29.08 (Sunday), 12-6 pm
Anarquistas de Bialystok: performative translation within the installation by Juan Pablo Macias with the participation of translator Jan Wąsiński
Admission included in the price of the ticket for the exhibition.
Juan Pablo Macias
WORD+MOIST PRESS VOLUME 5, 2021
editorial project, Polish language edition of Anarquistas de Bialystok, 1903-
1908 translated by Jan Wąsiński, with support from Instituto Cervantes
Warsaw
In 2009, the Spanish publishers Furia Apátrida and Edicions Anomia released
Anarquistas de Bialystok, 1903-1908, a compilation of autobiographical
testimonies, essays, political leaflets, and obituaries that focus on the
personal stories of activists in Białystok, Krynki, and the region. Anonymously
collating and translating research from Russian, Yiddish, and English
texts to Spanish, the book was distributed widely in print and as free
pdfs, and it became very popular for activists in Spain and Latin America. In
2013, two anarchists began translating the book into Italian while in prison
for engaging in insurrectionist activities. Collaborating with comrades inside
and outside prison walls, it was released in 2018 by the publisher Bandiera
Nera as Anarchici di Bialystok 1903-1908. In June 2020, this publication provided
the namesake for “Operazione Bialystok'', where 7 activists were arrested
and an autonomist social centre in Rome was raided by the police.
Despite the recent international attention to this history, most of the material
in the publication has until now been unavailable in Polish. Part of his
ongoing editorial project WORD+MOIST PRESS, the artist has initiated the
translation of the book into Polish, channelling resources from the exhibition
and Instituto Cervantes in Warsaw to make this hidden knowledge public
and without copyright so that local scholars and activists can use, edit,
and build on it. As the translator Jan Wąsiński completes sections of the
book, the pages will appear in the exhibition space juxtaposed with photographs
of local lichens, a reference both to clandestine publications and to
mycelial mutualism as demonstrating a primordial anarchist logic.
