THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE UGLY

Denis Manev & Stiliyan Hristov

Curated by Georgi P. Pavlov

13 - 22 May, 2024

THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE UGLY | Doza Gallery

One of the most notorious oddities in Bulgarian translation is changing the title of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (dir. Sergio Leone) to the cult classic The Good, The Bad and The Evil for no apparent reason.

But why "The Evil"? Why not "The Ugly"? As with the word "bedesten" - a large vaulted building with interior shops - the meaning has long since changed. It conveys a sense of forgetfulness, evoking a space without an actual master. Its "ugliness" is not just an outward characteristic but a fundamental feature of its essence.

The spaces that surround us often contradict, interfere, disrupt and encroach each other or redefine the places in which they are located entirely. On the one hand, their first priority is the schema of space that redefines place, much like the translation. And on the other, contradictions give rise to new, wholly unplanned in-between spaces, often arousing curiosity, sarcasm, and wonder in passersby. This is exactly what we incorrectly call a bedesten.

Denis Manev and Stiliyan Hristov's exhibition aims to show the truth of the unadulterated. It explores the difficult case of adaptation of scheme and form to content, intertwined by the desire of man behind it all.

The original idea of exploring the invisible, or rather the imperceptible in the in-between spaces surrounding us, turned into a study of the concept of "ugliness" in construction decisions, along with their reflection in Bulgarian national psychology. It is observed that the care of space for the future has been replaced by a permanent NOW. A quasi-eternal moment of slogans, signs, advertisements, businesses, entertaining solutions, and a total eclecticism of architectural and design features. Similar to the translation of Leone’s film, ugliness becomes a major essential of the spaces.

The duo doesn't really intend to critique urban eclecticism, but rather to draw attention to seemingly made in spite architectural decisions. They aim to show a serious feature of contemporary architectural attitude - an architecture of the permanent NOW, adapting to whatever is needed.

Captivated by the needs of the present, these spaces sleep in an almost eternal moment. However it sustains itself, this moment also contains its own ghosts, possibly giving rise to its own collapsing contradictions. And above all harbors the hope that beyond the 5mm - 10mm plaster lies a memory of what was and what can be.

Denis Manev (b. Bulgaria, 1999) is a visual artist and photographer. There is a fine line between the world of memory and the world of experience, the images he unveils are reminiscent of dreamscapes in which these boundaries of fiction and reality are challenged, symbols are modified, the past and the present merge into a ghostly assemblage. The compositions and situations he creates, or rather provokes, take the form of ephemeral poetic images, enduring traces teetering on the edge of recognition and alienation.

In August 2022 he published his first photobook, "Me, All Mine", which led to a solo exhibition in Sofia under the same name. In May 2023 he participated in the group exhibition "Nylona Brunch & Coworking" together with Valko Chobanov, Aaron Roth, Dimitar Shopov, Strahil Penev, Mitch Brezunek and others. He has participated in Synaesthesia Collective's group pop-up exhibition OBRAZCOV DOM in September 2023, together with artists such as Diana Bunkin, Nikola Stoyanov, Nikola Tsvetanov, Georgi P. Pavlov, Yakim Petrov and others. He participated in Emergence Art Fest in Varna, and recently in Sofia Underground 2024 curated by Synaesthesia Collective.

Stiliyan Hristov (b. Bulgaria, 2000) graduated Bachelor of Architecture at TU-Berlin and continued his Master's studies at Politecnico di Milano. His academic work so far has been mainly in the context of reuse of construction waste, vernacular spatial solutions and experimental material science. Significant projects include the redesign of the sanitary facilities at the BER Brandenburg airport, which won a student project competition at TU-Berlin. For his bachelor thesis, he considered the experimental use of pressed cork blocks as load-bearing elements for a new neighborhood in Porto, Portugal, where the spatial logic followed Louis Kahn's research on medieval English and Scottish castles.