Moulding visually discusses “eastern/central-futurism”, with an emphasis on the past, present but also future. It attempts to question, depict, and look at where is Central & Eastern EU heading after the transition from communism to capitalism.
The work is an exploration that occurred throughout my time spent in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Only a five-hour drive from my hometown; Bratislava, Slovakia but I could already relate to so little, yet so much at the same time. There are some traits that join these two nations; our Slavic-ness, the ability to understand our languages to a small degree, current populist ruling parties, and perhaps an amount of past trauma, which has not been fully resolved to this day. Likewise, Slovakia and Slovenia share a transitional process of a post-communist state to a capitalist one.
Thus, through this work and as an “outsider”, I inspect my experiences in Slovenia, the contemporary country, its foreseeable future, and its past. It includes an added layer of my personal experiences that have taken place within Slovenia as well as finding out more about Yugonostalgia', the country’s ongoing protests against the government, or a referendum for water that occurred whilst I was present in the country.
Common threads have been traversing the Central & Eastern EU topographies ever since the transition from USSR or communism, such as populism, far-right political parties, laws discriminating against marginalised communities, migrants, women, LGBTQ+ communities, and more. However, Western Europe seems to have been affected by the same phenomena.
Parts of history are being moulded, taken advantage of by new political propaganda - though, a different one than the one our ancestors may remember from the socialist/communist times in Central and Eastern EU.