I think it was towards the beginning of summer on the bank of Velký Rybník (The Big Pond),near Kutná Hora, that Daniel Vlček and I first started to talk about how it would be interesting to find a way to imprint his upcoming Zlín exhibition with a site-specific character. Kabinet T Gallery's location provided an obvious link to Tomáš Bat'a, followed by initial explorations aimed at areas of visual culture, architecture and typography. After these preliminary thoughts Daniel paid a visit to the Barum Otrokovice company. Built between 1966 and 1972 the company represents not only the world's largest tire
factory, but also an exception to the historical truth of the Zlín Baťa group’s decline, along with lighter periods of stagnation, after the 1945 nationalization.
A focus on the symbolic space of the factory regarding industrial production, whose global range had become smaller following the prolonged crises beginning at the start of the 70's, quickly proved to be an appropriate basis for the exhibition's concept. This concept in turn aims to consciously reflect on the here and now. Many of the photographs that Daniel brought back from his excursion to the Otrkovice factory had enormous "sex appeal." This appeal was contained above all in the shots detailing the surfaces and textures of semi-finished products waiting their turn to become part of a perfectly functional one. Such shots called out to be deviated, if only slightly, from the inevitable trajectory of the conveyor belt to become beautiful paintings. The fact that the detailed scans of the material used in the production of high-speed tires, which can be seen in the exhibition, resembled the folds of erotic clothing or expensive evening gowns cannot be a coincidence. Here the common denominator is desire, an emotion that we know can never be fully satisfied because pleasure passes away too quickly only to be followed by the onset of numbness and pain. This awareness of things, however, doesn't change anything, since desire is inseparable form the self-deception of the satisfaction accompanying it. We allow desire to run again and again, becoming machines driven by it. At first glance we don't seem to be much different from cars in this aspect, whose production, appearance, and speed is driven forward by a desire at least as fast as gasoline burns.
Tomáš Baťa was certainly very well aware of this at the beginning of the 30's when he decided to expand from his own factories to the production of tires. At the same time, this decision arose from the pragmatic analysis of the lack of this increasingly sought-after commodity on the Czechoslovakian market. Nevertheless, by way of an indirect connection through Zlín's preoccupation with the automobile industry, a symbolic circle was completed. Henry Ford's methods for controlling the production and distribution of goods, along with management methods (and control) concerning the life of his employees was a vital source of inspiration for Bat'a. A key aspect of Fordism is the perfect management of time on factory grounds through its mechanization and the most efficient use down to the last possible second. Hence the thoroughly convinced supporter of Fordism will follow the simple slogan: Time is Money. On the premises of the Bat'a factory workers were kept aware of its owner's devotion to this slogan by being simultaneously reminded and warned of the undeniable truth that the day has 86,400 seconds.
Ford's (or Bat'a's) strict accounting of time, in terms of its use and its accordance with maximum efficiency, is as perfect as possible. Nevertheless, Fordism (or Batism) represents a phase in the development of capitalism where a clear distinction between work time and leisure time, otherwise known as production and consumption respectively, is drawn. When I saw one of Daniel's photographs from "Barumka" and saw a simple "clock" where the needle gradually ticked away to show each work day, I realized how tight the clear separation between the two basic modes of time remains. This is
true even in the space of factories and industrial production in its advanced or "leaner" stage,that is the lean production variant developed after World War II by Toyota. The operating mode of factory employees has remained, in the second decade of the 21st century, effectively "Fordist." This is with the inclusion of all kinds of innovations with some exceptions. One such exception is the automobile maker Volvo's Udevallska factory which, in the second half of the 80's, tried to maximize profits rather than improve working conditions. As a result, artists are often concisely referred to as pioneers of "post-Fordism." The main characteristics of this operating mode include the expectation that employees will meet specific qualifications and be expected to be flexible, adaptable, and exhibit a constant readiness to come up with new ideas or at least be up to date with them. The boundary between work and leisure time is in turn blurred to the point of indiscernibility, translating to an indistinction between production and consumption. One of the most obvious examples of the producers of so-called immaterial work is the laptop (specifically the MacBook in the case of cultural producers). Along with laptops, Smartphones are the most obvious attributes of post-Ford workers who figuratively stand on the production line, even while sitting in a cafe or lying in bed. They are always read to submit a new project, always available and open to communication. The machines with which they work are different than those used by workers in "Ford's factory." These machines are personalized to the point of merging with their "servicer" (or servant) and becoming an indistinguishable unity. In an ideal world the machines' responsiveness is instantaneous. Despite this ideal, behind-the-scenes IT operations can sometimes take up to more than a second.
"Spinning Beach Ball" is an icon used in Apple's operating systems as the machine's warning to its user. Seconds, or God forbid, minutes spent staring at the colorful spinning beach ball icon are perfect cracks in the fabric of reality. The most common reaction to a similar violation of the "free work time" continuum,is probably frustration or even anger. The spinning ball can, of course, also lead to small epiphanies, revelations, insights beneath the veil, and a state following not unlike meditation. The key to Further and Higher is an unquestioning optimism. A concept that also appeared in the headline of the Magazine for Young Men and Women in Bat'a's School of Work and calls out, above all, a nostalgia within us. Can the "immaterial worker," constantly communicative and virtually connected through every social media yet radically individualized, really understand? Hyperperformance interchanged with periods of inactivity and apathy (not only when we have a project to work on) is strikingly reminiscent of how our "production facilities" function.
Just as these workers and ourselves operate on the basis of never-ending "upgrades," without prospects beyond the horizon of events, so too do others wish to go further and higher in the world, where everything seems within reach (?). Perhaps emphasizing that the gallery is a space where we have the possibility to see things (and if not "really see" then at least "see differently") is banal. Nevertheless, for precisely this reason such an emphasis is the core of every good exhibition. Six black monochromes revealing, upon closer examination, six phases of the spinning beach ball's rotation spin in a space with a shiny strip of rubber running to nowhere. This sloping path to nowhere recalls the kind of meeting in which the Surrealists wanted to reveal the poetic potential of the unconscious. However, if this meeting reveals anything it isn't the hidden areas of the human psyche, but rather inanimate things. Learning about things, getting to know what they desire, what they dream about, whether it be MacBook's or tires, is perhaps the best way that we can learn something more about ourselves.
Jan Zálešák