Pacta sunt servanda, 2011 - ongoing
performance, recorded on video, HD transferred to DVD 16 min. 37 sec.
The performance consists of simultaneous readings in Hungarian and Romanian of chapters from the artists’ school history textbooks: The 1848 Revolution, The Trianon Treaty (1920), The Vienna Treaty (1940), and the events in Târgu Mureș in March 1990, referred to by some Hungarians as Fekete Március (Black March). Each textbook claims to explain the fundamental causes of the ethnic conflict in Transylvania, resulting in two contradictory versions of the past. Read simultaneously, the two versions cancel each other out.
The artists neither validate nor reject one version or the other, but instead create a discursive space in which divergent histories—and precisely their dissonance— transform an echoing room into one where dialogue becomes possible.
Black March, 2012
performance, 9 min. 30 sec.
Black March is the 4th chapter of the project “Pacta sunt servanda”. The artists read a few fragments from the Romanian and Hungarian newspapers reporting on the inter-ethnic conflict that took place in March 1990 in Târgu Mures, Transylvania. Although the chronology is the same, each (official) version is substantially different.
SIC, 2014
performance, 11 min. 30 sec.,
SIC is the latest chapter of the Pacta sunt servanda performance series, which discusses the situation of Transylvania through contrasting Hungarian and Romanian official statements. It offers a manifold reading of the efforts for the autonomy of the Szekely region in Transylvania. The title refers to Terra Siculorum – a bumper sticker that interprets Szekely Land as an existing state. It also points towards the multiple meaning of the term (sic) in grammar which denotes misspellings, or logical inaccuracies.
performance, recorded on video, HD transferred to DVD 16 min. 37 sec.
The performance consists of simultaneous readings in Hungarian and Romanian of chapters from the artists’ school history textbooks: The 1848 Revolution, The Trianon Treaty (1920), The Vienna Treaty (1940), and the events in Târgu Mureș in March 1990, referred to by some Hungarians as Fekete Március (Black March). Each textbook claims to explain the fundamental causes of the ethnic conflict in Transylvania, resulting in two contradictory versions of the past. Read simultaneously, the two versions cancel each other out.
The artists neither validate nor reject one version or the other, but instead create a discursive space in which divergent histories—and precisely their dissonance— transform an echoing room into one where dialogue becomes possible.
Black March, 2012
performance, 9 min. 30 sec.
Black March is the 4th chapter of the project “Pacta sunt servanda”. The artists read a few fragments from the Romanian and Hungarian newspapers reporting on the inter-ethnic conflict that took place in March 1990 in Târgu Mures, Transylvania. Although the chronology is the same, each (official) version is substantially different.
SIC, 2014
performance, 11 min. 30 sec.,
SIC is the latest chapter of the Pacta sunt servanda performance series, which discusses the situation of Transylvania through contrasting Hungarian and Romanian official statements. It offers a manifold reading of the efforts for the autonomy of the Szekely region in Transylvania. The title refers to Terra Siculorum – a bumper sticker that interprets Szekely Land as an existing state. It also points towards the multiple meaning of the term (sic) in grammar which denotes misspellings, or logical inaccuracies.