A project conceived as an exhibition “AntiArt” or “The Closet”, more than 10 years ago, has undergone many working titles and accumulations, but has retained its essence. In general, encouraged by the art of doing accounting or accounting in art development from innovative detail to mature schematics, just as in Picasso – from classics to modernism.

Exhibition anti-art or the closet opposite the studio. Or how the art of doing accounting supports the production of art. The factory against meditation. Balance installation. From balance sheet to life balance, daily equation. Balance – opposition – assistance – harmony – synchronicity. Two antipodes – an artist and an accountant. Where is the connection? Where does the connection break? An artist works in accounting. An accountant paints. Are they complementary? Are they self-developing? Is this the range between the left and right hemispheres of the brain? Between the right and left cardiac aorta? My sub-question is, is this the symbiosis between mental and emotional?

Stored folders – a trade secret. Shown on display. Tax truth becomes art truth. From the drawings “White Accounting” to the volumetric assembly of real accounting. What is the expression of the accounting service? The document! What is the carrier of the expression with watercolor? The paper! So they have a common ground. Entire contact surface. Basic at that. For both activities.

Let accounting have no secrets. Public accounting – one of the working names of the exhibition. Just as art sometimes remains incomprehensible, so accounting could be difficult to understand. Chinese, as my daughter used to say, “I understand every word, but I don’t understand the meaning.”

It all starts in the closet, rather ends in the closet. Overflowing, crammed with accounting. And with … suitcases. Not with compotes, cans and bottles of drinks. The hidden way of life of an accountant. Synthesis of everyday accounting, intertwined with travel desires. Sequences of figures facing pages of travelogues (see section BOOKS from the site) and paintings (see section ART-TRAVEL from the site). All white folders against tour guides.

Documentary accounts-deposits swell over the years, avalanche-like accumulate and conquer territories, the annual harvests are harvested on shelves, shelves, shelves and above them in anticipation of the statute of limitations (5 years), the absolute statute of limitations (10 years) and the statute of limitations for storage of payrolls (50 years) and the psychological statute of limitations “well, if you need an invoice”, but they are also long after the expiration of the deadlines with a crystallized art goal and a secret idea – to become artifacts and continue a new artistic life , at least in photos and installation photo-poses. The postponement of the exhibition of the project waited for some time, but then the hesitation against possible accusations of declaring company secrets on the occasion of administration of personal and company data such as ID and BULSTAT, UIC and VAT numbers, addresses, telephones №, revenues, expenses, profits, losses, assets, liabilities, and even of non-existent companies and sole traders. Also, the info, timeless for the NRA (National Revenue Agency), continues to be info. History is history. Especially dressed in paper, floppy disk, magnetic disk, hard disk and other evidence. So these considerations turned the project from offline to online. In the demo of their multi-page country, volume without names, quantity without distinctive features. I had conceived different installation objects:

– piles of spilled binders, folders and pockets, as opposed to well-arranged chronologically, always bottom-up invoices, bank statements or whatever papyrus came in, duly described by owners and years,

– boards with all distinguishing monthly leaflets “purchases” and “sales” from the last 15 years of a company, for example,

– a box of hand-filled invoices,

– drawings on invoices,

– the “purchase” and “sales” slips themselves on drawings and watercolors, as a rule for my convenience I use second-hand paper to help the planet,

– a carton overflowing with worn-out toners from various printers, a kind of empty “black boxes” discarding their ink to reveal financial secrets,

– diskette boxes – unopenable and unreadable,

– container with telephones, incl. mobile apparatus, fax and other attributes of the development of communications,

– old and new computer – a play on words, so I mean the software files, but also the material hard drives themselves, out of natural technological use,

– boxes full of used pens, automatic pencils and various stationery, which I call accessories – mice, staples, antistaples, perforators, bleaching correctors – liquid and strips, glues, dividers, paper clips, clasps, pins (on time and we used them) and various others.

Objects like from a museum of socialist art, although my first working day as an accountant was from the beginning of the transition 01.04.1991 – triple-interesting day: I started directly as a chief accountant on the day the company was founded and the day it entered in force the new law on accounting and the new chart of accounts, which eliminated the 999-digit Russian, cumbersome, incomprehensible social chart of accounts. For all of us, everything was new. What a better start. Clear and white. I also called “white accounting” my sketches of the ranks of my favorite white binders, in which I want to arrange the accounting resources. It immediately makes you think of black, doesn’t it? When you are the face of the company in front of the tax authorities, there is no black accounting. Black didn’t interest me. It did not enter my field of vision. But, white accounting can be painted on black sheets and stands out well. Is this the background of life?

That’s what my accounting and travel closet is full of. In it I keep binders with past accounting and suitcases for future trips. Here are my bags (see the NYLON ROAD project), which dress every purchase when traveling (here is the link “sale” – “purchase”). When I work, I often mentally move here and there around the planet. My spirit hovered in parallel with the alternation of numbers, I wanted to say drawing numbers. Or maybe I’m flooded with unpredictable combinations of numbers, turning into nicknames for luck, for love, for success. Such recommended series of numbers are spreading on the net. I am exposed to their invisible influence every first half of the month. Why first? According to the deadlines for submitting VAT returns, dear. The pole of my traveling monthly half. Well, they are not equal in time, but the passenger part, when there is one, emotionally feeds the other, the stationary one. And so they mate permanently and satisfactorily. They become one. The whole.

The finished whole. The financial year is equal to the calendar year. The travel calendar always complies with the legal deadlines of the tax calendar. Accounting is leading. Determining the dates of departure and collection. With few stolen days and quite busy days before departure and after returning. With immediate and no objection adaptation of return from the airport. If I couldn’t remember where the computer was coming from all the time during each jitter, then with the landing of the plane, I’ve already turned it on. The transition takes place on the plane – the longer the flight, the more time for sleep and easier adjustment to the time zone and speed transfer from one world to another. From the time of the muted sound of the phone to the frequent consulting and coordinating ringing.

Thus, at one point, watercolors appeared during the annual end (sounds like a feast during the plague, right?) In the most difficult working period of the year – until March 31, which is already stretched to June 30. They crept in on New Year’s Eve and night and settled down. They slipped in and sat down. They found a gap and filled it. They held a secret referendum for an almost daily home presence outside of travel (again see the text to the ART TRAVEL section and then the watercolors to each destination) and they succeeded (now see the WATERCOLORS section). The precedent became an inspired picturesque repetition. The large format prevails over the maximum size of the suitcase, maximum A4 and A3. Watercolor gained an o-size advantage. Watercolor understood freedom. Conquers time territory. Color and / in water to infinity. Spills with control and unreservedly.

In part, the process is fueled by accounting. It is fed by accounting. At the same time it serves as a charging for accounting. Numbers against color. Yin-yang process. The two opposites work for each other. Against each other. Next to each other. One over the other. One below the other. One around the other. One despite the other. One for the other. One along with the other. Does one spring and the other overflow? Does one bubble when the other overflows? If you didn’t have one, would you have the other?

Mental and emotional concentration were self-formulated in slogans:

The computer against the brush

The numbers against the strokes

The pen against the watercolor

The keyboard against the marker

Head against hand

The printer against the drawing by hand

Copies against the original

Paper against cardboard

The mouse against the fingers

Printer ink against Indian inc

The mind against the imagination

The material versus the spiritual

Day against night

Insomnia against rest

The tension against relaxation

Work versus fun

The commitment against free time

The obligation against the hobby

Urgency versus extensibility

The calendar against timelessness

Help against carelessness

Acquisition against donation

The doctrine against talent

Practice against the imagination

Business against patronage

Payment against the gift

Debt versus pleasure

Loneliness against the crowd

Confession against rejection

Routine versus innovation

Experience versus experiment

Ration versus emotion

Individualism versus collectivism

Closedness against the company

Self-closure against ostentation

Shyness against publicity

Modesty against vanity

The empirical versus the sensory

Crafts versus art

Applied versus exquisite

Repeatability versus uniqueness

Science versus the divine

The grounded against the heavenly

The hardship against longing

Everyday life against the holiday

Persistence against arbitrariness

Security against demand

The spiral against the straight line

Cyclicality against space

Duty versus dream

Stagnation against the trip

Hardness against water

Hardening against lightening

Silence against speech

Electronic services against the live meeting

Absence versus presence

Invisibility against color

Shelves against walls

Support against hanging

Maturity versus passion

Arrangement against chaos

The mind against creativity

The rule against fiction

The formula against carelessness

Knowledge versus skill

Diligence versus technique

Calmness against rage

Sobriety against intoxication

Accountability versus clutter

Peace against movement

NRA (National Revenue Agency) against UBA (Union of Bulgarian Artists)

VAT against e-sky

March vs. July

Charging against unloading

Drafts for whites (not the other way around)

I’m thinking of stopping. The list goes on. And now, and when. You see the relationship between the opposites. You understand that there are no opposites. There is no opposition. There is a balance. My name is Balancer. Not an artist. Not an accountant. Not an accountant. Balancer. I juggle the balance daily, monthly, annually, every day. Oops, life is one.

M.K.

Formed on 15.08.2021