*
Art frequently reacts to a topical discourse, which it recognises as a mythic glue of community. Satire of Alpine life, or rather its gilded iconography, which is a genre with a long tradition, has recently begun to bet on the well-recognisable card – the conflict between the local and the global. Locality – a kind of original Alpine soul – at the end of the 20th century found itself caught in the vice of global shifts. Satirical language questions the march of globalisation, and above all the pragmatic reaction of the local people. The Swiss playwright Marcus Köbeli presents the dilemma almost soberly in the black comedy Peep Show. The protagonists in the play, the Holzer family, are aroused by the idea of providing the tourists stopping at their farm in order to have a leak a voyeuristic peek at original Alpine life. And charge for it, of course. And what could – according to the general perception – better depict mountain life but a village play, and then – who else but Heidi? The business starts, commissions are paid, costumes designed, the buses are coming. Until the protagonists, the grotesquely silly naturals, who are supposed to play themselves in idyllic disguise, end up losing their nerves. They leave the homestead, finally reconciled with the fact that their mountain identity, or rather its illusion, is gone. However, the tourist industry keeps on running. From now on the roles of Grandfather, Heidi, Peter, Klara and other heroes will be played by asylum-seekers accommodated in the village; it doesn’t matter anyway, it’s all the same what kind of illusion is acted out in a kitschy peasant room. The only thing that matters is that it be surrounded by a sweet and peaceful aura.
Globalisation is the central socially relevant part of the plot in the movie parody by Niki List. Once more the world trend is made concrete in tourism and its unforeseen possibilities of development. Heroes in Tyrol is an incredibly vivacious fairy-tale, skilfully playing with the notions of life in a mountain village. Like every fairy-tale it has good heroes on the one hand, and bad ones on the other. The protagonist on the side of evil is the mayor, a true local Godfather. His vision is a transformation of the village into a tourist paradise, where fees would be charged at every step – in dollars, yens, euros, whatever. The mayor is a surprisingly far-sighted and after all ambitious man. He won’t be selling only Alpine air, enchanting views and various mountain illusions; he will diversify into sex tourism and bravely challenge Thai competition. His antagonist Maks Adler – or Eagle, if you want – is a completely different type of hero. After travelling extensively all around the world he returns to his native village to protect it from the profit-seeking brood. His project is ecological: the Alpine village is to remain an oasis of untouched Nature, its inhabitants – whatever their origins – are to live a relaxed and joyful life. Adler is the one who will create a kind of commune, where sex, drugs and pure mountain air are in perfect harmony. The clash of visions is accompanied by a ruthless fight for a young bride, a local Heidi. Of course, in the end Heidi belongs to Maks; with him she will stroll along the untouched pastures and crawl over rocky overhangs. And if the hero’s mini ecological project succeeds, he and his young wife will be the ones who will send the hippies of all countries the best naturally grown marihuana, eco bunk-beds under the thatch roof and all others indigenous goods friendly to people and Nature.
If with the film The Inheritors Johanna Spiry is in retrospect denounced as a cheap mytho-maniac petty-bourgeois of the 19th century, Köbeli and List delivered a fair blow to their Alpine contemporaries. And tried to remain as topical as possible. The play and the film expose globalisation as the flood of mental alibis accessible to all. Locality – a kind of original Alpine tune – features only as a market commodity. In its fervent desire to articulate current problems, satire can at first glance be very accurate in pinpointing the symptoms of its time. The theme dividing the public into two camps becomes the fundamental lever of the plot. The tourist industry, as a kind of embodiment of the globalisation spirit, becomes the central point around which the relevant action is revolving; heroes are obsessed by the vision of the future – either as a promise or as a lethal threat. Their voices are points of view in a fervent public debate. In the above-mentioned satire, globalisation is something which forces the viewers to face and question their own attitude towards the general phenomenon. The public debate, the round-table discussion about the consensually accepted topic, is confirmed and strengthened. In Köbeli’s and List’s cases the language of art is included in the relevant intellectual debate; with its capacity to convey meaning it functions as the clearly recognisable part of the debate. However, in addition to unmasking the false guises of the actors of the present, intellectual debate is always seasoned with futurology – if it wants to be constructive and answer the questions which trouble the self-defined audience of a local community. The community is always worried about the unknown, about the future, the territory, which virginally dwells in the meanders of non-existence, and will soon come into tangible life. In order for predicting the future not to be just an eccentricity, but a legitimate product of the mind, it must be condensed around a notion embodying the exact social project that Fate has in store for the unknown future. The present and the future are forming a circle for acting out a critical social discussion. The rules are clear, it is known when a certain view – either ultra red or utterly conservative – is part of the established polemic or not. When either criticism or confirmation is part of the social reality and when it is beyond the notions that establish that reality.
Art, of course, always shifts the dominant theme of the intellectual debate into concrete life, into the sphere of the senses. Obviously, tourism is a very popular synonym for globalisation; for instance, it is the central theme of Houellebecq’s novel The Platform. Here, a foreign culture is only the exotic scenery, which is to reawaken the dead sexual desire, take advantage of the immense potential of financial markets. However, unlike the Alpine parodists, Houellebecq is above all interested in an intimate story. Intellectual debate – and art flirting with it – is always centred on the general conditions of existence, around the objectively given margins that every human being stumbles upon. That is its focus. Socially engaged art: the art, which we can quote in our comments on social reality without any guilty feelings. For its theses about contemporary society are firm and crystal clear. They eagerly await critical intellectuals, who will recognise them as wisdom. And perhaps shed a tear or two at yet another recognition of sharp reason in the irrational artistic act.
*
However, we must not be fooled by the emphasis on globalisation in the latest mental products of Alpine satire. The excitement over the planetary future is above all directed at the old theme – criticism of the local identity or of what constitutes a specific collective awareness. Köbeli and List slam the ‘homestead mentality’, unable to face the alleged plague of globalisation. The cause of this inability seems to be the same as in the time of Johanna Spiry. What lies behind the embellished Alpine iconography is empty staring, roughness without warmth, in short – loneliness. For Köbeli and List this state of affairs is a kind of basis, a starting point for a critical creative process. They try to prove the thesis of the hollowness of the Alpine peoples through a phenomenon, which is much wider than the local obsessions, and the status of which is the laws of fate. Globalisation is the territory, where firmly rooted mental models prove to be absurd. The highlanders must face the tourist industry; they must enter the world of global appearances, play with sugary images and calmly count the cash. They are a kind of test animal in an unfathomable laboratory. In remote Alpine regions tourism is a topic, which perfectly fits in the discussion about the local community and globalisation. It is established with all the necessary criticism and scepticism about simple solutions. This kind of artistic practice is always an exclusive correspondent with the current period, because it talks about the generally accepted central dilemma. The age of globalisation will actually have a strong influence on the structure of local identities, and no person who trusts his or her own judgement can or should doubt that. And the question of who or what is local identity appears at the beginning and at the end of any serious reflection on globalisation.
Is only art, which is emerging in a certain time and reflecting it, entitled to talk about the central dilemmas of this time? The Alpine world gave rise to a fair number of unscrupulous spirits, who ruthlessly dissected the local mentality and its self-glorifying projects. Are their portraits of society mere curiosities, or are they expressing something which, in the age of uniformisation of the planet, might seem an exciting response to the present time? For instance, what does the warrior among the warriors Thomas Bernhard posthumously think about globalisation? If we turn to him for an answer, for a yes or a no, if we look for clues of a clearly expressed view in his work, we won’t get very far. Bernhard’s prose does not contain a recipe for the future; his writing is a report about the present, devoid of any prognosis. At the turn of the millennium thinking will no longer be possible. Indeed, Bernhard was no prophet, and yet his vivisection of the sub-Alpine mentality is striking.