Chto Delat &
We are also meant. We are part of a whole. But what if the whole itself is about to fall apart? In the video performance nezhnost / tenderness by Chto Delat, we are invited to enter a communal space—to watch, think along and ask ourselves: how do we mourn? How do we think collectively? What is common sense? How are we useful, and do we even have to be?
Chto Delat’s work, originating with the start of the pandemic in 2020, is an artistic document of this time. It is an experiment, born of the fear of disappearing in the change of times.
Four people sit separate from one another in front of their screens and find a shared rhythm, oscillation, in mourning, meditative movements. The rhythm grows into the melody of the song, sung by Tatjana Doronina, which captures the loneliness and nostalgia of the first cosmonaut in space and makes isolation and feeling absence tangible.
Blue frames fade in rapid succession, introducing questions and fragments that have occupied the collective for years. Reflections of societal and political conditions, which Chto Delat analyses and questions. Art becomes a response to the crisis, an antidote to the always present danger of a collapse—and a consideration of how we behave when the collapse has already taken place.
Amidst the chaos ›tenderness‹ is, a conscious act of resistance, an attempt to describe the absurdity of reality and to maintain contact with one another. (Rosa Heidemann)
Chto Delat would like to thank Maria Markina for the inspirational
cross-pollination of practice during pandemics
