February 9, 2015
The wave of recent uprisings around the globe actualized the dream of directly employing the moving image in political struggle. For one instance, Maidan uprising in Ukraine became an inexhaustible source of visual images ready to be used as media-weapons in the fight against the regime. The moving image itself became Maidan’s direct political instrument, providing the movement with an image of itself and forcing this uprising into the global attention economy.
Why have protest movements drawn so much attention from political filmmakers? Could it be simply that a protest activity is an easy catch, obliging and self-sufficient material that does not require too much effort? Or, perhaps, the power of images of a protest movement lies in the fact that they demonstrate a certain break in the system of representation? Sergei Eisenstein wrote, “Soviet cinema must break through the skull. It is not a kino-eye that we need, but a kino-fist.” This rallying cry was literally enacted during Maidan. Only in place of cinema, it was grassroots video production that was “breaking through the skull” (in other words, according to Eisenstein, instantly mobilizing, transforming the viewer’s consciousness). In addition, the metaphoric broken skulls became actual image material.
The talk will include the screening of Integration, a short documentary comprised of a series of online video reports produced by the author in January to March 2014 in Kyiv, during the Maidan uprising. The films Referendum (2014) and Incident in the Museum (2013) will also be screened.
Oleksiy Radynski is a filmmaker and writer based in Kyiv. He is a member of Visual Culture Research Center, an initiative for art, knowledge, and politics founded in Kyiv in 2008. Since 2011, he has been an editor of Ukrainian edition of Political Critique magazine. His texts have recently been published in e-flux journal and in the publications Soviet Modernism 1955–1991: Unknown Stories; Post-Post-Soviet?: Art, Politics, and Society in Russia at the Turn of Decade; Sweet Sixties: Spirits and Specters of a Parallel Avant-Garde; and others. His latest films include Incident in the Museum and Integration.
For further information, please contact magdalena [at] e-flux.com.