Thursday July 24, 2025 | 8:00 PM
Location: Czech Center New York, Bohemian National Hall Rooftop
321 E 73rd Street, New York, NY 10021 (map)
In collaboration with the Czech Center New York, we invite you to a summer evening reception and screening of a selection of video works by Residency Unlimited resident and alumni artists exploring urban topics in Prague and New York City.
The Flow Building / dir. Oskar Helcel / 2020 /Czechia / Czech with English subtitles / 10:06 min
Topping Out a Tree / dir. Oskar Helcel / 2022 / Czechia / Czech with English subtitles / 12:36 min
The Ways We Are It / dir. Pierre Coric, Alice Brunnquell / 2025 / USA, Belgium, France / English / 11:55 min
Current RU resident artist Oskar Helcel critically examines the transformation of his hometown, Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic, through two selected films: The Flow Building (2020) and Topping Out A Tree (2022). Combining physical and simulated footage of urban settings and interiors, juxtaposing traditional elements and imaginaries, he questions how new developments take over historical layers of the city and the ways of living in it.
During his residency at RU in 2023, Belgian artist Pierre Coric, in collaboration with Alice Brunnquell, created the film The Ways We Are It. They explore the busy urban context of NYC – mostly developed on various islands – and the relationship that exists between people, land, water, and buildings.
Selected to be screened together on the Bohemian National Hall rooftop, all three films touch upon the ideas of seeing urban landscapes from various perspectives, including that of being in a city.
The program is curated by Residency Unlimited Curator Data Chigholashvili.
More information about the films:
The Flow Building (2020)
By Oskar Helcel
The video work “The Flow Building” critically explores the construction of a building with the same name on Prague’s Wenceslas Square in the Czech Republic. It is a controversial development project tied to the demolition of heritage buildings in the area. Through contrasting footage – corporate visualizations, scenes of labor, and disorienting handheld shots – the video reveals conflicting layers of urban transformation. Rather than offering a documentary-style account, the piece subtly dissects how real estate developers, state institutions, and opaque legal maneuvers reshape the city in ways that suppress public discourse and historical context. The video gradually disrupts the polished marketing imagery by overlaying it with subjective perspectives, fragmentary narratives, and moments of silent confrontation. Ultimately, it questions the aesthetic and political mechanisms that mask exploitation, leaving viewers to reflect on their position within these urban power structures.
Topping Out a Tree (2022)
By Oskar Helcel
The tradition of topping out a tree (Glajcha) celebrates the completion of a building’s rough construction with symbolic elements, such as a tree with ribbons, representing protection, life, and family continuity. In Oskar Helcel’s performative video essay, “Topping Out A Tree” (2022), this tradition is contrasted with a digital, commodified vision of home, represented by a simulated apartment interior that lacks emotional or cultural depth. The work critiques how modern development projects impose generic dreams of living, often detached from personal or ancestral meaning. In his work, Helcel explores themes of displacement, control, and the suppressed knowledge of traditional ways of dwelling. The work continues his exploration of tensions between development and lived experience, blurring boundaries between narrative, repetition, and form.
Oskar Helcel would like thank Eliška Raiterová and Lenka Střeláková.
The Ways We Are It (2025)
By Alice Brunnquell & Pierre Coric
How do we dig up the earth, divert rivers and pile material on top of each other to such an extent that hills are erected and islands emerge from sea while we almost instantly forget the artificiality of these bodies of land? These few stories about our ways of being in a megalopolis are coalescing around a strange little Island lying in the Upper Bay: Governors Island. From this ex-centred vantage point, New York is filmed as a mineral ship, slowly sinking into the ocean, or as living piles of earth, ever evolving. A complex assemblage, constantly modified by our mere presence.
With Céleste Brunnquell, Charles Brayer, Alonso, Samantha & George
Sound mixing and editing: Léa Berghe
Color grading: Marie-Sarah Piron
Produced with the support of Flanders State of the Art
Thank you to Residency Unlimited and INSAS
This program is organized in partnership with the Czech Center New York.
Oskar Helcel’s residency is made possible with support from the Trust for Mutual Understanding.
