Eda Čufer: A conversation with Miha Zadnikar

Recently, there has been a lot of debate on the relevance of the term 'activism' connected with the arts. You are a declared cultural activist. What, in fact, is activism?

In brief, this is the production of ideas away from one's own personal career, such pursuit of matters of broader social importance that due to their 'ideologic' orientation may be recognised in a political field devoid of parties, it nurtures mutual help without government, humanitarian or non-government institutions, and offers gratification by the mere investment without any material reciprocation.
There are many problems with the understanding of 'cultural activism', as you call it; and they are increasing with the growth of internationalisms. Let's have a look at two examples. What I find problematic is the consumption of culture which has, due to its trendy and sensational orientation, started promoting so-called radical left-wing ideas and images as arbitrary places. Matters that should be as serious as your life, a long-term work process for improvement of life, are nowadays advertised in the same way as any other cosmetics. On the more everyday anecdotal (or better, tragiccomic) level this is shown, for example, when you meet a girl in her late teens with a piercing and a tattoo and you naively consider her with that message automatically as a part of 'your' political option, 'your kind of person'. At first sight it is encouraging that the freedom concerning bodily expression has managed to spread outside of the identifiable political-social frontiers, but on the other hand, this is dangerous because it triggers misunderstandings instead of activisms, and it also limits the 'collective self-realisation'. If we wish to avoid the national scheme, the religious dogmatism, the collective yuppie blinds, the global consumer society and similar traps the latter is, in my opinion, the only issue left that can structure a human-worthy identity.
It is outright symptomatic (and indeed characteristic!) that sociology has also become trend oriented. The Ljubljana FDV (Faculty of Social Studies) likes to discuss 'youth subcultures', thus instrumentalising and limiting the population at the same time: Just as though subculture and its most frequent productive motor -activism- are something you get involved with for a limited time-span, and then you grow up, or what? The thesis about youth subcultures plays right into the hands of national (cultural, or , according to Gramsci without any adjective) politics, which takes great pleasure in dividing cultures in order to find it easier to suppress them. What is outright harmful for the growth of a wholesome personality is the automatism used by some theoreticians to connect 'youth subcultures' mostly to music. With this process, they are helping trend-distributive centres to the pedestal and are thus (not knowingly) indirectly helping to destroy the rare spaces where freedom of thought, the club culture is being bred. There is namely much more to this culture than 'music'. It's rather about sheer survival, if you wish.
Here is the other example of what seems to prove a problem: 'cultural activism' tends to be rather passive and only pretends to be political. I know an infinite number of people world-wide (from my generation) who have closed themselves into a safe niche of cultural management and shrunk their political potential into a mode of stammering companionship. They claim their heart to be on the right side and prove themselves exclusively through the aesthetic norm. Such a renegade activist will comment on the war against globalism in the terms of a performance, and will purify his/her own feebleness by including a politically-socially packed 'work of art' into his/her 'cultural programme'. This is actually worse than the opposition - people belonging to the international globalist scheme who pretend not to be a part of it. As far as 'culture' is concerned, they are actually interested only in one thing, definitely not cultural enough: to see the production potential of 'cultural activists' turned into market goods as soon as possible. If you make some enquiries about how much was stolen from the archives of the former Eastern bloc or how they treat artists there... We do not need to go far for evidence.
This is why I would prefer not to speak about art and activism.

You are into film and music, you teach at the university and spend a lot of time at Metelkova. In the context of cultural activism how are your actions related to your professional work? And what have you actually studied?

I have studied ethnology and sociology of culture. At the faculty I was often guided by keen activist impulses. The reactions were varied, I believe some of them were premature showing off, but nonetheless I retained the passion for reading hard-core critical theories of societies, materialisms, even some of the outlines of a distant view of the academy. Each year, I enjoy giving a course in Sociology and anthropology of music. Considering my activities - the work of an unemployed intellectual - I find it a rare enough, but all the more ingenious combination. I have eagerly remained in constant touch with my students for eleven years. I feel frustrated by the constant realisation that my views are generally more radical than those of the forthcoming generations. I work part-time at Slovenska kinoteka (Slovene Cinematheque), which is a great opportunity for me to observe the functioning of a government institution from close up. On the purely activist level I am interested in doing socially useful things with little money or none at all. Alongside my intense media work (radio, writing), these are my basic segments that form some kind of an activist circle where various issues merge in a productive way.
Anyway, this is not really to the point. I hate the term 'professional work'. It reminds me of a personal excuse resorted to by the government or a medium when it is time to soften the political facts and arguments. These days it is more about sheer survival. The realisation that you have helped a young person to grasp something different than the cut-down and narrowed offer they have been bombarded with for the last ten years counts for a lot, whether this happens in class, at the club, on the radio or in the street. We have come this far, you see.

I am interested in your relation towards some terms often used in your activist discourse. E.g. 'marginalism' or 'otherness'. Both terms can operate only in relation to something else and may be very adjustable within the context.

There are many various moments and situations where these kinds of contexts can manifest themselves. However, I doubt the relevancy of the question as to what is expressed by naming them in one way or another. Besides these two terms there are others like 'civil society', 'alternative', even 'subculture' that do not seem so very problematic. What I find problematic is the fact that these terms are being used in a relative manner even by their own protagonists who are ignorant of the fact that they are thus losing their edge.

What about 'independence'?

In the field of culture, the definition of the 'independent' ones is very precise and depends on the system of financing and decision-making. It varies from one space to another. The dance and non-dance theatre artists from the 80's were culturally 'independent'. This is the basis for 'independent' culture, as a contrast to the 'alternative' which can never reach recognition on the part of media and institutions. There are exceptions like the Ana Monro theatre, but these only serve the politics to officially relieve themselves of their bad conscience regarding the alternative. In general, the following pattern is evident: After seven years of work, Teater Gromki can not get a review in the central daily newspaper Delo if it shouts blue murder, whereas Betontanc theatre group got it after their first high-school performance, because they were evidently 'independent', thus, from the government point of view non-problematic, harmless, remote and at the same time promoting anti-intellectual tendencies, which is always along the lines of the main printed media. Or, to put it otherwise: the 'independent' may be off or even off-off, but they can not afford to be underground -in their eyes this seems childish, passé, useless- in short, they are afraid of it. Only at this point can we ask ourselves as to who is really independent. The essential questions of (cultural) policy are simple - you must buy your independence or find somebody to pay it for you, while you can choose your own alternative. The alternative always manages to survive somehow, it does not need much. But things turn out to be problematic if we have a look at the funding of the so-called independent movements, when these people do not possess any premises or basic infrastructure. Like Nevenka Koprivšek, for example, who has had problems for years with the premises to organise her projects and the Junge Hunde Festival. I find her example much more symptomatic than the relation of the government and the municipal authorities towards the alternative culture or Metelkova. If the government and municipal structures are not able to recognise as their own even those structures that they urgently need for their promotion, the situation must truly be alarming.

All the terms mentioned have their tradition from the 80's. However, the contexts have changed. How would you comment on the dialectics between the ideological and political through the change of context that we have experienced in the last 15, 20 years?

Every public activity is political. Every public note, every concert, every act bears a political connotation, but not necessarily an ideological connotation. It is well known that an act is even more ideological when it explicitly wants to deal away with ideologies. As we say in the language of art recognition, then the act is internally uncontrolled, linear, flat. I find it important for each artistic practice or cultural act to bear in itself the following open, but well-balanced structure: culture = art = politics = economy = aesthetics = ethics = law. Culture can achieve this high degree via an 'art form' either in an 'ideologic' or non-ideologic way. I am passionately in favour of recognisable 'ideologies', that is, in favour of a better world: This may be established through the radical left-wing discourse, it may possess a merely materialistic base, or again it may appear as some kind of a sketched revolt, as is the case with the new internationalist movements. Independently expressed 'ideological' segments may enrich a certain act, and in my opinion, the worst possible ideology is the one that regards ideologies as something obstructive, unsuitable. Such is the ideology of the modern time, i.e. globalism. In the presently narrowing gap between repression and ideology in this country one can clearly see that there is no more room for political activity outside the party system. I can sense this every day as an activist of the Urad za intervencije - UZI (Intervention Bureau). And when I hear an old ex-dissident reproaching UZI that it is in the service of 'forces of continuity' or something like that, I seriously ask myself what this kind of person had in mind during the times of his dissidence. What was he fighting against, and what was he fighting for? To me, such a person seems ideologically illiterate, ideologically disabled. Ideologies have not died out, not by far, there is just a growing number of poly-intellectual and even common discourses that ascribe them one-dimensional clichés.

I find the civil society of the 80's a typical ideological project, which dispersed at the moment when it was supposed to develop some political strategies and discourses in the 90's.

If we raise the question of what the ideology of the civil society was used for and by whom, we find ourselves in an ideological loop: A group of regional politicians depicted their fight 'for' power (as we can see today from the Liberal Democratic party staff (LDS) as a fight 'against' something old, using the ideology of the Zveza socialistične mladine (Association of Socialist Youth) and relatively large amounts of material means. This fight against the old proved simultaneously as successful and useless, and the once proud spirit of the civil society directed against the rigid Zveza komunistov (Association of Communists) as well as against the rigid cultural associations dispersed into a series of ideologically unrecognisable civil societies. At the end of the 90's, any tenant's association is considered a civil society, and looking back, one suddenly realises that the whole machinery had been run by individuals outside of Socialist Youth structures. The latter belong to the rare non-converted-up-to-the-present-day society who sustained the punk, and, let's say, video movement. A great deal of Socialist Youth funds were spent on most of the 80's civil-society projects, and there is less than a dozen people now who were active in the 80's and could avoid the catch of substantial financing of official alternative projects. The 80's alternative has received much praise to the present day and there is no point in denying the historical affiliation with it; however, if we analyse the amount of funds received by its protagonists we can clearly see that only a few people had to fight hard to get their ideas realised. Everything was simply paid for; the essential struggles were being fought elsewhere, through the nazi-punk affair, Channel A affair, Radio Student, etc. Apart from these domains, there was a kind of tolerated subsystem attempting self-justification through a logic of adhering to the official concepts. Looking back, it often seems it was a mutual, co-ordinated project. In spite of this, the fact is that there has been a good number of really amazing projects carried out in the 80's, a specific jargon has developed, urbanity was introduced and even some pieces of historical memory were retained (with a few people). Between the 80's and the 90's, a wide gap appeared, a loss, an amnesia, that makes us believe these days that history is beginning anew each day. Not only does one need to go explaining every basic thing all over again, the structure of the alternative also crushed - all of a sudden, the funds invested into the alternative were too abundant, and other investments not extensive enough. In spite of all, the 1988 Roška (*1) event was the worst, most fatal blow- when many of us expected freedom, the nation happened.

The case of Metelkova is a kind of metaphor and a measure for the success of the transition between the 80's and 90's. You have got a good overview of the developments ever since the 1993 squat. One could say that the issues concerning Metelkova are being resolved in very time-consuming, hermetic and puzzling ways. In a panel discussion organised by the participants of the World of Art course for curators in June 2001, Meta Hočevar, the dean of AGRFT (Academy for Theatre, Radio, Film and Television) stated that Metelkova is about 'much less than independent culture', while the moderator Bogdan Lešnik, Ph.D. paraphrased her claim with the words that Metelkova is about 'much more than independent culture'. Which of the two attitudes would you identify with?

I would not like to be too personal. We are at war, Mrs. Hočevar is on the opposite side, and war calls for various tactics: painstaking negotiations, battles on different levels, and perhaps I should add a strategic expression in the Klausewitz manner: 'We do not need to spend artillery where thunder will do'. As far as identification goes: I am happy that among those who understand the whole situation at Metelkova (what has actually been done there, where are the mistakes, what is the especially attractive point about it) people are so wise, deliberate and brave as Bogdan Lešnik. I am dead serious about this.

And what are, in your opinion, the key achievements of Metelkova in the period since the squat?

In September, eight years will have passed since the occupation of the location or, in a manner I prefer - since the liberation of the space, and twelve years since the idea arose. I will not attempt to systematise the actual stages, because things were changing so rapidly, and because our effort not to be a part of the system (in addition to, say, a non-hierarchical principle) is one of our strategic priorities at this moment. The working and mental input of numerous people into Metelkova is truly impressive, and the psychological toll is considerable. This can never be repaid with money, there is no reward for these people. I know, and this is said without any irony or nostalgia, many heroes and heroines of socialistic work in Metelkova. Anyone, who is aware of that, must know that we should not let go of Metelkova. This would be plain stupid. However, we are extremely occupied with defending it. It would be hard to present any actual plans - one reason being the conspiracy and the other lying in the fact that, following the recent serious threats of demolition, the city of Ljubljana failed to produce a single open card. We know they are confused and we also know that we have no reason to rest on our laurels, but if you are asking me to name the key achievements of Metelkova, let me mention one of them. In my opinion, this is the key achievement. We have developed forms of coexistence and an internal organisation that can not be identified from 'the outside'. It does not take a part in the capitalistic logic, and yet it somehow functions on various levels, from operation to the security system. The path was paved with many obstacles, and there are still many gaps in the co-ordination, but we are on the right track to solving these problems: During the recent one-month active visit of the German-Swiss craft group Axt und Kelle, not a single problem emerged. There is not a single blow to the Slovenian mentality greater than being able to do things as a team, collectively. This is the reason they are going crazy outside the ghetto. Let me add another word on 'key achievements' on the club level. For the past 15 years, since my first visits to Dutch and German squats, I have been wondering why they have clung so tightly only onto punk, hardcore and, occasionally, street theatre? Lately, I have noticed that this was their demise. I am not saying that our position is perpetual and redeeming, but I sense a vision in it. I am pleased (now speaking on behalf of Gromka club), that we have joined ourselves in a battle against the mono-culture. Mono-culture is equal to death. The club audience must be held, educated, surprised, taught, entertained, politicised, relaxed, etc., all at the same time and without straying away from the concept. The harder it is to identify the concept, the better it is. When a visitor asks me to turn up the music, I answer: 'Ask the young man reading a book in the corner. He is the measure of the moment.' The club is a sensitive point in all of its aspects - light, volume, service, programme and the rate of investment into the programme compared with the investment into equipment. The club is a form of live sociology and I should make my doctor's thesis out of it someday. Furthermore, only working in a club such as this gives you the opportunity to realise the essence of, not just social, but sociologic thought. You might think the following criterion for success is ridiculous, but I think that it is important for the club that there is a balance between the number of men and women in the audience. As long as it stays this way, the club remains progressive and friendly. Furthermore, if a space that was not explicitly intended for such a purpose, becomes a meeting point for gays, lesbians, or the bisexual and transsexual population, I know that we are something normal, something mundane. But where do we go from here? I prefer to say that this is just the beginning ... What seems as shining proof of coexistence of differences, only when they are recognised as such, can fall apart overnight. Fortunately, we do not have any illusions. And fortunately, we lived through the 80's, when anti-intellectualism was not as strong as it is now. Among our constant audience, there are many who are highly educated in the field of materialistic social theory, which gives us the possibility to make amendments as we go along.

With the idea to build artistic academies within Metelkova, Meta Hočevar mentioned a vision of a common cultural centre with a permanent cultural program as one of the possibilities. In a way, this idea overlaps with the old vision of the so-called 'independent artists', to create their own cultural centre and no longer 'depend' on the kindness of the central public institutions, which have a lease on the entire infrastructure. In the area of programmes there are many different interests manifesting their own appetites for the potential infrastructures of Metelkova. Do you think that in the event of serious financial investments on behalf of the City the currently existing program structure will be able to endure the pressure of outside competition?

Undoubtedly, and with a friendly, i.e. non-hostile production assistance this can be even more so. The reproaches from the city authority, claiming that the Metelkova location is too large for the current activities is partly due to ignorance, but even more so cynicism, if we take into account that the same city authority cut off all the financial aids to Metelkova. It must be added that within Metelkova a 'third class' came into existence, one which Mrs. Hočevar, due to her 'high-culture' vocation, is unable to notice, and which will soon be unnoticeable or ignored by the so-called independent artists.

This class being?

The low-budget, no-budget and volunteer productions, persisting with the methods of work that were never neither developed nor socially appraised within our environment. It is a position that will not consent to the idea that at the age of 25 you have to give up everything you are defined by and, paying the price, climb a class higher in order to survive at all. Certain production centres in the field of culture that have been developed within Metelkova absolutely avoid both options you have mentioned. If I limit myself to theatre, I can say that in Metelkova there are constantly projects that are completely unnoticed by either side, because they do not belong to any standard. They are mostly projects based on improvisation, experiment, pyrotechnics, ready made projects, etc. In our environment, these types of theatre are not included in the academic curriculum. What I find the most concerning is that the agreement between the city authority and the University uses Metelkova in order to manipulate with the student potential. The problems of space are used to sacrifice the student population, with the academic circles fighting to expand their territory into the area already occupied by us. The situation is similar to those moments in revolutions and wars when, under the influence of the psychosis, children were put into the front lines in order to protect the adults and their interests. If it continues in this manner, it could lead to a real social drama. The plan's concept is not for the Metelkova Mesto Cultural Centre to develop with the existing standards and the young population that was raised here, but to demolish it and give it to the highest bidder, the latter at the moment being the University. The current activities in Metelkova would be offered a substitute location, which would result in the end of all activities. MA Roman Lavtar, representative of the town municipality of Ljubljana, explicitly stated that he wished to build a substitute, a Youth Cultural Centre, which would also be offered to the highest bidder. This Youth Cultural Centre means nothing but a further division of the cultural sphere into more segments. Suddenly, we have youth, alternative, sub-, student, independent, amateur, elderly, folklore, choral, etc., culture. The division of culture into various forms or even generation groups is one of the intentions of the state projects. On the other hand, one of the achievements of Metelkova is bridging the generation gap, we have managed to shake off the so-called ageism, i.e. segregation by age.

I have a question related to ageism. Throughout the years, Metelkova has been trying to maintain itself as a specific entity, as a space of diversity, a space that enables different social and cultural initiatives. This project has evolved from the spirit of the 80's and thus has its generation representatives, such as Retina, Bratko Bibič, Marko Hren or, for that matter, you. On the other hand, nowadays, Metelkova has its regular users, who live and work there, who are active and have nothing to do with the 80's. I am interested in the nature of the particular relationships between you, Hren, Bibič and the most active users.

Concerning Bratko Bibič and myself, I must say that, among other things, we are also active users. In general, I am under the impression that the interpersonal relationships in Metelkova are becoming more transparent. To repeat this more explicitly, it is a fact that the vision for the future is not oriented on the generation models. To be more precise: In Gromka, we have a vision by which the representatives of the 'middle-aged generation' suddenly pass over the management to the younger ones. Since the opening meetings in 1993, I have personally supported the thesis that Metelkova should be a field we should prepare and later on let the others manage it. The introductory disputes with Marko Hren are directed to this question: Metelkova is not my personal project, it is not a part of my career - it is a place where I mainly co-operate, in contrast to Hren, if you will, who has Metelkova only in his head and is getting paid for that. If something happens in any other way than what he had planned, he is in a very bad mood. A paradox states that Hren is mostly absent and uninterested in the contents, but is basically more concerned with Metelkova than anyyone working there put together. Such is the fate of false anarchists. One day you realise that they have activated themselves in a phantom-like manner, only with personal gain in mind. In this psychosocial context Bratko Bibič is of an entirely different kind, a valuable advisor, an excellent, completely realistic and down-to-earth theoretician of the urban life, space sociology, a witty interlocutor, someone one can really enjoy learning from. With all his critical effort, he proves that, despite neo-liberalism and the infinite potential of the virtual culture, the virtual space itself is not sufficient as a space for cultures. A need to fight for real, physical space will always exist. In essence the problem of Metelkova is a question of life - who has the space, who occupies it, who lives and works there.

How do you comment the fact that the curator Aleksander Bassin chose Metelkova Mesto as the project he plans to present at the biennial in Sao Paolo in 2002?

It is perfectly clear that for the last 10, 15 years activisms, subcultures and underground movements have been a part of the trend in high art. Another part of the trend is to chose elite contexts and, within them, present hidden or forbidden parts of cities - street people, vermin, refuse and all other marginal communities. On the other hand, I am aware of the importance Bassin's decision has for Metelkova. We are in desperate need of surplus and approval. If we are getting constant confirmation from foreign guests, if we are present in the media abroad, giving interviews, then it is an even more beautiful thing when we get a positive voice from the home environment, from a man who is the director of a city institution, a hidden, so far unknown ally, who acts with the purpose of a more united and resonant presentation of Metelkova at an important artistic manifestation. Our goal, of course, is to present ourselves as more than just an artefact.

Within the programs of Metelkova, you are mostly preoccupied with the musical programmes. What type of music do you represent and where do you obtain your funds?

We are very strongly resisting the proposal from the Ljubljana Municipality to fund, if at all, the entire programme of Metelkova as a package. If we agree to that, it will be even easier for someone to reject the program package. Besides, the programs are very different and individual. This year, when they rejected most of the programs, those involved in club Gromka in an instance decided to expand our activities despite the fact that we had no money at all. We have ideas for several on-going programs, but we are unable to develop them, due to the multitude of everyday club planning, which is very time consuming. The musical programs are composed in a way that does not demand much money. We are very active in the areas of club DJ culture, lounge and electronic music, freely improvised music, avant-garde jazz. In autumn, we plan to intensively expand the field of new music. We have permanent musical evenings led by the musical editors from Radio Student, but we are also very open to the production of progressive dance genres. In the 'sitting' concerts, named Dephony, our intent is 'to radicalise the heart and ear'. We are educating a few dozens of members of our constant audience as regards the deficit caused by notorious events moving (in spite of their initial pledge) along the path of populism. If we consider that we have our own kitchen and accommodation to offer, all we need for our musical programmes are the fees we need to pay the performers. If we concentrated more on the co-operation with organisations such as the British Council and the Goethe Institute, we would be able to cover most of our travel expenses. Our activities in the field of improvised music, which is our speciality, have already brought results - in the well knit European net the word is spreading of how well received the musicians were during their visits, which means that they are willing to come here to play for a percentage of the entrance fees or for a very small fee. This exceptional compliment is proof of two things: The serious (meaning seriously working) musicians have a taste for homely environments, for environments with a grateful and critical audience, which offers an additional inspiration - a factor very important in improvised music, since these are the environments they originated from. On the other hand, this proves that entire Europe is more or less in a crisis and that people want to return to their origins, to their do-it-yourself practices. This is another way, in which I am convinced that Metelkova is on the right, brave track and that it represents an indispensable cultural form.

Notes:

(*1) Roška - a local name for the former military barracs Marshal Tito on Roška street in Ljubljana. This is the location where mass activities took place in 1988 in support of the four arrestedcitizensand against the represive behaviour of the Yougoslav People's Army on the territory of the Republic of Slovenia. What was at the time uderstood as an unified voice of civil society and hope for a better tomorrow, was narrowed to an explicitly nationalistic project only a few years latter.