Film screening: Irradiation – Anton Vidokle

The screening starts with an introduction by Martina Yordanova, curator National Gallery of Bulgaria in Sofia, and Vasil Vladimirov, artistic Director KO-OP (Sofia), following up on his retrospective exhibition Irradiation at the National Gallery (January 2026), and the historical significance of Cosmism as both a philosophical movement and a contemporary artistic proposition.

Date: Wednesday 18 March
Time: 15:00 – 16:30 (walk-in, 14:45)

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About the artist

Anton Vidokle is an artist, filmmaker, and curator based in New York and Berlin. Since 2014, he has developed an extensive body of films inspired by Cosmism, a 19th-century Russian intellectual movement combining science, mysticism, art, and politics in pursuit of overcoming death and resurrecting all who have lived. His films – shot across Kazakhstan, Siberia, Japan, Italy, and Mesopotamia – blend documentary and fiction, ritual and philosophy, proposing cinema as a site where the dead might speak again and the dream of immortality becomes a collective, planetary task. His major works include the Cosmism trilogy: This Is Cosmos (2014), The Communist Revolution Was Caused by the Sun (2015), and Immortality and Resurrection for All! (2017), as well as Citizens of the Cosmos (2019) and EXODUS (2024).

About the films

The Communist Revolution Was Caused by the Sun (2015, 33 min)
The second part of Vidokle’s trilogy on Cosmist fundamentals, this film explores the poetic dimension of solar cosmology through the research of Soviet biophysicist Alexander Chizhevsky. Shot in Kazakhstan – where Chizhevsky was imprisoned and later exiled – the film introduces his research into the impact of solar emissions on human sociology, psychology, politics, and economics. Aligning the life of post-Soviet rural residents with the futurological projects of Russian cosmism, the film emphasises that the goal of early Soviet breakthroughs aimed at the conquest of outer space was not technical acceleration, but the common cause of humankind in their struggle against limitations of earthly life.

Citizens of the Cosmos (2019, 30 min)
Based on the 1922 Biocosmist manifesto by Alexander Svyatogor, this film represents Vidokle’s attempt to explore the influence of Cosmism in and on other cultures and geographies. Shot on location in Tokyo and Kiev with amateur actors and volunteers, the film presents an imagined community voicing historical desires of Cosmism—immortality, resurrection of the dead, and interplanetarism—set within everyday contemporary Japanese life. Using urban shrines, cemeteries, crematoriums, tatami rooms, bamboo forests, and city streets as an open-air stage, the film features rejuvenation through blood transfusion, funerary processions, the Japanese cremation bone-picking ceremony (骨上げ), attempts to communicate with the dead using stethoscopes, and a theremin orchestra recital. Set to an original score by Alva Noto, this is an experiment in defamiliarization: a speculative test of the universality implicit in Cosmism’s premise when projected onto another language, geography, tradition, and culture.

More about the artist

Beyond his artistic practice, Vidokle is a significant figure in contemporary art institutional leadership. He is Editor of e-flux journal, the influential platform for art theory and criticism. His curatorial work includes serving as Co-Curator of the 11th Shanghai Biennale (2016), titled Why Not Ask Again: Arguments, Counter-arguments, and Stories, and Co-Curator of the Seoul Mediacity Biennale (2014). These large-scale international exhibitions cemented his reputation for orchestrating complex, research-driven presentations that bridge artistic practice, critical theory, and public engagement. He has also curated numerous exhibitions at e-flux in New York and other venues internationally.

Vidokle’s work has been exhibited at the Venice Biennale, documenta 14, Tate Modern, Centre Pompidou, MoMA, and the Stedelijk Museum, among many others. His films have screened at festivals including the Berlinale, Locarno Film Festival, and Toronto International Film Festival.