PURIFICATION AND REJUVENATION
NK Interview
The studio New Collectivism ("Novi Kolektivizem, NK")
has been active in the field of art design for several years both in Slovenia
and Yugoslavia. Studio NK has produced a number of posters for Slovene
cultural institutions, which were subsequently included in the exhibition
of the best Yugoslav posters at the Museum of Modern Art in Paris.
The group designed the overall image of the Ljubljana Summer Festival
(1986), a series of posters for the Slovene National Theater for the 1985/86
season and for the Croatian National Theater Split for the 1986/87 season.
It also produced the graphic image of the music festival "Revolucija
in glasba" ("Revolution and Music") in 1985 and 1986, the
posters for Novi Rock '86, Youth Work Brigades (1985), and also designed
books and album covers. The art design of Studio NK is based on a strict
awareness of form. In their four years of continuous activities, they
have consistently applied and developed the method of the retro-principle,
which was, and still is, the universal principle of studio design.
In the past few months, their poster and overall graphic image for the
celebration of Youth Day has upset a number of people, to say the least.
This was also the main reason for the following written interview, which
is also one of the methods used by NK for communication with the public.
You probably used the youth from the Nazi poster on purpose,
since you yourselves maintain that a poster may be provocative. The provocation
succeeded. Did you expect such a reaction? Would you have done it differently
had you known what was to follow?
The poster celebrating Youth Day is by definition a "political
poster." New Collectivism consistently applied the retro method in
the design of the Youth Day poster. Using the counterpoint method, it
combined two symbols from political history which had undoubtedly marked
the political scene of the twentieth century. New Collectivism consciously
decided to quote Klein's picture The Third Reich to avoid intentional
provocation and thereby stress the cognitive humanism of the retro-quotation.
Athough your poster is a work of art, it "strayed"
into political waters. What is your relation to politics and the state?
New Collectivism is a design studio. Design is a public
activity, which designates the emotional and visual image of cultural,
artistic and socio-political events. The essence of design is its mass
communication, which is contained in the technological process of reproduction.
The ambition of New Collectivism to accept commissions which give the
group the chance to communicate with the widest public is therefore understandable.
The relation of New Collectivism towards politics and the state is completely
the same as any other producer/client relation.
How does NK understand a political poster?
By definition a poster is a reproduction.
The idea and elaboration of the poster are associated with the evolution
of the most varied forms of visual techniques. A poster must be mass produced
and publicly displayed. That is why the origin of the poster can be identified
with the advent of the printing press as the first technology of mass
production.
The poster has become an indispensable element in introducing a new concept
of public display, in which the members of the society are defined mostly
as spectators and consumers. The poster has become, in the concept of
thus-established public display, a powerful weapon of political manipulation.
With the apocalyptic political picture of the twentieth century, an unambiguous
definition of the poster as a means of combat between opposing sides has
been formulated.
Why did NK decide to make a poster for Youth Day?
The ambition of every designer in New Collectivism is to
communicate with the largest audience. Design is a public activity which
defines the emotional and visual image of the cultural, artistic and socio-political
scene.
That is why the decision of New Collectivism to support Youth Day with
a retrogarde campaign and lend artistic meaning to the efforts of Slovene
and Yugoslav youth in the modification and re-evaluation of the celebration
of Youth Day is understandable.
Do you think it is possible to eliminate the traumas
of fascism with such artistic "provocations?" Does the society
even want such catharsis?
The trauma of fascism, or any other form of repression,
can be eliminated by each individual through an understanding of its reasons
and consequences. If each individual is aware of history, the possibility
of history repeating itself is thus avoided. New Collectivism believes
that society and its individuals do not want history to repeat itself.
That is why their posters have a sedative influence on the rational mind,
exhibiting at the same time a disturbing appeal to the public.
It is said that those who attack your poster the most
are even more upset by your explanations and statements. Any comment?
The retro-principle is present in statements and images.
The statements of New Collectivism are posters and the posters of New
Collectivism are the text.
The origin of the poster, for example, is subject to some laws. It must
be effective, informative... what else?
The artistic quality of the poster consists of the fact that it perceives
and mirrors more than the viewer is able to perceive before he sees the
poster. Its task is to persuade. That is why the poster must express the
propagandist's thought with immediacy and unpredictability.
Your conceptual principle is intensely eclectic, constructing
on reinterpretation, recreating models from the past and distancing itself
from all other present trends. Being eclectic, do you use any selective
methods, and if so, what are your priorities (in the all-aesthetic evocation
of historical works)?
New Collectivism communicates with its public through messages,
thoughts, which are contained in the form of the poster, book design or
overall image of an event. Every retrogardist in New Collectivism must
be acquainted with current events in art and society, because the only
selective method which NK considers in the design of its products is determined
by the media context of cultural artistic and socio-political events.
All productions of New Collectivism are formally aesthetically balanced.
However, by viewing the products of these four years of continuous activities,
it is possible to discern a consistency and purpose in the message of
each poster, book design and overall image.
Where do the problems with your products stem from?
The emotional possibilities of the poster are limitless.
A poster can be lyrical, threatening or revolting; it can be optimistic
or defensive.
If the viewer does not like the presented object, he will reject it at
once, regardless of how the designer presented the object. All the designer
can do here is to place it in some as yet nonexistant and untested context,
where the viewer will be able to see it in a novel way.
You act as a group. What role does the individual play
in your homogeneous organization?
New Collectivism is a group, composed of individuals. Each
individual is subordinated to the whole, which is a synthesis of the forces
and desires of all members.
Excerpts from interviews for "Mladina" and "Mentor,"
1987
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