1 May 2009 | An exhibition on Bulgaria’s most polarising music genre – and to an extent lifestyle, chalga, opened yesterday in the Sofia City Art Gallery.

“A potent cultural phenomenon has had tangible presence in Bulgarian society over the last 20 years. Unbearable for some, yet blissful for others, chalga (the most commonly used term to refer to Bulgarian pop folk music) has become an inseparable part of our everyday life,” according to the show’s organisers. “Over all those years we have involuntarily become ‘witnesses’ and ‘accessories’ to the complicated process of a marginal suppressed genre turning into a profitable industry, firmly establishing itself as a value system and lifestyle.”

“Gaudy, lustrous, noisy, scandalous, kitschy, chalga (also called „ethno pop” and „pop folk”) is a true reflection of the endless period of transition in Bulgaria and the social, political and economic change triggered by it,” which in turn informs the presented works. Chalga, according to the organisers, “is a remarkably candid celebration of the most typical features of our national mentality. Full of love and tears, the chalga euphoria triggered a post-socialist Balkan sexual revolution, defying all norms and taboos.”

Curated by Svetlana Kuyumdzhieva and Vessela Nozharova, about a dozen modern Bulgarian artists present their works, inspired by chalga as a social factor. Some, including Georgi Toushev, Daniela Kostova, Boris Missirkov/Georgi Bogdanov and Adelina Popnedeleva, were the first to treat chalga in their works in the mid- through the late 1990s, when the genre was at its peak.

Others, like Konstantin Bozhanov and Ergin Chavoshoglou, are better known abroad, and their works offer an outsiders’ view of Bulgarian chalga and its equivalents worldwide, by analyzing the phenomenon from a more distanced perspective.

The show also presents works by the new generation of modern Bulgarian artists, namely Boriana Ventsislavova, Svetozara Alexandrova, Stanimir Genov, Vikenti Komitski and Orlin Nedelchev.

Although some isolated efforts have been made in the past to examine the social phenomenon of the music genre and the lifestyle it promotes, the perception of it as low-brow by the intellectual elite has largely prevented the latter to engage chalga in any meaningful way until now.

The exhibition will be on display at the Sofia City Art Gallery, 1 General Gurko Street, until May 31.

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