DOI article:
Dmitrieva, Marina: Reinventing the periphery: the Central East European contribution to an art geographical discourse
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.52534#0255
thereby becomes glorifiée! by being attributed with
“genuinely European” values in the face of a trau-
matic historical expérience, fulfilling an “antemural”
function — Piotrowski speaks of “a bridge between East
and West, a borderline separating civilisation from bar-
barism” as opposed to the situation that would other-
wise ensue.26 In his new book Art in the Shadow of
Yalta, the Posen art historian explicitly calls for a new
model in the geography of art, transcending that of
the (Western) centre and the (Eastern) periphery.
There is evidently a general tendency to see the
status of East Central Europe as a problém, “in-be-
tween” West and East. In Russia however, East Cen-
tral Europe is largely disregarded. The exhibition War-
schau-Moskau/Moskau-Warschau, which should háve
been on a scale comparable to Moskau-Berlin/Berlin-
Moskau, and, earlier, Moskau-Paris, received little reac-
tion from the press or the public when it opened in
spring 2005 in the new building of the Tretiakov gal-
lery in Moscow. By contrast, it had aroused great in-
terest in Warsaw, where it was shown at the Zachçta
gallery in 2004. In the context of Moscow, only the
great centres such as Paris, London or New York are
perceivable. In this process, the East Central European
“periphery” simply gets overlooked.
Interestingly, attempts to demarcate borders and
differentiate are more widespread than attempts to
find common ground, which in fact is only found in a
joint rejection of the régime. This is particularly true
for the attempts to transpose constructions from art
geography on modernism with regard to the relation-
ship between centre and periphery. The construction
of centres and périphéries dépends on the point of
view from which the theoretical reflections on this
topic take place, be it in Western or in Eastern Eu-
rope. On the “periphery side” of things, this some-
times brings about generalizations and an element of
moralism.
On the other hand, the question is legitimate as
to whether the new self-consciousness of the periph-
ery, which ceases to need a centre but continues to
want to remain a periphery, perhaps brings about a
loss of créative energy that may ultimately resuit in a
process of self-sufficient provincialization.27
26 PIOTROWSKI 2000 (see in note 22), p. 47.
27 Thanks to Dina Gusejnova and Louise Bromby for linguisti-
cally revising the text.
251
“genuinely European” values in the face of a trau-
matic historical expérience, fulfilling an “antemural”
function — Piotrowski speaks of “a bridge between East
and West, a borderline separating civilisation from bar-
barism” as opposed to the situation that would other-
wise ensue.26 In his new book Art in the Shadow of
Yalta, the Posen art historian explicitly calls for a new
model in the geography of art, transcending that of
the (Western) centre and the (Eastern) periphery.
There is evidently a general tendency to see the
status of East Central Europe as a problém, “in-be-
tween” West and East. In Russia however, East Cen-
tral Europe is largely disregarded. The exhibition War-
schau-Moskau/Moskau-Warschau, which should háve
been on a scale comparable to Moskau-Berlin/Berlin-
Moskau, and, earlier, Moskau-Paris, received little reac-
tion from the press or the public when it opened in
spring 2005 in the new building of the Tretiakov gal-
lery in Moscow. By contrast, it had aroused great in-
terest in Warsaw, where it was shown at the Zachçta
gallery in 2004. In the context of Moscow, only the
great centres such as Paris, London or New York are
perceivable. In this process, the East Central European
“periphery” simply gets overlooked.
Interestingly, attempts to demarcate borders and
differentiate are more widespread than attempts to
find common ground, which in fact is only found in a
joint rejection of the régime. This is particularly true
for the attempts to transpose constructions from art
geography on modernism with regard to the relation-
ship between centre and periphery. The construction
of centres and périphéries dépends on the point of
view from which the theoretical reflections on this
topic take place, be it in Western or in Eastern Eu-
rope. On the “periphery side” of things, this some-
times brings about generalizations and an element of
moralism.
On the other hand, the question is legitimate as
to whether the new self-consciousness of the periph-
ery, which ceases to need a centre but continues to
want to remain a periphery, perhaps brings about a
loss of créative energy that may ultimately resuit in a
process of self-sufficient provincialization.27
26 PIOTROWSKI 2000 (see in note 22), p. 47.
27 Thanks to Dina Gusejnova and Louise Bromby for linguisti-
cally revising the text.
251