E X I L E curated by Jen Kratochvil
„dilithium, chapter 2: doppelgängers“

Jen Kratochvil (born 1986, Czech Republic) is a curator and educator based in Prague. He graduated from the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague and currently teaches at the Photography Department of the Film Academy in Prague. Kratochvil served as the director of Kunsthalle Bratislava until its recent closure by a new nationalist Slovak government. He was co-founder of Significant Other, a curatorial platform located in Vienna, operating within the larger Central European region, concerned with the overlaps of architecture and urbanism with art. Previously, Kratochvil worked as a freelance curator in collaboration with various institutions, such as Galerie Rudolfinum and the National Gallery Prague, independent spaces, and private galleries. His long-term research explores various forms of identity de/construction in Eastern Europe through artistic practices and institutional engagement and critique. His curatorial practice primarily focuses on time-based and lens-based media, with special attention to architecture, technology, and the potential of queer resistance amid a collectively experienced conservative turn within the region.

doppelgänger

i wrote jen this summer from paris, while overlooking the seine. i have no idea where jen is. somewhere in the us, i guess. but she (she?) could be anywhere. jen and i are google-doppelgängers. jen has my email. she (let’s settle with she for simplicity’s sake) beat me to it, getting my address earlier than i did. she has one “k”. i’m using two, like a crazy person, just because of her. but it’s not her fault. she didn’t know about me. i opened my account in 2011. three or four lifetimes ago. jen receives a lot of my mail. i got a single one from her, by accident. did you know when you were setting up your gmail that it would stay with you forever? i’m afraid jen is a terf. or even worse, a trump voter. why does one always need to fear the worst? that obviously says more about me than about her. jen might be my friend. even though my over-cluttered brain and overflowing heart can’t physically encompass more human beings. even though i still try. i love them. human beings. i love you. all of you. mostly. if you’re not terfs, or trump voters and such, that is. and this show was supposed to be about doppelgängers. about shadow images whose stories we don’t want to, can’t, or are not willing to tell. doppelgängers of who? not important. of us. all of us. the rest of us or the last of us mushrooms. we keep fighting binaries. binaries are winning though. just look around. winner/loser. harris or trump. poor and proud or a hypocrite. east and west, still, can you believe it. a delicious sweet energizing beverage or boycott. morality, or not. no left, no right anymore, yet still searching for luke skywalker at every step. it’s her or him and don’t you dare to think otherwise, hide in your little corner and pls just shut up. punch. punch. crying. boxers, i mean, shouldn’t sport be just? why, oh why. i really hope jen is not my mirror image and we don’t live in a multiversal simulation because this one life is too much already. overwhelmed. that’s what i am. and tired. and that’s ok, they keep telling me, memes. do i need jen? nope. i don’t. simple as that. does she need me? probably the same. but how would i know? i’m not her and have no idea what she’s dreaming of, what flowers she likes, how much the concept of the so-called traditional family means to her, or what’s her favorite conspiracy. do i fear jen? tbh, i don’t know. fairytales say doppelgängers are scary and ominous. but does that apply to email addresses too? one can’t even ask these stupid llm things anymore, because. i want to hide, i want to hide in anna’s armor; transform myself with nikola, one way or the other; levitate with hynek, oblivious; love deeply with petra and květoslava; pierce walls by threads with jelisaveta, live through times made mythology with astrid; age endlessly with laura; and simply curl up and dive in those nostalgia fetishes with martins. a warm embrace. calming. reassuring. i was afraid of being too loose. so i did my best doppelgänging be-a-western-gurl act to make this proper. and now i’m trying to smash the whole thing to pieces. but it is a gallery show at the end of the day. too proper actually. i’m disappointed with myself, but also, who cares. i just hope jen would come.

jen