The Lausitz lies in the southeastern part of the Province of Brandenburg in the former East Germany (Deutsche Demokratische Republik) where it meets the Polish border. Of Sorb origin (a Slavic language group), the region has been shaped by the timeline of industrialisation, where along with its capital, Cottbus/Chosebuz was defined as a Model State and energy heartland of the DDR. The Tagebau, part of the largest opencast mining territory in Europe, now owned by a Swedish energy multinational, lies north, east and south of the city. While the braunkohle (lignite) will eventually be completely depleted, it continues to be extended, leading to the destruction of century-old Sorb villages.

Having first visited the region in late 2003, seeking the impact of global capital in a periphery of Europe, as had been experienced in my native Ireland, I quickly realised that it was in fact the antithesis of this experience. Prior to the global economic collapse, but as evidenced by the above prophetic words of Marco, I encountered an emptying and the recognition that the same globalising forces which had transformed unrestrained the landscape of my origins, were indeed transforming this landscape through its forces of withdrawal and seepage – a globalised hemorrhaging. As a result, jobs were and continue to go further East while its younger population migrates to the West and in 2007, the Lausitz came last in a national survey addressing future prospects.

Informed by ethnographic understandings and incorporating audio digital video, photography, cross-generational testimony and artefactual material, the project has been constructed in the context of a landscape shaped by and inscribed with the utopic ideological aspirations of modernity – industrialisation, socialism and now at great cost, globalisation. In totality, the region invokes Marshall Berman’s ‘wounds of modernity’ resulting from the ‘cycles of destruction’ necessary for the functioning of capital. A pivotal emphasis for the project, is the catalyst for the region itself, the Tagebau and critically viewing it as perhaps a metaphor for late capitalism – finite, fragile and ultimately, unsustainable.

The production of the project has been generously supported by the Arts Council of Ireland.

Further information and location available here:

http://2012.photoireland.org/program/on-migration/

Images:

 – ‘untitled’, section(map), Cottbus, Lausitz, Eastern Germany (glass slide, single projection)

– Angelika, Tagebauarbeiterin, Tagebau Jaenschwalde, Lausitz, Eastern Germany, July 2008 (still, two-channel digital video, looped)

– ‘untitled’ (empty housing project in process of being dismantled), Neu Schmellwitz, Cottbus, Lausitz, Eastern Germany, August 2007 (glass slide, single projection)

Mark Curran (b. 1964) is an artist and educator who lives and works in Berlin and Dublin. He completed a practice-led PhD (2011) through the Centre for Transcultural Research and Media Practice, DIT, Dublin, lectures on the BA (Hons) Photography programme at IADT, Dublin and is Visiting Professor on the MA in Visual and Media Anthropology at the Freie Universität Berlin. Incorporating multi-media installation informed by ethnographic understandings, Curran’s practice presently focuses upon the role and representation of globalised landscapes in the predatory context of migrations of global capital. A cycle of long-term projects began with SOUTHERN CROSS (Gallery of Photography, Dublin 2002), which was widely published and exhibited. The Breathing Factory (Edition Braus/Belfast Exposed Photography/Gallery of Photography 2006), the outcome of his doctoral research has also been extensively presented internationally including Galerie Le Bleu du Ciel, Lyon (2008), Museum of Photography, Thessaloniki (2008), Fotofestiwal, Lodz (2009), DePaul Museum of Art, Chicago (2010) and the Xuhui Art Museum, Shanghai (2010). Ausschnitte aus EDEN/Extracts from EDEN (2011) was installed as part of Encontros da Imagem, Braga, Portugal (2011) and will feature in a forthcoming edition of the UK journal, Photographies. Curran was also recently nominated for the Prix Pictet by Gallery of Photography, Dublin.

Supported by the Arts Council of Ireland,

Dublin City Council and Department of Foreign Affairs, Government of Ireland and curated by Helen Carey, Director of the Limerick City Gallery of Art, Curran has been commissioned to mark the forthcoming centenary of the Dublin Lockout, a pivotal moment in Irish labour history to be held in Dublin in 2013. The transnational multi-sited project focuses on the functioning of the global stock markets.