How have artists from PLATO’s environs experienced the time of pandemic, isolation and uncertainty? Our two-part exhibition includes an online presentation Sand in the Air, created during the spring lockdown, followed by the project Dune in PLATO on show in the gallery in the autumn. The project is part of the Sand in the Gears exhibition.

Dune in PLATO

As mentioned already, the Dune in PLATO exhibition is a sequel of the lockdown-time Sand in the Air exhibition where nine artists from PLATO’s environs presented their works. The exhibition connected flexibly to the Sand in the Gears exhibition, planned and theme-related and curated by Jakub Adamec and Pavel Sterec who discuss in it the issues of slowdown, getting stuck and non-growth.

In the Sand in the Air exhibition we examined how is the complex situation of a pandemic reflected in the existential form of these days. Sand in the Air presented an online version of the collaboration between Ostrava-based artist and PLATO, while Dune in PLATO is their public meeting taking on a form of a gallery exhibition.

While the return to the “normal” state of things is discussed widely, we would just as much like to take some of the experience and values we (re)discovered during the COVID slowdown and bring them to our professional and private present. Together with our audience we want to reflect on what has this experience brought to our fragile bodies and what will this uncertainty mean for our mental health. The isolation has triggered some altruistic mechanisms and the need to share and care and has changed our often ambivalent attitude to technologies, e.g. surveillance and communication technologies, and our need to experience the physical world.

We will be pleased to welcome you in the gallery and share with us the reflexion on recent experience in the latest as well as previous works by Jakub Černý, Martin Kubica, Barbora Kurtinová, Otakar Matušek, Šárka Mikesková, Michal Moučka, Filip Nádvorník, Marek Pražák and Hana Puchová.

Edith Jeřábková

(text from 29/7/2020)

Sand in the Air

What can an art institution do at a time when basic preconditions for cultural activity, such as communication and sharing, have shifted to private and virtual space? The metaphor of the Sand in the Gears – the second exhibition of the Intensities series PLATO prepares for an uncertain opening in May – has stirred up and become Sand in the Air. The sand in the machine which slows down the mechanical operation of our contemporary means of existence has suddenly changed into a desert storm: a storm that has forced us to hide in shelters from which we try to function as a society, community, and future healthy culture. Simple meetings at exhibition openings, concerts, theatre shows, community events, in schools and even within the family have have become but an uncertain future prospect.

PLATO too accepts that split role of the “now” and “after that” state of things. As the sand is in the air, PLATO wants to connect and support those facing difficult work conditions and explore possibilities to share their work. With artists in its vicinity, PLATO wants to reflect on what this experience brings to our fragile bodies and how this uncertainty will influence our mental health. The isolation launched altruist mechanisms and the need to share and care, and we can observe how it changes our relation to technologies and the physical world. Some of us are anxious about economic changes and changes in the social structure of the society, and about surveillance apparatus deployed in the state of emergency. PLATO wants to explore how this complex situation of a pandemic influences our existence these days. The Sand in the Air brings an on-line version of the collaboration of Ostrava artists and PLATO: once the sand will have settled, then the Dune in PLATO will present a real physical meeting of invited artists and PLATO with the public. What shape this meeting will have and when it will occur is something we’ll leave to the days to come as we don’t want to speculate.

We’re looking forward to meeting all of you and wishing us all good health.

Edith Jeřábková

(text from 1/4/2020)

Special thanks to the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic and Moravian-Silesian Region.