Piotr Piotrowski

How to Write a History of Central‐East European Art?

Abstract On the one hand the ideology could serve (more or less) as a common platform for any comparative art studies in Central‐Eastern Europe, a common point of departure, a sort of framework of art historical narrative there between 1945 and 1989. On the other hand, however, such an instrument is useless if we would like to go deeper and draw a sort of map of Central‐Eastern Europe. Aiming at the above‐mentioned tasks, it is argued, we should take into consideration particular political practices, rather than the ideological discourse, or at least that what Luis Althusser called Ideological State Apparatuses, understood as different processes in different countries, producing different meanings of comparable art in comparable historical moments in the region, rather than classical concept of ideology. To show how the problem works in analytical praxis three case studies have been chosen: Clara Mosch Gallery in the GDR, Foksal Gallery in Poland, and the Balatonboglár Gallery in Hungary.