Tadeusz Kantor - Wielopole, Wielopole, 1984

Tadeusz Kantor was one of those artist that can fit any box, he was so easily incorporated my mainstream theatrical discourses as an innocent and solitary genius, detached from the mundane and more important, from politics. Fortunately, those apologists never acknowledged the dynamite social potential of his and of Cricot 2 collective's work. As in other performances (I would remind here only the excellent "Let the artists die!", a terrific comment on art elitism, the upper class audiences and the role of the poor artist) filled with strong political criticism, in "Wielopole, Wielopole" Kantor gives a final blow to militarism, patriotism, catholicism and anti-semitism in such a brilliant and unequivocal way that by simply watching some old recording in poor conditions you can get the goose bumps. I  don't even want to imagine what was to be present and watch Kantor giving the shooting signal for the Polish Army to kill the female rabbi over and over again. And these general strong statements that are present in this performance (based on some stereotypical images that Kantor is not afraid to use) have the great potential to change the perception of the spectators, especially when those images are based on some dusty memories from the author's childhood and from another era. It is so ironic to see how this performance was associated with an anticommunist struggle when it speaks so well today about the marriage between nationalism, Church and hate, all values promoted by the anticommunist right-wing all over Eastern Europe. Lucky for him, Kantor is not alive anymore to see his shows crashed by fascists and religious fanatics who would not take the artistic critique too easily.