Anton Kats
Anton Kats (r. 1983 Kherson, Ukraine) works as an artist and musician. Currently based on Earth.
Anton’s practice draws from the everyday, inspired by the complex narratives of Satelite Island a south-Ukrainian neighbourhood in the port city of Kherson. Leaving Ukraine in the year 2000 to claim asylum in Germany Kats’ work is complemented by the urgencies of displacement and the pragmatics of self-legalisation in Europe by way of entering formal institutions of education. In reverberations of this process, Kats was awarded a practice-based PhD at Goldsmiths, University of London and invited to documenta14 where he initiated the Narrowcast House and the A-Letheia projects.
Anton’s work is motivated by the questions of agency and intentionality. Flexibly augmenting art practice through sound, music, performance, radio and research Kats develops responsive and site-specific projects exploring the interdependencies of learning, migration and the non-normative. Kats’s practice emphasises artistic research protocols and embraces sculptures and installations, objects and drawings, concerts, lectures, performances, poems, films, radio shows, radio plays, vinyl releases and publications.
Methodologically conceiving spaces of imagination Anton is motivated to generate practical knowledge emerging through art as a mode of critical inquiry. Often driven by the context of diverse practitioners Kats willingly initiates collaborative works, nomadic music ensembles and artist residencies, learning sites, libraries, listening spaces and experimental academic curricula.
Exploring the potentiality of art practice within formal and informal frameworks Anton’s projects evenly take place in galleries and museums, concert venues, clubs and radio stations, as well as in cultural and academic institutions, and public spaces. Situated between performance art and music performance, Anton tours as ILYICH and hosts the Concrete Listening Show at the Refuge Worldwide Radio in Berlin. Kats was a lecturer at NYU, The New School, and Goldsmiths University. At present Kats facilitates the Artists in Exile program at The Berlin University of the Arts (UDK) and the Great Sound seminar at the MA Spatial Strategies, Kunsthochschule Weißensee, Berlin
Anton’s works have been introduced through the SAVVY Contemporary, Serpentine Galleries, Tate Modern, Tate Britain, BBC 6 Music, Victoria and Albert Museum, The Lot Radio, the Showroom Gallery, Bergen Kunsthall, Sonic Acts, Roskilde and Fusion Festivals, CCA Berlin – Center for Contemporary Arts, Kochi Muziris Biennale, Haus der Kulturen der Welt (H.K.W.), 10th Berlin Biennale, and at the documenta14 in Athens and Kassel among others.
Education:
2014-2017 PhD Goldsmiths University, Goldsmiths University of London
2011-2013 MA Interactive Media: Critical Theory and Practice, Goldsmiths University of London
2010-2011 MA Kunst im Kontext, Gasthörer, UDK, Berlin
Selected Publications and Chapters:
How We Hold: Rehearsals For Art and Social Change. Ed. Amal Khalaf. Serpentine Galleries 2023
Designing for Health & Wellbeing: Home, City, Society. Ed. Graham Cairns. Vernon Press 2019.
aneducation – documenta14. Archive Books, Berlin. 2018
For a Walk With: Dementia in the City. Serpentine Galleries, London. 2016
Sound Space Downtown: Workbook and User Manual. Studio 174, Kingston Jamaica / London UK. 2015
Selected Interviews:
MACBA Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona
Selected Grants, Awards, Fellowships:
Anton Kats is a fellow of the Berlin Artistic Research Programme (2024-25)
Presentation of Contemporary Art Award (2023) Senate Department of Culture, Berlin
Musicboard Berlin (2022) Project Grant: Grounded Outer Space People
Research Grant Fine Art (2022) Senate Department of Culture, Berlin
Research Grant Fine Art (2021) Senate Department of Culture, Berlin
Presentation of Contemporary Art Award (2020) Senate Department of Culture, Berlin
Research Grant Fine Art (2020) Senate Department of Culture, Berlin
Project Grant ILYICH (2020) Musikfonds e.V., Minister of State for Culture and the Media, Berlin
Artist Residency Grant Fine Art New York (2019 – 2020) Senate Department of Culture, Berlin
Selected Projects
2024
After Hope – Berlin Artistic Research Programme
Sound Stories Silent Site – House of World Cultures (HKW)
2023
If not now, when? – House of World Cultures (HKW), Berlin
The Cemetery of Melodies Alive – steirischer herbst, Graz
ILYICH and Grounded Outer Space People – 1014, New York
ILYICH, – Arsenic – Centre d’art scénique contemporain, Lausanne
Concrete Listening Show – Refugee Worldwide Radio (ongoing), Berlin
2022
Grounded Outer Space People, – Gallery Wedding, Berlin, Germany
Transmigration Library, – Gallery Wedding, Berlin, Germany
It is all an open secret, – H.K.W. – House of World’s Cultures, Berlin, Germany
Concrete Listening Show – Refugee Worldwide Radio (ongoing), Berlin
2021
Grounded Outer Space People, – Kulturbraurei, Berlin, Germany
Borealis Festival for Experimental Music – MÆKUR, Bergen, Norway
Radio Crystal – Zone2Source, Amsterdam, Netherlands
2020
Vostok 7 – SAVVY Contemporary, Berlin, Germany
Sound Crystal – SAVVY Contemporary, Berlin, Germany
Pre-Formance – Deutsches Haus, New York University, New York, US
MÆKUR – Sonic Acts, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Four Before and After Five – ISCP, New York, US
2019
Radio Amateur Ensemble – Helicotrema Festival, Venice, Italy
ILYICH:AND – Flaneur Festival, HKW (Haus der Kulturen der Welt), Berlin, Germany
MÆKUR – Lighthouse, Brighton, UK
Radio Stilts – HKW (Haus der Kulturen der Welt), Berlin, Germany
Your Craft – Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, Germany
Radio Amateur Ensemble – Goethe Institute, Minneapolis, US
2018
MÆKUR – Bergen Kunsthall, Norway
After Joy – Muziris Biennalle, Goethe Institute Bangalore, bangaloREsidency at Pepper House, Kochi, India
Radio Stilts – Radiophonic Spaces, HKW (Haus der Kulturen der Welt), Berlin, Germany
Mittlungsradio – 10th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art, Berlin, Germany
Radio Pedio – Park Fables by Chto Delat & Anton Kats, Commissioned and produced by: Onassis Cultural Center/ Fast Forward Festival 5, Curator: Katia Arfara, Athens, Greece
ILYICH – Concrete Listening, Kherson, Ukraine
Tourist – Journeys Festival International, Leicester, UK
2017
Narrowcast House – Open Radio Studio, Listening Space. documenta14, Kassel, Germany
A-Letheia – Social Sculpture, Site of Learning. documenta14, Athens, Greece
Radio Sound System – Sonic Sculpture, Mobile Radio Station. documenta14, Kassel, Germany
Terminal – documenta14, Kassel, Germany
Giant Steps – documenta14, Kassel and Athens
Another Continuum – documenta14, Athens, Greece
Place of 100 Places – documenta14, Kassel, Germany
2016
Narrowcast Radio – Tate Modern, London, UK.
For a Walk With: Dementia in the City – The Serpentine Galleries, London, UK.
Take Over: FFTV Gallery as a Neighbourhood Model – The Showroom Gallery. London
Site – Sonic Acts Academy. Amsterdam, Netherlands.
The Shipyard Take Over – The Alternativa 2016: Damage and Los. Gdansk, Poland.
Radio Sound System – Studio 174, Kingston, Jamaica.
Unwritten Handbook – Serpentine Galleries, London, UK.
2015
Sound Space Downtown: Workbook and User Manual – Studio 174, London, Kingston, Jamaica.
Artistic Research as Pedagogy – Goldsmiths College. London, UK
Sound Space Downtown – Studio 174, Kingston, Jamaica.
Sound Alphabet – Studio 174, Kingston, Jamaica
Corridor Residency – Westmead Elderly Resource Centre, The Serpentine Galleries, London, UK
For a walk with… – Westmead Elderly Resource Centre, The Serpentine Galleries, London, UK
Fourth Feathers TV – The Showroom Gallery and Fourth Feathers Community Centre, London, UK
Radio Delo – Displaced Film Festival, Berlin, Germany
Radio Delo – Alternativa Art Festival, Gdansk, Poland
2014
Sound Space Downtown, research space (ongoing), Studio 174, Openvizor, Kingston, Jamaica
ABC of Sound, publication, Openvizor, Kingston Jamaica, London UK
Radio Sonar (ongoing) Serpentine Gallery, London
For a walk with…, (ongoing) Edgware Road Project, Serpentine Gallery, London
Fourth Feathers TV, (ongoing) the Showroom Gallery and Fourth Feathers Community Centre, London
2013
For a walk with…, (ongoing) Edgware Road Project, Serpentine Gallery, London
Fourth Feathers TV, (ongoing) the Showroom Gallery, as Part of re-projecting London
Stops in motion, V&A Museum, Sackler Centre Digital Studio, London
One Eye Closed, Photography, Goldsmiths College, London
Character Research Tool, Centre for Possible Studies, Serpentine Gallery, London
Radio SO.N.A.R., (ongoing) Centre for Possible Studies, Serpentine Gallery, London
Greenlight Filmclub, (ongoing) OpenVizor, London
Berta, photography, video, Berlin
To learn what you know, workshops, Goldsmith College, London
2012
Cycling Antenna, moving installation, workshops, Goldsmith College, London
Serpentine Gallery, Butter, Chicago Boys (initiated Hiwa K.) performance, London
Royal College of Art, Chicago Boys (initiated Hiwa K.) performance, London
Snowflake, new media, Goldsmith College, London
Radio Delo, video
Becoming surplus value, video
2011
Radio Delo, photography
Group Affinity, Chicago Boys (initiated Hiwa K.) performance, summer school Kunstverein Muenchen,
Munich
Systemchange Studygroup with Claudia Hummel and Anneta Krauss, Berlin
Alternativa, Participant at Art-Festival, Gdansk, Poland,
Butter, Chicago Boys (initiated Hiwa K.) performance, photography, New Gallery, London
V Krugu HipHopa, music tour in St.Petersburg and N.Nowogorod, with adolescent young People from Berlin,
Goethe Institute St.Petersburg, Gangway e.V
A Chto Delat?’s 48 hours Seminar-Commune and Learning Play “Where has Communism Gone?”. Smart Project Space, Amsterdam.
Tourist, Photography
2010
Chicago Boys: While We Were Singing They Were Dreaming, ongoing performance and research project initiated by Hiwa K., Serpentine, London
Legal Leben, exhibition with former detained adolescents, Archiv der Jungedkulturen, Gangway e.V., Berlin
Dimitry Vilensky was ist zu tun?, video discussion with Dimitry Vilensky (Chto Delat?) about forms of
self-organisation and self-education of an artist
Blohina Street 18, anthropological video research about Lenins thesis on communal living
2009
Estrangement Project, Gdansk/London/Berlin “Kolja and Dasha”, Showroom London, documentary project, St. Petersburg
Top 9 Russian Breaking Foundation, documentary film, St. Petersburg
2008
A Walk with a Hat, choreography for the Circus Upsala, St. Petersburg
Meeting of Styles, documentary film, Graffiti Festival, Mainz
Act Bloom, performance
2007
Die Füchsin, short film, storyboard
Curiouserfilms, video research, film production company
Japan Ska. Kultur und Globalisierung, documentary film.
2006
The Skaliners, music arrangement and artistic support during Japan tour of the band