“No Posters Allowed”
An unexpected exhibition has opened at the Isolation Foundation’s premises in Donetsk
The “No Posters Allowed” exhibition has opened at the Isolation Platform for Cultural Initiatives Foundation’s premises in Donetsk. The project’s curator Andrii Horokhov has brought to Donetsk over 30 kilograms of posters collected this year in Berlin. Most of them come from the Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg-Neukoelln neighborhood, known for creativity of its residents. The exhibits include ads promoting punk concerts, radical magazines, garage parties and tattoo parlors. “I started to tear posters off because I strived to preserve these things of beauty present throughout the city, but unable to survive beyond the first half of a day. My home is no place to keep so many posters, thus I resolved to create a collection of graphic works for the Donetsk design museum,” Horokhov told us.
Berlin abounds with posters, advertisers glue newer products on top of older ones, creating colorful ‘cakes’ of five or six posters in one place. The exhibition’s curator commented: “This interesting series of small photocopies on colored background is a typical Berlin work. A black photocopy on bright fluorescent paper can be quickly stuck on top of any poster, making it into a parasite poster, a cheap and rough product. The graphics of these posters is mediocre, but they crowd all the other signs out because photocopies glow at night.”
Dance for the Revolution appeal is an example of such posters. Berlin has a tradition of political dance events, with proceeds from such parties used to help, for example, comrades arrested by the police during protest dispersal. A small acid-green poster invites to attend just such a disco party.
The posters on display combine fierce creativity with social topics. A huge poster calls: “Cancel Rapists’ Subscription!” Black silhouettes of male rapists not reported to the police occupy almost all of the poster’s space, and only six pale pink silhouettes stand for those convicted. The statistics below informs that about 160,000 rapes are committed in Germany every year.
Some of the exhibits use silk printing techniques, involving a few coats of paint applied through photocopied stencils, making colors brighter and more intense than those of conventional prints. Silk-printed posters are done by hand and only rarely get to the street. One of these exceptions is the black and white poster Independent Binz, Est. 2006. Binz was a factory in Zurich seized by the locals in 2006. It has become a center of independent living since, hosting concerts and housing squatters.
The collection of the exhibition’s curator includes posters from Cologne, Moscow, Kharkiv as well as weird ads of hair buyers from Luhansk. Horokhov admitted: “I am interested in Donetsk posters, but this city has nothing on par with Berlin’s boldness and ugliness, local posters are not ‘bad enough’ for me. In general, one needs to learn to be able to see the poster beauty, since people often ignore wonderful works. My posters are valuable visual evidence, and they will become a unique archive in a decade. I hope there will be more exhibitions, as I still have a lot to show and, of course, I am still collecting posters, it has become an addiction for me!”
The exhibition “No Posters Allowed” will run until January 26.
