The public program accompanying the project Backstein Function² explores the history of contemporary art in Russia through the figure of art critic and theorist Joseph Backstein (1945–2024).
The sessions will bring together artists, researchers, and Backstein’s colleagues, for whom his name is associated with a unique ability to capture and define the essence of cultural processes as much as with his artistic practice and cultural institutions.
This fall Garage will host two discussions that place the project Backstein Function² in a broader context—as a tool for understanding an era, a way of recording artistic life, and a form of personal involvement in the commons. The program will also consider the role of video in the (self-)archiving and institutionalization of contemporary Russian art.