This artist's book derives from a series of videos documenting the present
situation of six unrecognized Republics on the border of Eastern Europe
and Western Asia. Vellahu collects the collective memories of people and
lands which have been affected by years of war and by the politics of
borders.
This is not an artist's book about borders. Rather, it is an
artist's book about overcoming the influence of politics on the land
within the borders of unrecognized or semi-recognized states. It is a
document of the fragmented symptoms of the "Bosnian pot" character of
governance, in which all components simultaneously complement and
eliminate each other. This unsettling principle of governance, in which
elements unable to withstand the pressure collapse, while those that are
more powerful survive (and are subsequently absorbed within the system),
has been known for many centuries. By not taking sides, what this book
highlights, from a bird's-eye view, are the contrasts and conflicts
provoked by contemporary attempts at preserving a semblance of safety
within those borders. Unfortunately, many of these attempts did, and
continue to, constitute crimes.
Much more than a mere cinematographic idea, Fragments I is a
series of video documents detailing a journey through specific
socio-political pulsars: The Republic of Abkhazia, a state of limited
recognition; Varosha, a silent town in the Turkish Republic of Northern
Cyprus, recognized only by Turkey; through the Field of Blackbirds in the
Republic of Kosovo, a state of limited recognition; at the edge of the
Tskhinvali region of the Republic of South Ossetia, a partially recognized
state; in the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic or the Republic of Artsakh, a
state unrecognized by any sovereign state; and in Transnistria, or the
Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic, a self-proclaimed, non-recognized,
autonomous territorial unit with a special legal status.
Vangjush Vellahu (born 1987 in Pogradec, Albania, lives and
works in Berlin) is a visual artist working with
video,
prints, objects and
archives
with the focus on different forms of storytelling particular to specific
communities; exploring how collective memories of authoritarian regimes
are produced and remembered by communities affected by them. His works
intertwine urban histories of entities that from an ideological and
political stand point remain on the margins of recognition. His travels
often take a shape of journal-like reconfigurations that attempt at
re-defining the popular understanding of what borders, territories or
geographies represent today. Since 2014 he is part of a local group of
emerging young artists – Nucleu 0000 in Bucharest, that tries to coagulate
an artistic organization as a response to the lack of cultural finance.
