Meeting Zuzanna Czebatul for Bibimbap and a chat on her Erlangen show

Czebatul’s sculptural and photographic pieces have a large spatial presence and exude profoundly timely themes about power and its influences, consequences and symbolic embodiment across geo-political and societal scopes.  
While waiting for our drinks after ordering, Czebatul spots a man asking other customers for change; when he arrives at our table, she’s ready with a 2-Euro coin and a smile. 

Hans Krestel: This is a fitting introduction, seeing you help those in need. In winter you also organized clothing donations for the homeless on Instagram and delivered the donations. In this sense, how are social activism and art related in your work?

Zuzanna CzebatulArt is social work in a way, isn’t it? Either for peers creating communities, networks, safe spaces or support structures and exchange, while being educative or creating awareness, sensitising for other people’s interests or concerns for anyone else. The wealthy need that especially. *laughs*

For many artists, activism comes naturally, since we are trained to come up with solutions for unusual tasks while being sensitive to needs. For me it is easy to organise things and mobilise others–maybe even easier when it’s not art-related. To share these abilities outside of the individualistic art production is logical to me. Whether it is collecting clothing for the homeless or in projects like the Artist Charity Aid Network, a platform swapping art for donations for different causes which I have been doing with Kate Brown, Leon Eisermann and Alexander Egger since last summer, this work has a more direct effect on things which matter to many of us. The arms of art seem to be often much longer on a timeline or in impact.

HK: Tell us more about the Happy Deppy Ecstasy Institute. What inspired it?

ZC: The invitation came in November 2019. I just returned from Hong Kong, where I witnessed the climax of the protests of the democratic movement. Before that I stayed in China for two months. My own Eurocentric thinking was exposed to me and much of what I thought China would be turned out wrong. In Europe, the post-colonial discourses were vivid already. Much of the Hong Kong-China conflict is related to either historic or contemporary colonialism. It was also the second extremely hot summer. The combination of many current topics made me question the institutions around me, whether art, education or politics, since they still seem so stiff and rigid in addressing so many urgencies, like later the pandemic. So the ‘Happy Deppy Ecstasy Institute’ was born. I imagined a museum about the human species and its collapse, similar to the dinosaur exhibitions in a natural history museum, just a bit more twisted and formulated ad absurdum. The orange carpet is based on an Internet meme circulating last summer when California was on fire. Somebody placed a Pantone trademark logo on top of the orange skyline of Los Angeles, calling it End-of-Days-Orange, which I used then for the carpet. That burned soil ties the show together, while also creating a visual connection between the different architectural styles of the Kunstpalais.

HK: You question power structures and elements of ruling systems in your work, with phallic symbols or direct representations of erections soaring large and self-confidently into the sky. 

ZC: We all love big things, don’t we? (laughs) But seriously, on one hand humans presumably have a natural relationship to the sky since the sun is there and the stars, and the clouds, which bring rain and create life. Babies are drawn to shiny things apparently because reflections of light are inscribed into our instincts. So it is no surprise that in different cultures the sky is worshipped, and slim shapes got erected. Under capitalism this worship has shifted toward a praise of the phallic form itself, now primarily representing patriarchal hegemony and white supremacy. The tie, the obelisk, even architecture–all expressions of masculine self-masturbation. When I was invited to design the Berlin Art Prize, I couldn’t think of any better object than a penis, plainly because until today it is the best gadget for success in the art world. I think it’s good to keep highlighting that in order to break it.

HK: In 2019 you were in Hong Kong during the widespread protests against increasing Chinese rule. You shared your insights on Instagram along with impressive photos. Tell us about that experience and how police violence influences your art.

ZC: It was pretty intense, and not because the police were  especially brutal. It was also intense because for me our globalised world just unfolded in an utmost tragic way: when economic interests spill into politics and people have the resources and communication networks to question both, then rise up and are met with such cruelty by their own governments. There is a severe change of police duty and the function of that institution itself happening all over the world. And then to realise how Europe and the U.S. are involved, as in almost any other conflict, and how that is connected to our privileges here makes clear how we are all intertwined, no matter where we live. The pandemic illustrates this quite well too. 

HK: Your work can also be seen in public spaces in Germany. Where can we see it?

ZC: Currently two sculptural works are installed at the project ‘Park Platz’ on the parking lot of the Berlinische Galerie in Kreuzberg, an initiative of Draussenstadt aiming to utilise semi-public spaces differently over the summer. It is curated by Nuno de Brito Rocha. Another two works are at the BUFA Filmstudios in Tempelhof and part of the exhibition Common Grounds, curated by Andrea van Reimersdahl and Eva Berendes. I am also participating in Der Katalysator at Museum Morsbroich in Leverkusen, curated by Ania Czerlitzki. 

The Happy Deppy Ecstasy Institute runs through 14 November, 2021 at Kunstpalais Erlangen. The exhibition was curated by Malte Lin-Kröger. 

The SLEEK edition Gentle Reminder (of the Banality of Power) by Zuzanna Czebatul will be available soon in our store.

This interview by contributing editor Hans Krestel has been edited. Connect with Hans Krestel on Instagram. 

Photography by Ludger Paffrath