Half-Syrian and half-Hungarian artist Roza El-Hassan and her Serbian artist colleague Milica Tomic have a series of photographed meditations on identity and overpopulation culminating in a pointed poster that recently showed in Vienna.

Roza El-Hassan width Milica Tomic, Driving In The Porsche, 2000

Reminiscent of the by-now-well-known Adbusters, El-Hassan and Tomic (Tomic is dressed in Yugoslav partisan’s uniform) had themselves digitally inserted into an existing party-political poster of the cheery far-right Austrian politician Haider, squeezed happily into the front passenger seat of his Porsche car. Having overpopulated Mr Haider’s car, the resulting altered picture was displayed on the side of a Vienna gallery for all to see, with a slogan proclaiming the two artists to be “thinking about overpopulation”. Yes, the slogan is in English.

Roman Ondak, Antinomads, 2000, 12 postcards, postcard stand, each postcard 10.5 x 14.8 cm, Courtesy of the artist © Roman Ondak

But while right-wing Austrians may be thinking about nomadic East Europeans migrating to the “West” (wherever that starts) one Slovak artist at the Knoll show had his own quiet response. A series of normal postcards, on sale for a normal price (just under twenty US cents) each show a normal Slovak person photographed by Roman Ondak, mostly at home in their slightly-sparse but comfortable-looking communist-era apartments. Showing striking mutedness, Ondak’s name is not even on the cards, which are all entitled ‘Antinomads’. The individual Slovaks look thoughtful and settled, not about to go anywhere, hardly about to pop over to Vienna to help overpopulate Haider’s Porsche.

The postcards, of course, can travel the world in their place.

>An artist who does not speak English is not an artist
Date: June 15th – July 28th, 2001
Place: Knoll Gallery Budapest
Address: 10 Liszt Ferenc tér, 1061 Budapest
Tel: +36 1 267 3842
https://budapest.knollgalerie.at