Elena Sorokina - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Elena Sorokina

GLEAN Magazine , 2024

Is Anna Zemánková (1908–1986) an artist ‘brut’, belonging to a loose field also called ‘outsider ... more Is Anna Zemánková (1908–1986) an artist ‘brut’, belonging to a loose field also called ‘outsider art’? I don’t think so. I could actually finish this argument right here, adding perhaps that the very question sounds obsolete today and that it also demonstrates my non-objectivity. The moment I set eyes on Zemánková’s work 1, I realised that I was looking at powerful and eccentric organic abstraction. Leaving all categories aside, I am routinely mesmerised, personally and professionally, by her subtly anthropomorphic, eroticised and vigorously blooming creatures.

fragilités, 2022

Fragility has emerged in recent years as a key concept through which to reimagine both human and ... more Fragility has emerged in recent years as a key concept through which to reimagine both human and ecological conditions. The exhibition fragilités unfolds the concerns, visions, and sensibilities expressed by artists who have engaged deeply with fragility and reflected on its tensions, complexities and paradoxes. The traditional meaning of fragility – weakness, powerlessness, passivity – is challenged, and claimed instead as a source of force and agency that encourages sustaining interdependencies.

Res: Anthropology and aesthetics, 2008

In our present time, one feels somewhat embarrassed when speaking or writing of immortality, in p... more In our present time, one feels somewhat embarrassed when speaking or writing of immortality, in particular the immortalityof an individual. You feel you have to explain how on earth you came up with such an odd? even kitsch? topic. Today, the individual's ...

Frontières Invisibles (Exhibition Catalog), 2009

This is the art world that we live in at present and it suggests that, pace the Barthesian sense ... more This is the art world that we live in at present and it suggests that, pace the Barthesian sense that we never go to the theatre anymore, we are in fact already there. Shannon Jackson
The exhibition catalogue 'Invisible Borders' features the work of more than seventy European artists. Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, it appears essential to learn more about the dynamism of these contemporary artistic and creative scenes which cross without taboos the old lines of demarcation and to discover a new vision of Eastern and Central Europe, between the geopolitical and the geopoetical.

At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, 2005

Opening on May 18, 2005, At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, the annual exhibition of t... more Opening on May 18, 2005, At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, the annual exhibition of the Whitney ISP's curatorial fellows, chooses as its theme the many dimensions of the concept of "care" as an important social keyword. Questioning the dominant uses of the term "care," the exhibition engages a broader political context, touching on institutional care, human rights, and international aid, often revealing how power relations masquerade as care.
The show features the work of Eleanor Antin; Robert Blanchon; AA Bronson; Sophie Calle; Teresa Dulce and Marne Lucas of Danzine; Alia Hasan-Khan; Alfredo Jaar; Mike Kelley; Mary Kelly; Elena Kovylina; Kristina Leko; Joanna Malinowska; Annette Messager; Christian Philipp Müller and Jane Johnston; Yoko Ono; Adrian Piper; and Ernest Truely, Danielle Brans, and Sean Smith.
Each artist maps care through a continuum of psychological dynamics, from narcissism to obsession, aggression to violence, guilt to obligation. The works in At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care question the assumption that caring for another is a natural impulse. While rejecting the sentimental and sometimes disingenuous uses of the term, the exhibition argues that care must remain a crucial ethical concept. Ultimately, the exhibition foregrounds a human subject in need of care—vulnerable, dependent, and at the mercy of others.
At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care was organized by the 2004-05 Helena Rubinstein Curatorial Fellows of the Whitney Museum of American Art Independent Study Program: Sasha Archibald, Sarah Lookofsky, Cira Pascual Marquina, and Elena Sorokina.

Gregory Buchakjian Abandoned Dwellings: Display of Systems, 2019

Today, the act of walking in cities is connected to our newly-acquired digital gestures - scrolli... more Today, the act of walking in cities is connected to our newly-acquired digital gestures - scrolling and swiping, fixing our gaze on-screen and occasionally looking up to check the environment surroundings. In post-internet cities, physical markers that characterise the urban fabric no longer guide us. Google Maps has fundamentally transformed our ways of navigating and communicating with urban environments. As Hito Steyerl has stated, “Our sense of spatial and temporal orientation has changed dramatically in recent years, prompted by new technologies of surveillance, tracking, and targeting. One of the symptoms of this transformation is the growing importance of aerial views: overviews, Google Map views, satellite views. We are growing increasingly accustomed to what used to be called a God’s-eye view.”.

Be that as it may, a search for “abandoned houses in Beirut” via Google Earth’s God’s-eye view’s view would not return any results. Besides, Gregory Buchakjian wouldn’t opt for such a view, anyway. The artist prefers a horizontal perspective: a view from the inside, and the logic of direct observation. In his project, “Abandoned Dwellings in Beirut,. Wars and Transformation of the Urban Space : 1860-2015,” he embraces the “elementary form of the experience of the city” - – walking in the streets and talking to people. The city in his project is real, pulsating with insecurity, myth, destruction, and reconstruction, and populated by people who can show you the way.

“Eastern Europe doesn’t exist any longer” : the opening statement of the curators’ text for the e... more “Eastern Europe doesn’t exist any longer” : the opening statement of the curators’ text for the exhibition catalogue Les Promesses du passé : une histoire discontinue de l’art dans l’ex-Europe de l’Est lucidly formulates the current state of affairs of the subject matter in question.

Zbyněk Baladrán’s “Preliminary Report” Galerie Jocelyn Wolff, Paris Exhibition

I have written this text for the exhibition of Manolo Millares in Barcelona, at Galeria Mayoral, ... more I have written this text for the exhibition of Manolo Millares in Barcelona, at Galeria Mayoral, April-June 2017.
Millares' work is often described by metaphors of wounds, holes, violent ruptures, ripping and tearing apart, while stitching up —also as part of the same process— is rarely mentioned or discussed. Millares carries out this ancient gesture located at the crossroads of art, philosophy and care; his needle is used to repair damage, and his “sewing” becomes part of his work, functioning almost like an idiomatic expression, like “dripping” or “action painting.”

Three art projects I would like to discuss in this text take human rights as their sites, approac... more Three art projects I would like to discuss in this text take human rights as their sites, approaching them as the “last utopia”(1). They demonstrate how artists can use the principles of human rights as a deconstructive tool, unsettling fixed definitions of democracy, identity, inclusion and exclusion. They revolve around acts of contestation, resistance, civil disobedience (or on the contrary a radical ’civil obedience’). The projects themselves have a double life – they exist as actions and as installations, or spaces of ‘legal utopias’. Including strong archival elements, these utopian spaces stage particular relationships between documents, authors and spectators.

In view of the current discussion concerning choreographing exhibitions and inscription of dance ... more In view of the current discussion concerning choreographing exhibitions and inscription of dance into exhibition spaces, I am republishing my short comparative review of two exhibitions which run in parallel in New York in 2010 - Marina Abramovic at the MOMA and Tino Sehgal at the Guggenheim Museum.
"The logic of display and the terms and conditions of including “live art” in exhibitions are shifting, and the diverse ways of intertwining the spatial and the temporal are being tested. Sometimes the live-art additions simply take on a festival model, with a schedule of events taking place consecutively. Other models combine some installation work on display—which may or may not stand for art, “contain” art or be art—and live events. But the main field of experimentation is the hybrid model, meaning the intertwining of “live” elements and components with the exhibition’s own temporality and experience of time."

Books by Elena Sorokina

Introduction to and description of the works in the exhibition 'Spaces of Exception', a special p... more Introduction to and description of the works in the exhibition 'Spaces of Exception', a special project of the Moscow Biennial 2013 hosted by ArtPlay, Moscow.
Bilingual: English/Russian

Frontières Invisibles , 2009

The exhibition catalogue 'Frontieres Invisibles' features the work of more than seventy European ... more The exhibition catalogue 'Frontieres Invisibles' features the work of more than seventy European artists. Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, it appears essential to learn more about the dynamism of these contemporary artistic and creative scenes which cross without taboos the old lines of demarcation and to discover a new vision of Eastern and Central Europe, between the geopolitical and the geopoetical.
Le mot « scène » renvoie tout aussi bien à une vue d’ensemble qu’à une formule de l’univers théâtral désignant une unité structurelle d'une pièce ou d'un film. Le terme peut devenir totalement dramatique lorsqu'il se rapporte à la vie réelle, comme c'est le cas dans les expressions « une scène de crime» ou « la scène d’un accident ». Mais avant tout, le mot « scène » est lié à une expérience en construction : il s’agit de quelque chose d’essentiellement incomplet, partiel, inachevé. Les œuvres de l’exposition peuvent être considérées comme des scènes liées à différentes histoires ou pièces, appartenant peut-être à de plus grands récits, mais toujours rattachées de manière très explicite à un contexte historique ou géographique spécifique.

At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, 2005

This publication accompanies the exhibition At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, May 18-... more This publication accompanies the exhibition At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, May 18-June 25, 2005, organized by the 2004-05 Helena Rubinstein Curatorial Fellows of the Whitney Museum of American Art Independent Study Program: Sasha Archibald, Sarah Lookofsky, Cira Pascual Marquina, and Elena Sorokina

Verticality as Fantastic Occupation: Štefan Papčo, 2019

Following Hito Steyerl’s thinking, Papčo is suspicious of today’s vertical visuality, and his wor... more Following Hito Steyerl’s thinking, Papčo is suspicious of today’s vertical visuality, and his work traces it back to its origins, to the “modern obsession” it once was, and simultaneously questions it. Rooted in the cultures and techniques of climbing, his practice uses their body-based strategies; from the pool of performative modernities described in Hansen’s book, he recovers apocryphal elements and different ideas of verticality. Notable among these is his adoption of the way mountaineers perceive the vertical. This “climbers’ verticality” that Papčo activates in his work is contradictory, unstable, and performative. It rejects the god’s-eye perspective and opts for an individually lived experience of the “vertical” and its discontents.

Crystal Clear, 2020

Ranging from almost perfect transparency to complete opacity, crystals have been used in all area... more Ranging from almost perfect transparency to complete opacity, crystals have been used in all areas of human activity, from science to magic, from technology to healing. Scientists typically describe crystals as "growing", even though in their eyes they are not alive. Many living organisms, such as molluscs, are able to produce crystals. In many ancestral cultures, crystals and minerals were regarded as sentient. Indeed, they constitute the perfect emblem for the fluid and porous borders between animate and inanimate, organic and inorganic. The cryptocrystalline mineral turquoise, for example, is known for its ability to change colour in reaction to the skin. Its porosity allows the crystal to absorb bodily oils and fluids so that its colour becomes an amplification of the one who wears it. In certain cultures, the changes in the shade of turquoise are believed to indicate the owner's health. For centuries the Tibetan people have believed that turquoise is sentient, and their name for it, "gyu", doesn't include "stone" or "crystal". Rather, it is a proper noun, a thing in itself, a vibrating essence of atoms with its own character and qualities. It came to Europe through Anatolia, from the mines in historical Khorasan, which explains its European seventeenth century name, "turquoise". It was among the first gems to be mined in large quantities and many historical sites have been depleted. The Slow Growth of Crystals The project Crystal Clear was initially conceived as a platform for the artists to engage with the questions of transparency and opacity, earth and growth, and the extractive logic that we have to challenge and to change. I started to work on the project more than a year ago, long before the advent of Covid-19, when the word "crisis" had very different connotations. As countries progressively went into the first lockdown, with no one know for how long, the Pera Museum maintained its planning, and Crystal Clear was not cancelled, as thousands of other projects were. During lockdown, I continued working, discussing the project with artists, on the phone and via Skype or Zoom, researching and making curatorial choices and decisions. We kept working in a situation filled with uncertainty, and with an increasing awareness of what "crisis" means to us and to other people. We have gradually come to understand that crisis is our new normal and it is here to stay. As Elísio Macamo wrote, "Covid-19 is a cruel reminder that crisis is us. As we brace up to look the pandemic in the eye, we would be well advised not to forget what our normal is, namely crisis. History has taught us that you do not master a crisis by setting the return to normality as your goal. You master a crisis by enabling yourself to act whatever the circumstances." 1 In parallel to working on Crystal Clear, I have co-founded the Initiative for Practices and Visions of Radical Care with my colleague curator Nataša Petrešin-Bachelez. 2 It might seem unrelated to the exhibition, and yet I consider it an integral part of my thinking and my decisions during this time, which affected the rhythm and timing of the Crystal Clear project among other things. The Initiative was inspired by decolonial feminist and decolonial ecological intersectional practices and theories; it was informed by slow research and slow methodology,

GLEAN Magazine , 2024

Is Anna Zemánková (1908–1986) an artist ‘brut’, belonging to a loose field also called ‘outsider ... more Is Anna Zemánková (1908–1986) an artist ‘brut’, belonging to a loose field also called ‘outsider art’? I don’t think so. I could actually finish this argument right here, adding perhaps that the very question sounds obsolete today and that it also demonstrates my non-objectivity. The moment I set eyes on Zemánková’s work 1, I realised that I was looking at powerful and eccentric organic abstraction. Leaving all categories aside, I am routinely mesmerised, personally and professionally, by her subtly anthropomorphic, eroticised and vigorously blooming creatures.

fragilités, 2022

Fragility has emerged in recent years as a key concept through which to reimagine both human and ... more Fragility has emerged in recent years as a key concept through which to reimagine both human and ecological conditions. The exhibition fragilités unfolds the concerns, visions, and sensibilities expressed by artists who have engaged deeply with fragility and reflected on its tensions, complexities and paradoxes. The traditional meaning of fragility – weakness, powerlessness, passivity – is challenged, and claimed instead as a source of force and agency that encourages sustaining interdependencies.

Res: Anthropology and aesthetics, 2008

In our present time, one feels somewhat embarrassed when speaking or writing of immortality, in p... more In our present time, one feels somewhat embarrassed when speaking or writing of immortality, in particular the immortalityof an individual. You feel you have to explain how on earth you came up with such an odd? even kitsch? topic. Today, the individual's ...

Frontières Invisibles (Exhibition Catalog), 2009

This is the art world that we live in at present and it suggests that, pace the Barthesian sense ... more This is the art world that we live in at present and it suggests that, pace the Barthesian sense that we never go to the theatre anymore, we are in fact already there. Shannon Jackson
The exhibition catalogue 'Invisible Borders' features the work of more than seventy European artists. Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, it appears essential to learn more about the dynamism of these contemporary artistic and creative scenes which cross without taboos the old lines of demarcation and to discover a new vision of Eastern and Central Europe, between the geopolitical and the geopoetical.

At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, 2005

Opening on May 18, 2005, At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, the annual exhibition of t... more Opening on May 18, 2005, At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, the annual exhibition of the Whitney ISP's curatorial fellows, chooses as its theme the many dimensions of the concept of "care" as an important social keyword. Questioning the dominant uses of the term "care," the exhibition engages a broader political context, touching on institutional care, human rights, and international aid, often revealing how power relations masquerade as care.
The show features the work of Eleanor Antin; Robert Blanchon; AA Bronson; Sophie Calle; Teresa Dulce and Marne Lucas of Danzine; Alia Hasan-Khan; Alfredo Jaar; Mike Kelley; Mary Kelly; Elena Kovylina; Kristina Leko; Joanna Malinowska; Annette Messager; Christian Philipp Müller and Jane Johnston; Yoko Ono; Adrian Piper; and Ernest Truely, Danielle Brans, and Sean Smith.
Each artist maps care through a continuum of psychological dynamics, from narcissism to obsession, aggression to violence, guilt to obligation. The works in At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care question the assumption that caring for another is a natural impulse. While rejecting the sentimental and sometimes disingenuous uses of the term, the exhibition argues that care must remain a crucial ethical concept. Ultimately, the exhibition foregrounds a human subject in need of care—vulnerable, dependent, and at the mercy of others.
At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care was organized by the 2004-05 Helena Rubinstein Curatorial Fellows of the Whitney Museum of American Art Independent Study Program: Sasha Archibald, Sarah Lookofsky, Cira Pascual Marquina, and Elena Sorokina.

Gregory Buchakjian Abandoned Dwellings: Display of Systems, 2019

Today, the act of walking in cities is connected to our newly-acquired digital gestures - scrolli... more Today, the act of walking in cities is connected to our newly-acquired digital gestures - scrolling and swiping, fixing our gaze on-screen and occasionally looking up to check the environment surroundings. In post-internet cities, physical markers that characterise the urban fabric no longer guide us. Google Maps has fundamentally transformed our ways of navigating and communicating with urban environments. As Hito Steyerl has stated, “Our sense of spatial and temporal orientation has changed dramatically in recent years, prompted by new technologies of surveillance, tracking, and targeting. One of the symptoms of this transformation is the growing importance of aerial views: overviews, Google Map views, satellite views. We are growing increasingly accustomed to what used to be called a God’s-eye view.”.

Be that as it may, a search for “abandoned houses in Beirut” via Google Earth’s God’s-eye view’s view would not return any results. Besides, Gregory Buchakjian wouldn’t opt for such a view, anyway. The artist prefers a horizontal perspective: a view from the inside, and the logic of direct observation. In his project, “Abandoned Dwellings in Beirut,. Wars and Transformation of the Urban Space : 1860-2015,” he embraces the “elementary form of the experience of the city” - – walking in the streets and talking to people. The city in his project is real, pulsating with insecurity, myth, destruction, and reconstruction, and populated by people who can show you the way.

“Eastern Europe doesn’t exist any longer” : the opening statement of the curators’ text for the e... more “Eastern Europe doesn’t exist any longer” : the opening statement of the curators’ text for the exhibition catalogue Les Promesses du passé : une histoire discontinue de l’art dans l’ex-Europe de l’Est lucidly formulates the current state of affairs of the subject matter in question.

Zbyněk Baladrán’s “Preliminary Report” Galerie Jocelyn Wolff, Paris Exhibition

I have written this text for the exhibition of Manolo Millares in Barcelona, at Galeria Mayoral, ... more I have written this text for the exhibition of Manolo Millares in Barcelona, at Galeria Mayoral, April-June 2017.
Millares' work is often described by metaphors of wounds, holes, violent ruptures, ripping and tearing apart, while stitching up —also as part of the same process— is rarely mentioned or discussed. Millares carries out this ancient gesture located at the crossroads of art, philosophy and care; his needle is used to repair damage, and his “sewing” becomes part of his work, functioning almost like an idiomatic expression, like “dripping” or “action painting.”

Three art projects I would like to discuss in this text take human rights as their sites, approac... more Three art projects I would like to discuss in this text take human rights as their sites, approaching them as the “last utopia”(1). They demonstrate how artists can use the principles of human rights as a deconstructive tool, unsettling fixed definitions of democracy, identity, inclusion and exclusion. They revolve around acts of contestation, resistance, civil disobedience (or on the contrary a radical ’civil obedience’). The projects themselves have a double life – they exist as actions and as installations, or spaces of ‘legal utopias’. Including strong archival elements, these utopian spaces stage particular relationships between documents, authors and spectators.

In view of the current discussion concerning choreographing exhibitions and inscription of dance ... more In view of the current discussion concerning choreographing exhibitions and inscription of dance into exhibition spaces, I am republishing my short comparative review of two exhibitions which run in parallel in New York in 2010 - Marina Abramovic at the MOMA and Tino Sehgal at the Guggenheim Museum.
"The logic of display and the terms and conditions of including “live art” in exhibitions are shifting, and the diverse ways of intertwining the spatial and the temporal are being tested. Sometimes the live-art additions simply take on a festival model, with a schedule of events taking place consecutively. Other models combine some installation work on display—which may or may not stand for art, “contain” art or be art—and live events. But the main field of experimentation is the hybrid model, meaning the intertwining of “live” elements and components with the exhibition’s own temporality and experience of time."

Introduction to and description of the works in the exhibition 'Spaces of Exception', a special p... more Introduction to and description of the works in the exhibition 'Spaces of Exception', a special project of the Moscow Biennial 2013 hosted by ArtPlay, Moscow.
Bilingual: English/Russian

Frontières Invisibles , 2009

The exhibition catalogue 'Frontieres Invisibles' features the work of more than seventy European ... more The exhibition catalogue 'Frontieres Invisibles' features the work of more than seventy European artists. Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, it appears essential to learn more about the dynamism of these contemporary artistic and creative scenes which cross without taboos the old lines of demarcation and to discover a new vision of Eastern and Central Europe, between the geopolitical and the geopoetical.
Le mot « scène » renvoie tout aussi bien à une vue d’ensemble qu’à une formule de l’univers théâtral désignant une unité structurelle d'une pièce ou d'un film. Le terme peut devenir totalement dramatique lorsqu'il se rapporte à la vie réelle, comme c'est le cas dans les expressions « une scène de crime» ou « la scène d’un accident ». Mais avant tout, le mot « scène » est lié à une expérience en construction : il s’agit de quelque chose d’essentiellement incomplet, partiel, inachevé. Les œuvres de l’exposition peuvent être considérées comme des scènes liées à différentes histoires ou pièces, appartenant peut-être à de plus grands récits, mais toujours rattachées de manière très explicite à un contexte historique ou géographique spécifique.

At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, 2005

This publication accompanies the exhibition At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, May 18-... more This publication accompanies the exhibition At the Mercy of Others: The Politics of Care, May 18-June 25, 2005, organized by the 2004-05 Helena Rubinstein Curatorial Fellows of the Whitney Museum of American Art Independent Study Program: Sasha Archibald, Sarah Lookofsky, Cira Pascual Marquina, and Elena Sorokina

Verticality as Fantastic Occupation: Štefan Papčo, 2019

Following Hito Steyerl’s thinking, Papčo is suspicious of today’s vertical visuality, and his wor... more Following Hito Steyerl’s thinking, Papčo is suspicious of today’s vertical visuality, and his work traces it back to its origins, to the “modern obsession” it once was, and simultaneously questions it. Rooted in the cultures and techniques of climbing, his practice uses their body-based strategies; from the pool of performative modernities described in Hansen’s book, he recovers apocryphal elements and different ideas of verticality. Notable among these is his adoption of the way mountaineers perceive the vertical. This “climbers’ verticality” that Papčo activates in his work is contradictory, unstable, and performative. It rejects the god’s-eye perspective and opts for an individually lived experience of the “vertical” and its discontents.

Crystal Clear, 2020

Ranging from almost perfect transparency to complete opacity, crystals have been used in all area... more Ranging from almost perfect transparency to complete opacity, crystals have been used in all areas of human activity, from science to magic, from technology to healing. Scientists typically describe crystals as "growing", even though in their eyes they are not alive. Many living organisms, such as molluscs, are able to produce crystals. In many ancestral cultures, crystals and minerals were regarded as sentient. Indeed, they constitute the perfect emblem for the fluid and porous borders between animate and inanimate, organic and inorganic. The cryptocrystalline mineral turquoise, for example, is known for its ability to change colour in reaction to the skin. Its porosity allows the crystal to absorb bodily oils and fluids so that its colour becomes an amplification of the one who wears it. In certain cultures, the changes in the shade of turquoise are believed to indicate the owner's health. For centuries the Tibetan people have believed that turquoise is sentient, and their name for it, "gyu", doesn't include "stone" or "crystal". Rather, it is a proper noun, a thing in itself, a vibrating essence of atoms with its own character and qualities. It came to Europe through Anatolia, from the mines in historical Khorasan, which explains its European seventeenth century name, "turquoise". It was among the first gems to be mined in large quantities and many historical sites have been depleted. The Slow Growth of Crystals The project Crystal Clear was initially conceived as a platform for the artists to engage with the questions of transparency and opacity, earth and growth, and the extractive logic that we have to challenge and to change. I started to work on the project more than a year ago, long before the advent of Covid-19, when the word "crisis" had very different connotations. As countries progressively went into the first lockdown, with no one know for how long, the Pera Museum maintained its planning, and Crystal Clear was not cancelled, as thousands of other projects were. During lockdown, I continued working, discussing the project with artists, on the phone and via Skype or Zoom, researching and making curatorial choices and decisions. We kept working in a situation filled with uncertainty, and with an increasing awareness of what "crisis" means to us and to other people. We have gradually come to understand that crisis is our new normal and it is here to stay. As Elísio Macamo wrote, "Covid-19 is a cruel reminder that crisis is us. As we brace up to look the pandemic in the eye, we would be well advised not to forget what our normal is, namely crisis. History has taught us that you do not master a crisis by setting the return to normality as your goal. You master a crisis by enabling yourself to act whatever the circumstances." 1 In parallel to working on Crystal Clear, I have co-founded the Initiative for Practices and Visions of Radical Care with my colleague curator Nataša Petrešin-Bachelez. 2 It might seem unrelated to the exhibition, and yet I consider it an integral part of my thinking and my decisions during this time, which affected the rhythm and timing of the Crystal Clear project among other things. The Initiative was inspired by decolonial feminist and decolonial ecological intersectional practices and theories; it was informed by slow research and slow methodology,