Chto Delat

Chto Delat ("What is to be done?") was founded in 2003 in Petersburg by a working group of artists, critics, philosophers, and writers from Russia, with the goal of merging political theory, art, and activism.

Chto Delat sees itself as an artistic cell and also as a community organizer for a variety of cultural activities, intending on politicizing “knowledge production”. The artistic activity is realizing across a range of media—from video and theatre plays, to radio programs and murals—and includes art projects, seminars and public campaigns. The works of the collective are characterized by the use of alienation effect, surreal scenery, typicality and always case-based analyses of concrete social and political struggles. The aesthetics of the group is based also on heretic unpacking the artistic devices offered by Bertolt Brecht, Jean-Luc Godard and Rainer Werner Fassbinder. The work of the collective has been exhibited in many festivals and biennales in an international level (among them: MUAC Mexico 2017, KOW Berlin 2017, Sao Paolo Biennale 2014, Gwangju Biennale 2012, Institute of Contemporary Art London 2010), while it is part of big museums and collections, such as the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York; Museum Reina Sofia, Madrid; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Kadist Art Foundation, San Francisco.