Jak­ub Jan­sa – Club of Oppor­tu­ni­ties

Art Cinema OFFoff welcomes Czech artist Jakub Jansa for a screening program of Club of Opportunities and a Q&A with Koi Persyn. 

The episodic videoproject is inhabited by human-vegetable hybrid entities who challenge dynamics of authority and class struggles in a way that is poetic yet intellectually provocative. The series of nine videoworks blends fiction and humour with tropes of the grotesque and contemporary leftist theories. It follows the protagonist, Celeriac, who strives relentlessly to escape the lower rungs of the social hierarchy and infiltrate the Avocado’s upper class at any cost – only to find himself rebelling against the deceit of that society.

Working across media including film, sculpture, installation, and live performance, Jansa creates fictional environments in which exhibitions merge seamlessly with their architectural context. His projects often recall cinematic sets, where narratives unfold through a carefully composed dramaturgy of video, objects, and live action, inviting the audience to become a member of this Club of Opportunities.

Jakub Jansa (°1989, Prague) will represent the Czech and Slovak Pavilion at the 61^st Venice Biennale (2026) alongside the artist duo Selmeci Kocka Jusko. Winner of the Jindřich Chalupecký Award (2021, Prague), Jansa created a new episode of Club of Opportunities on the occasion of the Czech Presidency of the EU Council (2022, Brussels) and presented the ninth and most recent episode at the 57^th steirischer herbst (2024, Graz). Jansa held a major solo exhibition at Prague City Gallery’s Stone Bell House (2023). His works have also been shown at Pioneer Works (2018, New York), Anthology Film Archives (2023, New York), the 34^th Ljubljana Biennale (2021), HEK (2020, Basel), and the 6^th Athens Biennale (2018), amongst others.

This event is organized in collaboration with celador in Brussels (Av. Jef Lambeaux 23, Saint-Gilles). 

• On Friday, October 21, celador hosts the book presentation of The Garden of Problems with a performative reading by Jakub Jansa and Koi persyn at 19:00.
• The presentation sælæry remains on view at celador from 13:00 – 17:00 on Saturdays and Sundays until November 30.