Judit Navratil — Magdalena Jadwiga Härtelova

Transsaulted Circles is a part of the Szívküldi Lakótelep (szívküldi= heart-sent, lakótelep=social housing neighborhood), a multi-layered virtual reality project that artist Judit Navratil has been developing since 2018, considering the possibilities and dangers of ‘home’ in cyberspace. Szívküldi Lakótelep grew from her childhood experiences of flying on large kites and growing up on the 8th floor of a comfortable flat in the late communist era of Hungary. For the past four years, the VR neighborhood’s districts have been building on each other. The shell of one area becomes the beginning structure for another, creating a self-recycling, rhizomatic system.

Transsaulted Circles is the latest addition to the VR neighbhorhood Szívküldi Lakótelep and connects a historical social housing project in the center of Berlin, built in the 1960s, a room within an exhibition space in San Francisco and all ‘homes’ where Judit has been rooted, in several different countries and cultures. Transsaulted Circles is the blueprint of her attempt to nurture connections, co-create a safe place for the grandchildren, and plant seeds that may help us navigate #movingonline.

This is an exhibition organized by and taking place across two spaces: Mehringplatz 20 and /room/, a gallery space in San Francisco, directed by Maxine Schoefer-Wulf. Judit’s proposal was selected from an open call seeking video work by Bay Area artists, juried by Magdalena Jadwiga Härtelova and Philisha Kay. Throughout the exhibition, visitors to each space–along with anyone else who wishes to participate–will be asked to think about what it means to be an ancestor and invited to contribute to Transsaulted Circles, the shared virtual neighborhood in the process of being formed.

To visit the growing virtual housing, go to: https://hubs.mozilla.com/R32YR2C/wheredidthefriendshipbegin

Judit Navratil’s practice is multivalent, engaging performance, social practices, drawing, as well as video and extended realities. Her projects are affective mappings of what it means to continuously oscillate between analog and digital, past and present; an immigrant’s attempt to construct “home.” Navratil uses her body-device to keep balance through her compass-meditation: the Long Distance Somersault career. Rolling as far as she can, helps her seek higher alternatives and gaze into the Eye of the Hurricane. Navratil earned an MFA in Painting at the Hungarian University of Fine Arts in 2008 and an MFA at the California College of the Arts in San Francisco in 2019. She has exhibited in Hungary, Canada, France, Korea and the Bay Area. Her work has been recognized through awards and residencies including the affiliate artist residency at Headlands Center for the Arts, the Cadogan Art Award, and the Dennis Leon and Christin Nelson Scholarship.