Catalogue > At random

Alicja Rogalska

Dark Fibres

Vidéo expérimentale | 4k | couleur | 5:16 | Pologne, Georgie | 2021

A song about scavenging, economic exploitation and post-internet reality performed by a Georgian polyphonic choir and based on a story of Hayastan Shakarian - an elderly, illiterate woman from the village of Armazi near Mtskheta, who in 2011 allegedly cut the internet cable connecting Georgia and Armenia whilst looking for scrap metal to sell. The story became global news though Shakarian denied any involvement, famously saying she had never heard of the internet, and many people disputed its veracity. The lyrics were sung to the tune of Chakrulo, a medieval Georgian song about peasants preparing for armed rebellion against their feudal master. The song was sent into space in 1977 on Voyager 2.? Commissioned by Arts Territory for Myth exhibition, Artisterium Festival, Tbilisi (song), filmed at Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Optics and Precision Engineering IOF and supported by the DAAD Artists-in-Berlin program (video).?

Alicja Rogalska's practice is research-led and focuses on social structures and the political subtext of the everyday; she mostly works in specific contexts making situations, performances, videos and installations in collaboration with other people to collectively search for emancipatory ideas for the future. She recently presented her work at National Gallery of Art (Vilnius, 2023), Scherben, Berlin Art Prize (2022, winner), Manifesta 14 (Prishtina, 2022), Temporary Gallery (Cologne, 2021-22), Kunsthalle Bratislava (2021), Kunsthalle Wien (Vienna, 2020-21), OFF Biennale (Budapest, 2020-21), Art Encounters Biennale (Timis?oara, 2019), Tokyo Photographic Art Museum (2019), Biennale Warszawa (2019), Museum of Modern Art (Warsaw, 2019), Kyoto Art Centre (2019) and Muzeum Sztuki (?ódz?, 2019). Rogalska was a fellow of the DAAD Artists-in-Berlin program (2020-21), and took part in residencies at City of Women Festival (Ljubljana, 2019), Stuart Hall Library (London, 2019), Paradise AIR (Matsudo, 2018), Museums Quartier (Vienna, 2018) and IASPIS (Stockholm, 2017), amongst others.