water bottles -- a traditional method of smuggling vodka into Poland, Kadan said. Border officials didn't spot the oil or gas, but did find one of the hidden cameras. The students lost half their footage, but still managed to shoot an eight-minute film.
"We used the traditions of Ukrainian folk contraband to take into the countries of the EU a certain quantity of natural resources that cost more there," he said. The students then sold the balloons in Poland.
St. Petersburg-based artist Sergei Bugayev-Afrika shows a ready-made work called "Stalker-3," a film shot by Chechen fighters in 1996 showing the ambush and killing of Russian soldiers.
The film, which the artist said was discovered by Russian special forces, was first shown by the artist in 2001 at the Valencia Biennale and later exhibited in Vienna and New York. "This is the first time it's come back to Russia," Bugayev-Afrika said. "Hopefully there will be some form of reaction here."
"I don't think it's directly related to ideas of petroleum or oil as much as other works here," he said, explaining that he finds the film's images and editing reminiscent of Andrei Tarkovsky -- hence the "Stalker" title.
"I was not trying to support ... the idea that the war in the Chechen republic was totally dependent on the oil problem," the artist said.
The grainy one-hour film is accompanied by a series of calligraphic drawings made by China scholar Bronislav Vinogrodsky, who used chopsticks to apply hot bitumen. "It gives you a structure, because it's the heaviest part of oil refining," Vinogrodsky said, calling the works "petroglyphs."
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