The Art Pledge
Portrait of Chto Delat

Photo courtesy KOW Berlin.

Chto Delat

Born in
2003
From
Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation
Lives and works
Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation
Represented by
KOW
Website
https://chtodelat.org/
Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chto_Delat%3F_(art_collective)

UN goals

Tags

The first thing that motivates us is the rejection of all forms of oppression, the artificial alienation of people, and exploitation.

Biography

Chto Delat? (What is to be done?) is a collective formed by Russian artists, critics, philosophers and writers whose objective is to merge together activism and art. Inspired by Nikolai Chernyshevsky’s novel Chto Delat? and Vladimir Lenin’s eponymous pamphlet, their installations, performances, videos and curatorial projects defy the very nature of standardized art. Their collective actions outside art circuits show that art is to be found everywhere, and so are artists. In line with utopian ideals, Chto Delat is a call to arms, an apostrophe directed to the general public to act against class composition: for them capital shouldn't determine art’s value. 


We cannot help but find analogies with the Guerrilla Girls group that challenge patriarchal and racist values within the art world. However, Chto Delat’s actions tend to be time-based, projects unfolding for several years such as their collaboration with EZLN groups in Mexico.


Their ideology also connects them to the spirit of 20th century avant-garde movements, particularly with the dadaists like John Heartfield, who was a fierce detractor of Nazism. Like Chto Delat, they condemned social and artistic conventions.

Career highlights

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