ORTA Collective

Transdisciplinary art-group ORTA Collective (Alexandra Morozova, Rustem Begenov, Darya Jumelya, Alexandr Bakanov, Sabina Kuangaliyeva) from Almaty, Kazakhstan, CultureHub and LaMaMa Experimental Theatre Club present New York Spectacular Experiments on the Great Atomic Bombreflector. It is the launch of a global art-project to create the unprecedented science-fiction device called the Great Atomic Bombreflector and intended to transform the destructive energies of atomic inhumanity into the genius forces of global uplift. The project is called the Planetary Program of the Great Atomic Bombreflector.

From 1949 through 1989, Kazakhstan, then a Soviet colony, was subjected to more than 600 inhumane nuclear and thermonuclear explosions. These tests ruined the lives of more than 1.5 million people and caused irreparable ecological damage. The bowels, surface, and atmosphere of Kazakhstan are the most nuclear-bombarded spot on the Earth, and an unimaginable amount of dark, infernal energy of grief, horror, and dehumanization has accumulated there. How can this energy be transformed so that it does not lead to more disastrous wars, killings, and destruction, but gives people the power to transform the world into a better place, especially now when many believe that we are on a brink of nuclear apocalypse?

The Great Atomic Bombreflector is a sci-fi device that aims to accomplish this transformation. The author of this device is the first Kazakhstani avant-garde artist, writer, inventor, thinker, and the “Genius of the Absolute Interplanetary Category” Sergey Kalmykov (1891–1967), who invented the Atomic Bombreflector in the 1930s, prophetically declaring the horrors of atomic weapons. From his ideas and life, ORTA Collective has been developing the “New Genius Theory” (or, simply, the New Genius)—a unique approach to life and creativity that sees genius as a practice anyone can perform as opposed to the traditional exclusive conception that attributes it to a rare, innate quality of exceptional individuals. The New Genius was presented to the world at the 59th Venice Biennale of contemporary art where ORTA Collective were curators and participants of Kazakhstan’s first ever national pavilion. Their project LAI-PI-CHU-PLEE-LAPA Center for New Genius was dedicated to Sergey Kalmykov who won great attention from an international audience and major publications thereby fulfilling the prophecy he wrote while living his life in poverty, loneliness and obscurity: “No artist has had a happiness that I have had! I am a professional genius unknown today, but I will remain for ages together with Picasso and Da Vinci!”

One of the key engines of the Great Atomic Bombreflector is the “universal (people’s) sci-fi composition of reality” as it almost happened during the blossom of the sci-fi genre in the late 19th–early 20th century when the “authors”—artists, writers, inventors—fantasized the future, space flight, discoveries of unknown worlds, and unseen technologies. Those authors were not necessarily scientists or engineers, but the world we live in today is vastly outlined and determined by their ideas and visions. We believe, today, everyone can take part in the composition of our reality.

The Great Atomic Bombreflector is a spectacle-ritual for as many as one thousand participants who will perform the transformation of the energies of atomic inhumanity into the colossal power of upliftment that is stored in every human and non-human being as genius. The creation of the complex spectacle-ritual will take two years and multiple experiments, research expeditions, discussions, contributions from dedicated searchers and practitioners from various fields and places on Earth. It is planned to be conducted in 2026 in the land of former test sites in Kazakhstan. The successful conduction of the Great Atomic Bombreflector will mean the start of the chain reaction of freeing the energy of genius of all the people of the world.

The Planetary Program of the Great Atomic Bombreflector will be launched at the legendary La MaMa Experimental Theater Club—the beacon and the cradle of true avant-garde theater and bold experiments by the most outstanding global artists. In three nights, ORTA Collective will conduct three “Spectacular Experiments”—immersive performances that will feature 3,000 square feet of aluminum foil and 10,000 artificial stones-genionites, unique Kazakh music instruments, collective practices of agitating everyone’s “Inner Genius”, and Kazakh songs and Sergey Kalmykov’s interworld texts performed by guide-performer Alexandra Morozova. The results of the experiments will be used in, and every spectator will become a contributor to, the creation of the Great Atomic Bombreflector.

The New York Spectacular Experiments on the Great Atomic Bombreflector is a co-production of ORTA Collective, CultureHub and La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club and was supported by Caravan of Knowledge foundation and the Pro.NRG festival, Chevron company, and Goethe-Institute Kazakhstan as a part of the first phase of the Great Atomic Bombreflector Planetary Program.

About ORTA
Transdisciplinary ORTA Collective was founded in 2015 by actress Alexandra Morozova and director Rustem Begenov. Since 2017, the group also includes artist Alexandr Bakanov, photo and video designer Daria Jumelya and artist Sabina Kuangaliyeva. ORTA explores the higher dimensions of human creativity through the creation of Universal Projects, including theatre, visual arts and new media art, video and film, technology, social research and philosophy, as well as robotic, computer, electronic engineering and applied arts. Since 2017, their projects have been mainly focused on the New Genius Theory of the artist Sergey Kalmykov (1891–1967). Selected projects: Pop-mechanical performance Medea.Material (co-production with Goethe-Institute, NET-2016 festival participant, nomination to Kuryokhin Gran-prix award); large-scale techno-mystery Svetoprestavleniye Sergey Kalmykov (NEW DRAMA—2018 festival headliner, nomination to Kuryokhin Gran-prix award); LAI-PI-CHU-PLEE-LAPA Center for the New Genius (national pavilion of Kazakhstan at 59th Venice Biennale, 2022).