Vyacheslav  Ahunov (1948) is an artist, performer, video-actor, poet, essay-writer and philosopher. But primarily, he is a painter with an amazing destiny. From the point of view of the foreign art-critics, the name Ahunov stands in the same circles as the Moscow conceptualists. But, as regards his native country – he does not exist. Vyacheslav Ahunov lives and works in Uzbekistan. However, he is forbidden from performing his work in his own country. That is why the inventive author of performances  such as “A MAN- COMPASS” (2006) and “BE AWARE – SYPHILIS OF EVENTLESSNESS” (2007) arranges apartment exhibitions like those which took place in the ex-USSR.

It would be wrong to call him an “Uzbek artist”, although Ahunov is actually the only representative of actual art. For the present, Vyacheslav  Ahunov is one of the participants of the main project ARSENALE 2012.

Vyacheslav Ahunov

ART UKRAINE № 3(28) May-June 2012. Heading INTERVIEW

 

Anna Landikhova As far as we know, you are officially banned from performing your work in Uzbekistan, is that why you arrange apartment exhibitions?

Vyacheslav Ahunov Yes, I am not allowed to show any works of a political, social or actual bent. The problem is that the ex-first secretary of CCCP of Uzbekistan is leading the country using experienced methods of  prohibitions and sops.  The people, depressed by their repressive fear, do not have the will for changes. But, anyone who speaks of the real situation experiences repressions.

- Actually, many people miss the underground period when exhibitions took place in private apartments because of Soviet Authority pressing…

- In reality, the system itself produces the underground. Uzbekistan is often called “the reserve of Soviet totalitarianism”, degenerating into “the khan absolutism of medieval type”. So apartment exhibitions on the background of entire absence of private artistic infrastructure are likely to be a forced action.

- In 2010 you conducted an apartment exhibition devoted to the Lenin 140th anniversary in Tashkent. Has the theme of desire for our Soviet countries died away, even though it was actively reflected in the 90’s?

- On the contrary, the interest for the Soviet countries as they were, is regaining force. The more we move from the break-up of the USSR, the more we show interest in the “The Red Empire”. For example, in September 2011 an ambitious project “Ostalgia” was organised in New York by the forces of The New Museum. The same topic dominated the 11th biennale of modern art in Istanbul, in the project “Revolution vs Revolution” in the Beirut Modern Art Centre in Lebanon and in other places. 

From SC USSR. 1979

- They say nowadays that in Russia, for example, that art is not censored if it does not affect the church. And what about this topic in Uzbekistan?

- In our country the absolute power of khan-president has just overpowered the church and it dictates to the church on how to act and what to tell the people.

 

- So, are the artists who emphasise the religious problems, persecuted as in Russia?  

- Two years ago, Tashkent photographer Umida Akhmedova shot a film “The Burden of Innocence” about the problems of intimate relationships among young people in our neo-medieval society. The film unmasked the fact that the girls, who are accused of having lost their innocence and subjected to  persecution from their neighbors and country men, commit suicide, often by burning themselves. The prosecution started a criminal court case on the basis of “offended housewives”. Umida was found guilty and given three years’ probation.

Procrustean bed of Marxism-Leninism, scientificcommunism and dialectic materialism. 1974

- Is this the result of the state dominance over the church?

- No, it is not. This incident just proved that the Islamic priesthood can speak in its own name. The threats of violence and even murder are not just words. Fanatics killed the director of the theatre “Ilhom” Mark Weil in the entrance of his apartment building in Tashkent. They were extremely offended by the frank homosexual direction that his play took.

 

- Perhaps, you have heard about the scandalous closing of the exhibition “Ukrainian body” in Kyiv for the following reason – the NaUKMA administration considered the pictures of naked bodies to be pornography. In this respect, can an analogy be drawn between the situation in Ukraine and the situation in Uzbekistan?

- The Art Academy of Uzbekistan does not allow nude pictures of any style to be displayed. It is out of the question to expose naked bodies. Although striptease dancers can be invited to some holiday parties.

Bright image of Lenin illuminates the path to thecommunism for the people. 1976

- After all the democratic gains of the XX century, such taboos seem absurd.

- The problem is that political post soviet space, at present, is a concentration of not very bright but practical and cunning men. Such people see defiance, mutiny and a threat in everything. The most common concerns of the citizens is for the government not to steal, not to lie, but to perform as promised.

 

- Tell us about the artistic style of “socialist modernism” in the contexts of which you used to work.

- In the 70’s and 80‘s, the artists from the USSR, had a real chance to postpone, for an indefinite term, the art system collapse, working in such artistic style as socialist modernism, but we did not manage it. The painters, all together rushed to interpret western art in a domestic manner.

Holiness of marriage. 1977

- So, has the art system collapse taken place?

- Yes, it has. Because if all possible artistic formalities are discovered, tested and finished, so the expulsion from the Paradise now known as “art” can be considered to be fact. So rather, the Garden of Eden was cut down with all the postmodernist vitality, so far pseudo-futuristic awareness made the unreal future become the past, which cannot be returned to.

 

- So maybe “the end of the days” announced by David Elliott has arrived?

- Yes, David was right, “the end of history” came long ago and now we are waiting for “the beginning of new history”, perhaps with a little more optimism. Now we are very patient in the godforsaken expectation that the dead wall replace the mass culture with the real threat of existence in global monotony. This is a verdict and a sentence at the same time. The artist’s task is to describe, in detail, the state of expectation.

 

- Is it possible for art to move any further? If yes, then where?

- In our case, the strategy which can lead to the outlet of the dead end is determined by the very impossibility of moving forward into tomorrow. We need a principally new structure of social relationships to return the art as a new valuable artistic system. That means, we need a new society!

 

 

Anna Landikhova