DECEMBER 2010
Kontekst - struggle for autonomous space!
See blog http://kontekstprostor.wordpress.com/
NOVEMBER 2010
Public announcement regarding the closure of the Kontekst Gallery project
The Kontekst Gallery's last program took place on November 13th 2010, by which our work on this project ended.
Kontekst Gallery officially opened on February 11th 2006. This project was initiated within the Youth Forum of the Cultural Centre "Stari grad", as an attempt to transform a part of this Centre into a place of autonomous education and research in the area of contemporary visual arts and culture. From August 2007, Kontekst Gallery was being developed within the framework of a non-profit platform for contemporary art and culture - Kontekst, but still as a programme of the Cultural Center. After March 2010 and the establishment of Cultural Institution "Parobrod" - which took over the function and the public space of the Municipal Cultural Center "Stari grad"; and due to various pressures in the form of an official demand to vacate the working facilities, as well as the refusal of communication by the new management - we made a decision to end our work in this space. However, our decision to close Kontekst gallery is to a grater extent caused by our disagreement with the policy of the new cultural institution.
This policy is only a symptom of the new cultural policy in Serbia in which culture is conceived as an instrument in the process of European integration, nominal implementation of human rights and tolerance, as well as the process of culturalization of society in order to create apolitical subjects for the dominant ideology - while structurally and systematically retrograde social values such as: nationalism, clero-fascism, hegemony of patriarchal matrix, intolerance towards all kinds of otherness etc., are still being reproduced. All of these processes lead to the commodification and pacification of cultural production that resulted in neutralization of its antagonistic political potential. Governing structures that are represented by political parties and private capital are working on creating a monopoly over cultural production and control of the symbolic content.
Our work on producing a concept of the Gallery's programme and its realisation has been for us also a process of self-education, reflection, self-criticism and contemplation. Through our work, constant learning process and interaction with local and international art and activist scenes, we developed an understanding of our work as a space for critical and political action through contemporary art and culture. Over time and in accordance with local and global political, economic and social transformations, our positions and programms became radicalized as an overall attempt of repoliticization of local cultural production and reproduction of those ideas that could produce a potential to create alternatives to dominant ideology.
We will go on working in that direction through our further engagement within Kontekst platform.
Saturday, 13th November, 19h
Urban Machines And Spaces Of Resistance - exhibition and public debate
Participants: Aleksandar Bede (NS), Ana Kršinić Lozica (ZG), Ivana Hanaček (ZG), Vida Knežević (BG), Marko Miletić (BG), Nataša Vujkov (NS), Irena Borić (ZG), Ivan Klis (ZG)
Concept of the program: Secret Exhibitions and Kontekst
)
Cultural policy led in countries of the region is a part of wider processes which are taking place in Europe since 1989. They are a consequence of the introduction of neo-liberal capitalist ideology in the former socialist countries and the politics of European integration through which contemporary colonial relations are established in order to control the economy, knowledge, subjectivity etc. This cultural policy is promoted almost exclusively through the prism of economic interests and profit opportunities where culture is completely commodified and commercialized.
This discussion will address the critical re-examination of the relationship between local cultural policies and contemporary capitalist production, but also the possibilities and the potential of struggle and resistance to these processes.
Urban Machines And Spaces Of Resistance is the name of the exhibition and public debate within the Secret Exhibitions, interdisciplinary project that deals with the elucidation of complex mechanisms of censorship and destruction in the context of visual art, which were developed within the process of post-socialist transformation. The project operates as an interdisciplinary platform of curators, artists, designers, historians, art historians who have dealt with the topic of censorship or are faced with it directly. In the framework of the project a series of secret exhibitions in Zagreb apartments were held with the intention to move the explicit forms of censorship present in the visual arts to an absurd level. Program that will be realized in Belgrade focuses on the less obvious mechanisms through which censorship operates. It deals with the so called gray zone of censorship, whose practice is depersonalized and with the rhizome like inscription of the power relations that are being infiltrated in the modes in which the market and cultural policies function.
The project is realized in partnership of Kontekst and Secret Exhibitions;
Supported by Ministry Of Culture, Republic of Croatia, and Ministry Of Culture, Republic of Serbia
Friday, 12 November, 19h
Cultural Center REX, Jevrejska 16, Belgrade
Uglyville - A Contention of Anti-Romaism in Europe
by Eduard Freudmann and Ivana Marjanović
Serbia/Austria 2010, 58 min., English
Organizer: Kontekst
)
The film is based on the text Contention of Anti-Romaism as a Part of the Process of the Decoloniality of Europe written by Ivana Marjanović, extended, edited and adapted by Eduard Freudmann and Ivana Marjanović. It is a critical analysis of the interrelation of racism (i.e. anti-Romaism) and capitalism in so called New Europe (Europe after 1989) but also an analysis of strategies of resistance to its necropolitical governance.
The starting point for the film was the brutal demolition and fencing of a Roma slum next to "Belville", a residential area erected to accommodate guests of the international sports event "Universiade Belgrade 2009". In the same time Serbia was holding the annually rotating presidency of the "Roma Decade", an international initiative that tends to represent an "unprecedented political commitment by European governments to improve the socio-economic status and social inclusion of Roma". For that year, one would expect Serbia to make serious efforts towards improving the discriminated position of Roma and decreasing the effects of a policy of anti-Romaism that has lasted for centuries in the region. The opposite was the case: What we witnessed was the total disregard of the Decade's objectives and even an intensification of discrimination by Belgrade authorities, citizens and media. Seen from the perspective of the coloniality of power and the history of racism, this event appears to be a paradigmatic case of anti-Romaism in contemporary Europe.
After the film screening the discussion with Ivana Marjanović will be opened.
Moderation: Dejan Vasić
OCTOBER 2010
19th October, Tuedsay, 7 pm
Lala Raščić: The Damned Dam
KOLOS, DELTA AND EUROPOLIS: THE DAMNED DAM
Mali klub Akademija
Rajićeva 10, Belgrade
)
The year is 2027. Tarik is a young engineer. Merima is his beloved. They can save the towns people of Lukavac if they broadcast the radio drama "Catastrophe" from the year 2000. Heroes and fairies, love and dystopia, rivers and lakes, dams and factories, BH and EU, epic geography and oral tradition: between these a future romance is shaped.
Lala Raščić's The Damned Dam is a narrative in progress. This multimedia art project consists of performative research, blog, public events, performances, video installation, documents, illustration and publication. During September, October and November project will be produced and realized in a form of series of public presentations.
Lala Raščić's project The Damned Dam departs from a real event when the broadcasting of the radio drama Catastrophe in the Bosinan town of Lukavac caused effect similar to Orson Wells's War of the Worlds, but instead of reporting news about aliens, Catastrophe reports about constructive damage of Modrac damn. Catastrophe caused a panic among people living in Lukavac and they were forced to seek protection on the nearby Ratiš hill.
The motif of the flood is embedded in the fictional narrative that is composed on the basis of field research on specific locations and events in the region. The collected materials are processed as objects, video installations, audio recordings, a blog and performances that form the elements of this modular project. While researching in Belgrade, the author found couple of interesting topics that could be the part of this narrative:
. Europolis, Third Belgrade, Kolos, Delta, rafts, tunnel bellow Danube
The narrative strategies that the artist employs in her work are, in the project The Damned Dam, informed by Bosnian traditions of oral literature. Based on the study of these traditional forms, the artist delivers a fantasy love story set in the future that is intersected with socio-political connotations.
A series of public events that will take place in Sarajevo, Belgrade, Banja Luka and Zagreb premiere with a storytelling performance of a lyric epic narrative as part of a three-evening performance series; 3 Damned Utopias: 3 Narrative Performances by Lala Raščić. In accordance with the tradition of oral storytelling, the narrative transforms with each performance, following the development of the narrative through the cities in which it is performed. The Damned Dam project will culminate with the Zagreb exhibition in which all the elements of this project-in-progress will be collected in a multimedia installation.
Partners:
BLOK, Zagreb, www.urbanfestival.hr
DELVE, Zagreb, www.delve.hr/weiyth
KONTEKST, Beograd, www.kontekstgalerija.org
PROTOK, Banja Luka, www.protok.org
SCCA, Sarajevo, www.scca.ba
Supported by:
Ministry of Culture of Croatia, www.min-kulture.hr
Ministry of culture of Serbia, http://www.kultura.gov.rs/
Secretariat for Culture- Belgrade, http://www.beograd.rs
www.lalarascic.com
www.prokletabrana.net
JUNE 2010
June,the 1st at 6 pm
Fifth Park- Fight for the Everyday
Exhibition opening
Authors: Branko Belaćević, Dubravka Sekulić, Jelena Stefanović, Marko Miletić, Srđan Prodanović
Library"Vuk Karadžić", Small Gallery Miljković
Bulevar Kralja Aleksandra Street No 298
)
Five years ago (11 June 2005), a small green area, Fifth Park, in Zvezdara municipality became a site of a battle between citizens of this part of Belgrade and a private investor. Changes of laws and urban plans and general lack of a public debate about these changes have created a situation that one morning inhabitants woke up to see the demolished park.
However, that was not the end of the park - neighborhood decisively responded, and from that day, they have been successively defending their park. The longtime fight that took various forms, from legal battle to physical encounters, opened up many questions to which members of the Initiative for Protection of the Fifth Park tried to answer so that they could from a group of individuals establish themselves as a collective that could meet their individual needs, as well as their struggle against private, neoliberal, petty political interests:
. Is common property possible in neoliberal capitalism?
. How can a collective that was established as a response to the feeling of "endangerment", and constituted through self-defense channel its positive aspirations towards overall improvement?
. What are the possible strategies and range of a collective struggle?
. Although legitimate, should a collective struggle also become legal?
. Do law and legal system exist only to preserve, strengthen and authorize particular financial interests?
. Can financial interests have the exclusive right to decide about the future progress and reshaping of the city?
. Which is the basic level of self government, and can citizens have a say without interference of political parties?
There are a lot questions. Trying to open a debate abut these and similar issues, we wish to show the potential of civic self-organization and collective struggle for protection and enlargement of rights and influence of citizens who are gathered around the struggle for the Fifth park and similar initiatives. Also, we wish to open a debate about who has the right to the city as well as who should be a decision maker in the city.
The exhibition "Fifth Park- Fight for the Everyday" will feature interviews with participants of the struggle for preservation of the Fifth park, interviews with those who supported the struggle, video and photo documentation, theoretical papers, newspaper clips, timeline and selectively chosen illustrations of actions and tools which citizens used in their struggle.
Organizer of the exhibition is "Kontekst".
The exhibition is open until June the 14th 2010.
The exhibition Fifth Park- Fight for the Everyday is supported by: Swiss Cultural Program in Western Balkan, Republic Serbia - Ministry of Culture, City of Belgrade - Secretariat for Culture.
www.kontekstgalerija.org
http://petipark.org/
FEBRUARY 2010
Sunday, 28th February, 19h
Bolognaburns: INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS MEETING
Cultural Center REX,
Jevrejska 16
We will be discussing the problems of Bologna process as such, problems regarding the implementation of reforms and funding issues in higher education with our Austrian coleagues.
Bolognaburns>>>
"Bolognaburns" is the contiuation of the "#unibrennt" protests in fall 2009, which have started in Vienna. Now the movement is preparing counter actions against the ministers' "we love the Bologna process" party. Considering the current situation and the ongoing protests in many European universities this celebration is a mockery for all of us.
The Bologna process and it realization is "burning", because we don't think it is enough to just think about it and turn a bit here and push a bit there. No, we demand a total change of the ideas and the logic of the the Bologna system. Not only has the Bologna process clearly failed to achieve the agreed goals of improved mobility; it also led to more restrictions for students and their studies and to greater social selection of access to higher education in general.
The ministers' party is in Vienna, because Austria has realized the basis for the Bologna sytsem with outstandingly repressive laws. And this seems to be reason enough that on March 11 and 12 2010 the education ministers of 46 European countries will celebrate the 10-year anniversary of the Bologna process in Vienna and Budapest.
The fact that the entire process is based on the understanding of education as only producing workforce dictated by the market is reflected in the agreed goals. Therefore our aim is not only to measure success or failure of the Bologna process, but furthermore to question the process and its foundations itself. Master and Ph.D. as elite programs which especially exclude women, introduction of tution fees and under-financing of universities as well as de-democratization within the university system are obvious symptoms. The difficult financial situation increases the corporate influence on education and scientific research. The orientation of teaching towards corporate interests does not only affect universities, but the entire education sector in general. Hence the possibilities of self-determined and critical learning are restricted.
In view of this disastrous situation we don't see any reason to celebrate the Bologna-process. The European-wide protests of students and teachers of the last years show that the economization of education is directed against their interests. Hence we consider a common, european-wide opposition directed against the current education politics absolutely necessary, in order to establish and enforce alternatives.
Therefore the celebrations will be accompanied by demonstrations and blockades as well as followed by a counter-conference, where we are going to exchange experiences from all the different countries, discuss about European education policy, new student movements, common goals and strategies.
Together we will show that we do not agree with the celebration of a process, that limits education to the production of human capital!
http://bolognaburns.org/
http://unsereuni.at/
More info on Ministerial conference in Vienna:
http://www.ond.vlaanderen.be/hogeronderwijs/bologna/2010_conference/
More info on students' counter-summit in Vienna:
http://emancipating-education-for-all.org/bologna_burns_newsletter
27.02. Saturday at 6 pm
Latin America - The Factory of Revolution, Part III: The Take
Series of film projections and discussions:
Latin America - The Factory of Revolution
Selection of films and concept: CRuzok
)
The last two decades' events in Latin America represent the most radical alternative/counterbalance to the global capitalist order since the fall of the Berlin wall. While in the most developed capitalist countries the prevailing ideologies are that of capitalism having no alternative, or that of the neoliberal utopia, and while the post-socialist countries are dominated by the anticommunist sentiment and hopes of establishing "normal" capitalism after the rocky road of transition, the fight that is being fought in Latin America shows that the ideas of class politics, socialism and workers' self-management are not dead, and that they still represent a legitimate and real alternative to global capitalism. This fight is not being fought against the local bourgeoisie, politicians and the military elite only - but also against their more powerful allies - neocolonial tendencies of the USA which have been aggressively obstructing the democratic processes in Latin American countries throughout the whole 20th century and also against the neoliberal offense of the financial institutions like IMF and the World Bank. Establishing of the leftist governments and massive overtaking of the factories and businesses by the workers shows that resistance to the global capital is possible during its most invasive offense.
Due to the absence of the media coverage on the events in Latin America in Serbian media, we've decided to present three films: The War On Democracy, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, and The Take and start the debates on Latin American resistance to capitalism and imperialism and the perspective of workers' organizing in Serbia.
The Take (Avi Lewis and Naomi Klein, 2004) presents the story of the struggle of the ex-workers of the car factory "Forja" to overtake and keep the factory that had been abandoned by its owner amidst the economic collapse of Argentina in 2001. This story, by itself, is not an exception - in the wake of the economic crisis of 2001, 200 Argentinean factories and businesses had already been appropriated by their workers - among which are private schools and health clinics. With the slogan "ocupar, resistir, producir!" (occupy, resist, produce) the workers enter a fierce battle against former owners, the court, the police and politicians - this is a constant battle that doesn't end with taking over the factories and starting production.
22.02. Monday at 7 pm
Bug 2/2
exibition opening
Artists: Marko Tirnanić, Ana Banduka, Miloš Miletić, Ana Djukić, Ljiljana Popović, Jovana Sudimac, Jovana Vasić, Branimir Benšek, Nikola Krstić, Bogdan Vojnović, Smilja Ignjatović
)
The Bug 2/2 exhibition is the product of intermedia arts lectures realized during the winter semesters 2008/09 and 2009/10 at the Belgrade University Faculty of Fine Arts, with the faculty's 3rd year students. The exhibition follows on on the activities on the said subject and the attempts to make them more present in the broader cultural milieu. The nature of this subject and the researches it initiates are conditionned by the general cultural and productive circumstances of the contemporary arts practices that can be perceived as the work of linguistic and symbolic mechanisms and their mutual interactions. The exhibition is meant to form an information space for viewing the documented results of different symbolic testing and intervening by participating artists within our everyday reality, or documents that function as reports on that reality distorted through the living experience of the authors. They are also comments on the faculty's production, contributing in the same time to the actual discussions on the problems and usages of the artistic documentation, which was in the same time the topic of those workshops.
Workshop realized by:
Zoran Todorović
Guest lecturer:
Marina Gržinić, Kontekst
20.02. Saturday at 6 pm
Latin America - The Factory of Revolution, Part II: The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
Series of film projections and discussions:
Latin America - The Factory of Revolution
Selection of films and concept: CRuzok
)
The last two decades' events in Latin America represent the most radical alternative/counterbalance to the global capitalist order since the fall of the Berlin wall. While in the most developed capitalist countries the prevailing ideologies are that of capitalism having no alternative, or that of the neoliberal utopia, and while the post-socialist countries are dominated by the anticommunist sentiment and hopes of establishing "normal" capitalism after the rocky road of transition, the fight that is being fought in Latin America shows that the ideas of class politics, socialism and workers' self-management are not dead, and that they still represent a legitimate and real alternative to global capitalism. This fight is not being fought against the local bourgeoisie, politicians and the military elite only - but also against their more powerful allies - neocolonial tendencies of the USA which have been aggressively obstructing the democratic processes in Latin American countries throughout the whole 20th century and also against the neoliberal offense of the financial institutions like IMF and the World Bank. Establishing of the leftist governments and massive overtaking of the factories and businesses by the workers shows that resistance to the global capital is possible during its most invasive offense.
Due to the absence of the media coverage on the events in Latin America in Serbian media, we've decided to present three films: The War On Democracy, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, and The Take and start the debates on Latin American resistance to capitalism and imperialism and the perspective of workers' organizing in Serbia.
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised (Kim Bartley and Donnacha Ó Briain, 2002) is a film about Hugo Chavez, elected president of Venezuela since 1998, and about the coup carried out with the support of the USA government, which managed to overthrow him for a short period. While his support comes from the Venezuelan working class, his enemies are the powerful structure, above all the magnates of the oil industry, which would like to see him removed. Two indepent film makers were present in the presidential palace on the 11th of April 2002, when the president was removed from the position by force. They were also present 48 hours later, when he resumed the position with his associates. This film tells the story of the political rivalry and portrays the man that has been called "the biggest headache of Washington" by the Wall Street Journal, since the eternal one, Cuba.
13.02. Saturday at 3 pm
STAD in Kontekst Gallery
)
STAD invites you to a meeting around the flowing streams of the Belgrade rivers and the floating exchange of ideas. We would like to investigate the story of a place and the place of a story. What is the web of possible connotations around Danube and Sava? What can be found in the meeting of historical layers, future visions, social questions, physical city planning and poetic recounts on flows and civilisations? A number of speakers will share their ideas and experiences; Poligon, Zoran Djukanovic, Dubravka Sekulic and Dusan Pajin as well as the editorial board of STAD. Please note, this event will be held in english.
STAD is a magazine and a conversation about the city, centered on its inhabitants and their interactions with their environment. STAD is a space for interdisciplinary collaboration with its starting point in the cities' public spaces. STAD is also becoming a public space in itself while cumulating, reflecting and distributing ideas in an ongoing open process. STAD is the starting point for a wide range of activities such as a talks, walks, exhibitions and more. STAD is a platform of architects, writers, engineers and artists who met at the post graduate course Resources:08 Los Angeles" at The Royal University College of Fine Arts in Stockholm in 2008.
STAD #3 Confluence Belgrade
STAD #3 is using the of Belgrade as its take-off point. The confluence of the rivers Danube and Sava becomes the meeting of historical layers, social questions, physical city planning, future visions, and poetic recounts on flows and civilisations. STAD #3 is produced in collaboration with the guest editors Pavle Stamenovic, architect based in Belgrade and Tijana Stevenovic, architect, currently based in London.
12.02. Friday at 7 pm
Latin America - The Factory of Revolution, Part I: The War on Democracy
Series of film projections and discussions:
Latin America - The Factory of Revolution
Selection of films and concept: CRuzok
)
The last two decades' events in Latin America represent the most radical alternative/counterbalance to the global capitalist order since the fall of the Berlin wall. While in the most developed capitalist countries the prevailing ideologies are that of capitalism having no alternative, or that of the neoliberal utopia, and while the post-socialist countries are dominated by the anticommunist sentiment and hopes of establishing "normal" capitalism after the rocky road of transition, the fight that is being fought in Latin America shows that the ideas of class politics, socialism and workers' self-management are not dead, and that they still represent a legitimate and real alternative to global capitalism. This fight is not being fought against the local bourgeoisie, politicians and the military elite only - but also against their more powerful allies - neocolonial tendencies of the USA which have been aggressively obstructing the democratic processes in Latin American countries throughout the whole 20th century and also against the neoliberal offense of the financial institutions like IMF and the World Bank. Establishing of the leftist governments and massive overtaking of the factories and businesses by the workers shows that resistance to the global capital is possible during its most invasive offense.
Due to the absence of the media coverage on the events in Latin America in Serbian media, we've decided to present three films: The War On Democracy, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, and The Take and start the debates on Latin American resistance to capitalism and imperialism and the perspective of workers' organizing in Serbia.
The War on Democracy (John Pilger, 2007) deals with the political situation in the countries of Latin America, and particularly investigates the historical role of the USA in those countries. Through archive footage and testimonies of some of the participants, the film narrates the story of the struggle of the peoples of Latin America with poverty and racism, against the backdrop of the interventionist politics of the USA in the countries that have been the pillars of this struggle. Through the examples of El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Chile and Bolivia, the film sketches out the hypocrisy and brutality of the politics that has been obstructing the struggles of the peoples of Latin America for the past 50 years. With a particular focus on the recent history and present situation in Venezuela, the film raises important questions about the future of this struggle.
NOVEMBER
7.11. Saturday at 7 pm
Without borders? Some critical reflections on European and global border conditions
exhibition opening at Magacin, 4, Kraljevića Marka Street
)
Conceptualized by h.arta and Kontekst
In collaboration with: Lidija Antonović, Mirjana Dragosavljević, Bojana Matejić, Vladimir Miladinović, Jelena Savić, Aneta Stojnić, Nataša Tepavčević and Dejan Vasić
The project that consist of the workshop and exibition, "Without borders? Some critical reflections on European and global border conditions", is conceptualized as a collaborative work between Kontekst Belgrade (Vida Knežević, Ivana Marjanović and Marko Miletić) and the h.arta group from Timisoara (Maria Crista, Anca Gyemant and Rodica Tache). It has been organized as part of KulturKontakt's broader international "Without Borders" project which was initiated to mark the 20th jubilee of KulturKontakt Austria Artists-in-Residence-Programme and organized in collaboration with the Austrian Cultural Forum. The h.arta group has been invited as one of the former participants in the residency program.
Bearing in mind the title of KulturKontakt's overall project "Without borders", our project critically reflects on the issue of borders after the fall of the Berlin Wall and on the borderless new Europe. After 1989 and with the introduction of "Schengenland" as well as with the transition from communism and socialism to capitalism in Eastern Europe and the overall transformation of Western Europe due to the transformation of capitalism from Fordism to Postfordism or with the neoliberal push of a free market economy and deregulation, the historic (Westphalian) concept of sovereignty has weakened. Borders are disintegrating thus creating a new organization of space in Europe and the world (special economic zones where special - state of exception - legislation is in force, Fortress Europe etc). Thus, within the European Union border checkpoints have disappeared, visa applications have been abolished and special border regimes are being introduced for those countries which are about to join the European Union (for example: the White Schengen list, special trade agreements for countries which are not part of the EU including tax reductions for import-export, detention camps for "illegal" immigrants, Frontex etc). In this brutal regime everything which is seen to be an obstacle to the efficient circulation of capital has to be removed to ensure that the flow of goods that brings profit is not interrupted. Hence, the world has become "a world without borders" only for the power of capital and not for the people living in it (or at least not for all people).
While in order to ensure the endless circulation of capital, borders are on one hand disappearing, on the other hand they are constantly being reproduced on other levels (poverty, racism, patriarchy etc). As pointed out by philosopher Rada Iveković, borders are subject to constant reinterpretation, reincarnation and redrawing. The rich diversity of complex societies is evened out into a flat surface, whereby borders are introduced deep into the social canvas ("us" & "them")... Creating some borders often enables others to be removed, but the principle of borders remains.
In her text dealing with the disappearance of borders after 1989 and the euphoria which accompanied the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall theoretician Marina Gržinić pointed out the need to establish a border - to draw a line of division that would re-articulate this new world that seems to be without borders and where the only thing that seems impossible is impossibility as such - which means to present, to take a clear political stance, to ask for a political act .
Bearing in mind this complex and critical situation, the exhibition, "Without borders? Some critical reflections on European and global border conditions", deal with the different paradoxes accompanying the processes of disappearing borders such as the promotion of democracy, human rights and freedom of movement on one hand, and the intensification of racism, exclusion, exploitation, violence and the power of death within this new (united) Europe under neo-liberal capitalism on the other. Furthermore, the workshop explore what it means to act politically nowadays.
The workshop that is organized from 31.10. till 6.11. in Kontekst gallery and exhibition in Magacin as its outcome have been developed as a platform for collaborative work between h.arta, Kontekst and the workshop participants.
More about see:
http://workshopwithoutborders.wordpress.com/
The exhibition is open from 7th November till 15th November, every working day from 10 till 7 pm
www.hartagroup.blogspot.com
www.kontekstgalerija.org
www.kulturforumbelgrad.org
OCTOBER
26.10. Monday, 7 pm
Magacin, Kraljevića Marka 4
DISCUSSION ON KAPITAL, VIOLENCE, RACISAM, HOMOPHOBIA
Marina Gržinić, Sebastjan Leban (Ljubljana)
REARTIKULACIJA: The Law of Capital: Histories of Oppression
+
Vladan Jeremić, Ivana Marjanović, Rena Rädle, Ana Vilenica , Majda Puača, Maja Savić (Belgrade)
The Law of Capital: Histories of Oppression: Case Study Belgrade
Moderator: Marko Miletić
)
REARTIKULACIJA is organized on several levels: a journal, creation, production and organization of exhibitions, lectures, presentations and organization of auto-educational processes/school for radical theory. REARTIKULACIJA through contemporary political theory, critic, art projects, activism aims to intervene in the Slovene, Balkan and international space. The logic of this intervention is a formulation of a contemporary discourse, which is not only limited to formal solutions but is based on research and application of new radical-critical strategies in terms of content. The project The Law of Capital: Histories of Oppression is one of the last critical theoretical and exhibition performative projects that Marina Gržinić and Sebastjan Leban conceptualized and based on the research of the role of capital in regulating all social processes and on questioning its consequences.
In second part of discussion Vladan Jeremić, Ivana Marjanović, Rena Rädle, Ana Vilenica, Majda Puača and Maja Savić will reflect on recent events in Belgrade, that were caused by organization of Universiade 2009. (brutal demolition of Roma settlement, racist campaign of authorities etc), that they followed and reflect through texts, art works, and activism. Also recent ban of Belgrade Pride will be discussed .
REARTIKULACIJA is structured in such a way to allow for a constant changing and upgrading of each issue/exhibition/lecture according to a specific context and due to collaborators from Slovenia and abroad, who are given full autonomy based on their historical, political and artistic backgrounds. REARTIKULACIJA platform allows networking with other political subjects, activists, artists, who are interested in the possibility to create and maintain a dialogue with concrete social and political spaces in Slovenia, Europe and worldwide.
REARTIKULACIJA editors: Marina Gržinić and Sebastjan Leban. Translation editors: Tanja Passoni and M. Gržinić. Design and website: Staš Kleindienst and S. Leban. Platform REARTIKULACIJA was formed in 2007 in Ljubljana, Slovenia, by Gržinić, Kleindienst, Leban and Passoni.
The project The Law of Capital: Histories of Oppression is a critical intervention in the structure of contemporary society, aiming at shedding light to topical problems regarding social inequalities, contemporary forms of colonization, comodification, migration, marginalization of various sexual and ethnic groups, exploitation faced for centuries by the major part of world population. Special focus is given to the development of a discursive platform as an interaction/hybrid between art, theory, philosophy and activism. The aim of the work is thus to re-think of what could be the alternatives to the current neoliberal reality, its exploitation strategies, and to imagine a different future that will not depend on politics of exploitation but rather it will de-link from such politics and abrogate them.
http://www.reartikulacija.org/
http://univerzijada-beograd2009.org/Default.aspx.html
www.raedle-jeremic.modukit.com
http://www.belgradepride.rs/
SEPTEMBAR
10.09. Thursday at 8 pm
Nina Hoechtl, Tales of protest. A necessity. A videoinstallation
Place: Center for Cultural Decontamination, Birčaninova Street 21
)
"November 2008 I spent a one month residency in Belgrade (Galerija KONTEKST in collaboration with <rotor>/Austria) researching into the fight of the workers from the factory Jugoremedija in Zrenjanin. For 2 years the workers fought for their factory and against the privatization of their work place. Throughout their struggle they lived partly in the factory, squatted the city hall for 4 months, protested 3 days and nights in front of the agency for privatization in Belgrade, got beaten up, injured and imprisoned by the police and private security. During this 2 years period the workers didn't earn and many were left behind by their families. Since 2006 Jugoremedija became the first factory amongst the "transition" countries in Eastern Europe undergoing neoliberal privatization to be recovered and controlled by its workers.
This summer I came back to Serbia to research further into the subject. I soon found that alone in August there were around 40 smaller or bigger protests per day.
Based on this research and interviews with the workers (mainly from the factory Jugoremedija) I developed "Tales of protest. A necessity.". In this piece fictionalized characters tell their tales, juxtaposed with text derived from the interviews, and footage from Sergei Eisenstein's silent film "Strike".
In 1925 the film "Strike" Eisenstein depicts a complex re-creation of the development of a 1912 factory strike in pre-revolutionary Russia. The workers were acted by the Proletkult Theatre. My interest in this film lies on the scenes that portray collectivism in opposition to the individualism of each tale in a similar way as the characters' voices generate a murmur that one can only follow focusing on each tale.
As I talked to the workers, and having witnessed their protest in front of the Privatization agency and the govermental building in Belgrade triggered to question my own position as an artist and framer of the workers' struggle: What am I fighting for? Do I let anything be done to myself?"
Nina Hoechtl
Nina Hoechtl, born in 1978 in Stockerau (Austria), lives in Vienna and Mexico City. Nina studied at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice and the Piet Zwart Institute in Rotterdam. Presently, she is a doctoral candidate in Fine Art by Practice at Goldsmiths (UK).
Nina's projects deal with identity, language and communication and employ different media. Since 2000, she has participated in several exhibitions and projects. Most recently, she has exhibited Moved, Mutated and Disturbed Identities, Casino Luxembourg (LU), DONAU GEHT, Viertelfestival Weinviertel, Lower Austria, 2009; Too Early for Vacation, OPEN/INVITED ev +a, 2008, Belltable Arts Centre, Limerick, Ireland, 2008 (Curator: Hou Hanru); Arbeitswege, Festival of Regions, Kirchdorf, Austria, 2007; PAN-CARTA, lugar a dudas, Cali, Columbia, 2007; Loutec, Fundaçion Valenzuela y Klenner, Bogotá, Columbia, 2007; To my dear friend, Naima, who is already 10., Animotion Festival, Sibiu, Russia, 2007; Ear candies, Emil Filli Galerie, Ustí Nad Ladem, Czech Republic and Institute of Contemporary Art, Dunaujvaros, Hungary, 2006.
http://www.ninahoechtl.org
The project is suported by Austrian Cultural Forum
JULY
PETITION AGAINST FENCING ROMA SETTLEMENTS IN BELGRADE
http://www.petitiononline.com/01101102/petition.html
Three months before the opening of the Universiade[1], Belgrade's City Secretariat for Inspections decided to destroy the Roma slum settlement located right next to the athlete's village "Belleville", residential area for athletes built for this occasion. On April the 3rd 2009 all of a sudden a couple of bulldozers showed up at the settlement and demolished 40 houses.
As a consequence of this, a series of public protests opposing the humiliating policy was organized, and it made a public pressure on the City Secretariat's decision-makers to an extent that they did not dare to terminate what they started: the total erasure of the settlement. The new strategy is to erase the settlement's visibility and to ban its residents from the streets. On June 16th 2009, a metal fence was built around the settlement. The fence is guarded by police and security staff on both sides, inside and outside the settlement.
We demand that the fence around the Roma settlement in Block 67 is removed IMMEDIATELY. We demand that the City of Belgrade finally assumes its responsibility to improve the unacceptable living conditions of tens of thousands Belgrade citizens who are forced to live in one of the approximately 150 slum settlements all over the city.
No to ghettoization of our neighborhood "for the benefit of the city"!
No to Universiade or any public event if it is at the expense of human dignity!
No to the authorities that value capital over human life and use racist strategies to manage their policies!
Other Scene (Druga scena) and (international) friends
Platform of Belgrade independent cultural and activist scene
www.drugascena.org
LINKS:
http://picasaweb.google.com/jeremic.vladan/NaseljePosleRusenja#5321280137444794258
http://www.archive.org/details/BELLEVILLE
http://www.dur.org.rs/cms/
http://www.youtube.com/user/pravonanaseljetv
UNITED neighborhood against racism
Due to intensifying racist measures of Belgrade authorities in Roma settlements near Belvil in Block 67, and as a support to our Roma fellow citizens, members of Druga Scena and friends will be permanent guests in these Roma settlements from the opening of Universiade, Wednesday July 1st. During Universiade, and in cooperation with ghettoized residents of settlement, we will organize a number of informal meetings, art workshops and cultural programs, culminating in cultural show and press conference on Wednesday July 8th.
On June 16th 2009, a wired fence was built around Roma settlements, while security and police "guard" it on external side. Recently, wire was covered by promotional banners of Universiade in order to hide Roma people behind it. In addition, police patrol operates along the wire fence inside this settlement! Residents are forbidden to leave the settlement, to walk the streets near Belvil, to gather materials from surrounding dumpsters (which is their only source of income). These measures have limited the right to free movement and the right to work for residents of this Roma settlement.
Belgrade authorities have ignored the problems of Roma people for more than decade including refusal to provide them with basic life conditions. Now they went step further in discriminating our fellow citizens, using the security measures for Universiade as an excuse. By building the wired fence around settlement and imposing police surveillance - city authorities have shown that they actually don't want to deal with improving life conditions of people, but just improve media image of this city. The main goal of these measures is to hide the "shame" - poverty and misery Roma people live in, from international guests and public.
We will not let humiliation of our fellow citizens, nor forging the reality. The true image of Serbia consists of images of Belvil and Roma settlements next to each other, the corruption on highest level and fired workers, privatization of University and Universiade, sports event that turned out to be more important than human lives and dignity. We demand that wired fence around Roma Settlement in Block 67 is removed IMMEDIATELY, as well as to start working on finding appropriate ways to improve life conditions of the residents of the most vulnerable settlements in the city.
No to ghettos in our neighborhood for the "benefit of city"!
No to Universiade against human dignity!
No to authorities that value capital over life of people and use racist strategies as a way of management!
We invite all interested colleagues from cultural scene to join us and help realization of cultural programs, art workshops, cooking actions, movie projects.
Druga Scena
Platform of Belgrade independent cultural and activist scene
www.drugascena.org
JUNE 2009
15.06. Monday at 8 pm
Exhibition of Finalists of Dimitrije Bašičević Mangelos Award and announcing of The Award winner for 2009
The finalists: Aleksandrija Ajduković, Dušica Dražić, Zorica Čolić, Ivana Smiljanić, Ranko Travanj
Organization: Kontekst galerija and DEZ ORG
)
Dimitrije Bašičević Mangelos Award was founded in 2002 by The Center for Contemporary Art Belgrade and The Foundation for a Civil Society (FCS) from New York, as part of the regional project Young Visual Artists Awards (YVAA) and with the idea of establishing annual residential award (first year grant was held in Sausalito, California, since then in New York, New York) awarded to a young artist from Serbia.
The award is named after a renowned artist, one of the founders of conceptual practice and an art historian from former Yugoslavia - Dimitrije Bašičević Mangelos.
Since 2006, the organizers of the Award contest have been the Kontekst Gallery and Art Association DEZ ORG from Belgrade. The award consists of a six-week residential program in the ISCP (International Studio and Curatorial Program) in New York which represents one of the most important programs for young artists nowadays. The residential program includes visits to numerous galleries, museums and the attempts to establish connections to the leading representatives of New York art scene. On returning from the residential program, a solo exhibition will be organized for the awarded artist.
Prior to 2008, Dimitrije Bašičević Mangelos Award had been granted to the following artists in Serbia: Bob Milošević (Sausalito, California, 2002), Vladimir Nikolić (New York, 2003), Milica Ružičić (New York, 2004), Milena Gordić (New York, 2005), Siniša Ilić (New York, 2006), Katarina Zdjelar (New York, 2007) and Ivan Petrović (New York, 2008).
This year, having considered the votes of the Award participants, the following jury members have selected finalists for the Dimitrije Bašičević Mangelos Award for 2009: Nikola Dedić (art historian and theorist, Niš), Maida Gruden (curator, Gallery of Dom kulture Studentski grad, Belgrade), Gordana Nikolić (curator, Museum of Contemporary Art of Vojvodina, Novi Sad), Miroslav Karić (art historian, Belgrade), Jelena Radić (artist, Belgrade) and Ivan Petrović (artist, Mangelos Award grant for 2008).
The exhibition is open till 03.07. 2009. Kontekst gallery is open every working day 4 pm to 8 pm
Support: Foundation for a Civil Society (FCS), Trust for Mutual Understanding (TMU), Ministry of Culture of Republic of Serbia and City of Belgrade - Secretariat for Culture.
http://www.mangelosnagrada.org.rs/
http://www.yvaa.net/
Download catalogue here
03.06. Wednesday at 8 pm
The Helsinki Effect
Darinka Pop-Mitić and Svebor Midžić
)
"The better part of information concerning the Balkan states came from their former residents who had fled to Constantinople. A surprising number of Bulgarians, Yugoslavs and Romanians claimed that, before their departure, they were a part of a spy ring.
They were more than ready to put those rings at the disposal of British intelligence services, providing, of course, that we supply the necessary funds for their activation. The war has shown that money had entered espionage all over Europe, and during the 1940s a careless buyer could spend millions in Constantinople on intelligence originating from inside city walls. We were losing a lot of time in finding ways of discerning real from false data and appraising its importance. However, we seldom succeeded, and I am pretty certain that, despite all the care we took, several refugees were pulling our leg."
Kim Philby, My Silent War
Three years after signing the Helsinki Accords of 1975, the NGO Helsinki Watch was established to monitor their implementation throughout the Soviet bloc countries. Numerous volunteers and professionals were involved with this organization. In 1988, Helsinki Watch evolved into Human Rights Watch. The "Helsinki effect" is a term which accentuates the influence of this organization's "monitoring" on the dissolution of the USSR.
Is the artist in residence which takes up such a local problem as the subject of his work a spy or an amateur ethnologist? Is there a map without politics? Who is the contractor of investigative work in modern art - and whom is it intended for?
The work of Darinka Pop-Mitić and Svebor Midžić - The Helsinki Effect - tries to find ways of asking those questions in the form of a simple visual essay/narrative, based on a single case of a single work during a single residence.
Exibition is open till 10th of June.
MAY 2009
15.04. 07.06.
Poster campaign
Land of Human Rights: Artistic analyses and visions of the human rights situation in Europe
)
Artists of the 3rd campaign: Nikolin Bujari (Tirana / Albania), Freee (Sheffield / Great Britain), Maryam Jafri (Copenhagen / Denmark), Michaela Thelenová (Ústí nad Labem / Czech Republic)
Land of Human Rights is a project dealing with the status quo of the human rights in Europe seen from the perspective of visual art, which will also work on the issue in an analytical and visionary manner. Over a period of three years the discourse on human rights in Europe will be disseminated in the general public with the means of art. The discussion shall purposely be based on issues "in front of one's own door" or "inside one's own house". The planned activities are supposed to reach a broad audience and shall make us aware of the following fact: In many respects the observance of human rights is not guaranteed in Europe too!
One integral part of the long-term project Land of Human Rights is a poster campaign that will be realized in the KONTEKST gallery as well. Starting in September 2007, a set of 4 posters will be printed every half a year. The front side of the posters will present works of artists and on the back side there will be short texts of theorists or human rights activists who will thematize current human rights issues.
The aim of the campaign is to inform the people about their rights in connection with the human rights and to raise awareness of current human rights issues in a large part of the population.
Land of Human Rights is developed and organized by < rotor > association for contemporary art Graz, Austria in cooperation with 5 countries - Slovenia, Croatia, Germany, Czech Republic, Hungary.
Posters are for free!
http://www.landofhumanrights.eu/
APRIL 2009
15.04. Wednesday at 8 pm
war is peace: no war - no torture - no capitalism
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After the action "50 000 posters against G 8 - On the Urgent Need for Radical Answers" the international art project holy damn it newly participates in the political debate on social alternatives in the process of global protest and resistance movements against war, capitalist globalization as well as patriarchal and racist power relations.The art project holy damn it has invited 10 international artists and artist collectives to submit a contribution for the DVD "war is peace."
The latest DVD-project is a compilation with artistic contributions against war, torture, global states of exception and the military management of the crisis, consisting of videos, slide shows with sound, and image montages (1-7 mins).
Artists:
Internacional Errorista (Argentina), Noel Douglas (GB), Marina Gržinić and Aina Šmid (Slovenia), Petra Gerschner (Germany), Feld für Kunst (Germany), Gülsün Karamustafa (Turkey), Carlos Motta (COL/USA), Oliver Ressler (Austria), Walter Seidl (Austria, David Thorne (USA)
The project is also a contribution to the mobilization for the protests against the NATO summit in 2009, which was held on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the most powerful war alliance in Baden Baden (Germany) and Strasbourg (France) and to the international anti-war-movements.
Capitalist globalization and global war form two sides of one coin: The dominating political system can no longer offer new perspectives other than the administration of crisis, be it billions of money donated to banks or armament for the occupied zones. This leads to increasing militarization of societies worldwide, within and to the outside. Global war has no temporal or spatial limitation, no beginning and no end. War is Peace. In our current world order, there is no longer a state of peace doing without war. The military has become an essential means for global crisis management: whether in military border units of the EU and the USA against the right of free migration, to defend climate violation, securing raw materials and trade channels, e.g. in Guantanamo, Afghanistan, or the increasing militarization of everyday life in metropolises as well as the expansion of the authoritative surveillance state.
The DVD "war is peace" provides artistic and political interventions free of charge. It can be used by all anti-militarists for screenings in public space, in exhibitions, in political and cultural institutions, cinemas, political events and actions.
http://www.holy-damn-it.org/videos/index.html
15.04. Wednesday at 8 pm
Poster campaign
Land of Human Rights: Artistic analyses and visions of the human rights situation in Europe
Artists of the 3rd campaign: Nikolin Bujari (Tirana / Albania), Freee (Sheffield / Great Britain), Maryam Jafri (Copenhagen / Denmark), Michaela Thelenová (Ústí nad Labem / Czech Republic)
Land of Human Rights is a project dealing with the status quo of the human rights in Europe seen from the perspective of visual art, which will also work on the issue in an analytical and visionary manner. Over a period of three years the discourse on human rights in Europe will be disseminated in the general public with the means of art. The discussion shall purposely be based on issues "in front of one's own door" or "inside one's own house". The planned activities are supposed to reach a broad audience and shall make us aware of the following fact: In many respects the observance of human rights is not guaranteed in Europe too!
One integral part of the long-term project Land of Human Rights is a poster campaign that will be realized in the KONTEKST gallery as well. Starting in September 2007, a set of 4 posters will be printed every half a year. The front side of the posters will present works of artists and on the back side there will be short texts of theorists or human rights activists who will thematize current human rights issues.
The aim of the campaign is to inform the people about their rights in connection with the human rights and to raise awareness of current human rights issues in a large part of the population.
Land of Human Rights is developed and organized by < rotor > association for contemporary art Graz, Austria in cooperation with 5 countries - Slovenia, Croatia, Germany, Czech Republic, Hungary.
Posters are for free! They can be taken away till 07.05.2009.
http://www.landofhumanrights.eu/
PROTEST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AGAINST RACISM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
08th of April 2009
New attacks on Roma
Night before last night (night between 6. and 7. April) at 2:30 after midnight a group of neonazis attacked Roma settlement near "Shopping mall" in open air (flee market) in New Belgrade.
According to the words of witnesses, 20-30 attackers drove with 2 vans and they were armed with knifes and metal sticks. With words "We will move you" they attacked a group of children, women, and men who were sitting outside. Few children were beaten up and one young man got serious injuries when he was hit by a bottle in his head. Few older people collapsed in fear and panic that was produced. Neonazis run away only after 50 man from nearby barracks organized themselves to defend the settlement. Present policemen (5-6 policemen who were patrolling in the settlement) didn't react - their excuse was that "they do not have a right to intervene".
Journalists who were next morning (as all these days) reporting from Roma slums didn't report about this incident.
(People with whom we talked informed us about one more attack by neonazis that happened few months ago. Back then, Molotov cocktails were thrown on barracks in the nearby slum in the moment when people were inside of the barracks. One child was seriously injured by serious burns and died because of them.)
Earlier on the same day, 6th April, at 9 o clock in the morning one more incident happened in the settlement Resnik. Roma live here in the refugee's shelter on the periphery of that settlement. Unknown group of people set the forest and meadow nearby the shelter on fire. Firefighters showed up and stopped the fire only when it was almost reaching the building of the shelter. People are afraid to leave the shelter because they have to organize themselves in group in order to defend it.
The shelter where 46 families are living is the constant target of threats and attacks. Groups of 10-15 persons usually take part in the attacks. People are afraid for the safety of the children in the schools, and they are even afraid to go alone to the local shops. There is no trust in police because they were often broad in the police stations and beaten up during informative talks.
Source: Queer Belgrade
Translation: Ivana Marjanovic, Kontekst gallery
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
05th of April 2009
Solidarity Appeal: Support Roma Housing
Struggle in Belgrade, Serbia
http://www.youtube.com/user/pravonanaseljetv
http://picasaweb.google.com/pravonagradbg/SolidarnostSaRomima_442009?feat=directlink
Today, Roma organizations and allies in Belgrade, Serbia are organizing a demonstration in response to the demolition of the Roma community's housing units in Block 67 situated in the New Belgrade. The violent and surprising move to destroy people's homes and an entire community was organized by the City of Belgrade authorities with the support of Belgrade City Major Dragan Djilas. Your solidarity is needed!
On Friday morning (April 3rd), the forcible and violent eviction of Roma families living in the Block 67 neighborhood began. The residents of this community say that the demolitions began during a surprise invasion beginning at six in the morning led by heavy police presence and special forces. Police brutality resulted in an emergency evacuation of two women from the community. Peoples' entire belongings were left behind in the ruins. A part of the community is now spending the night in front of the City Council. They are without warm clothes, blankets, food, and medicine (many people had to leave them behind). Residents say that during the day unidentified youth on motorcycles were provoking and instilling fear in the community.
In the meantime, no alternative housing has been secured by the city government, nor is anyone taking care of these needs. Belgrade's Major Djilas announced that it is "necessary that they be removed from that area so that we can build a new boulevard necessary for the development of the city, and holding of events being planned in the future." He also threatened to deploy police forces to remove any protesters attempting to bloc the streets. These actions were preceded by a media campaign that justified the expulsion of Roma living in New Belgrade under "security" and "city image" considerations in the lead up to the Universiad 2009. Through his statements, Major Dragan Djilas has contributed to the fascist relationship towards Roma citizens and justified the destruction of their homes. as An "alternative" the city officials are suggesting to remove the building of a fence around the community so that "the city's deformities won't be seen during the Universiade."
Does this mean that the Universiade will be paid for with human lives if necessary?
Our fellow citizens who have been left without home are determined to fight for their rights, their right to life, freedom, housing and work.
Today (Saturday) at 1pm a protest is being organized against the brutal behavior through which the Belgrade government prefers to solve the city's problems. Support people that have been thrown onto the streets in this violent way. We must stand in solidarity with the Roma of Belgrade, we must not allow that people's houses are destroyed, that fascist walls are built and that people are fenced into ghettoes!
We call on international solidarity in conjunction with these actions:
PLEASE CONTACT THE FOLLOWING: (1) Mayor's office of the City of Belgrade; (2) President's Office of the Republic of Serbia; (3) Head Office of the International University Sports Federation (organizing the Universiade in Belgrade); (4) Your nearest Serbian embassy or consulate.
(1) Mayor's Office:
E-mail: natasa.golubovic@beogradsg.org.yu
Head of Office, tel: 3246-764, 3229-787
tel: 3247-424, tel/fax: 3344-675
Natasa Golubović
independent expert associate in international affairs
Dear Mayor Dragan Djilas:
I am writing to express my outrage at the recent racist expulsion of 50 families from the Roma community of Block 67, near Belvil in New Belgrade.
I demand that your government take all necessary measures to provide restitution to the residents of the community and prevent any further expulsion of Roma families or their further social exclusion.
Belgrade can not expect to rebrand itself in the eyes of the world by hosting Universiades or Eurovision contests while it continues to deny fundamental rights to housing, employment, life and security to its residents, particularly the most vulnerable and socially excluded.
I demand that your government respond and meet its obligations under a number of international conventions and work towards securing the rights of Roma residents instead of deploying police forces to suppress them and engaging in "social cleansing."
Kind regards,
____________
(2) President of the Republic of Serbia:
GENERAL SECRETARIAT OF THE
PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF SERBIA
Andricev venac 1, 11000 Beograd, Serbia
tel: +381 (0)11 3632-007, 3632-136
e-mail: kontakt.predsednik@predsednik.rs
www.predsednik.rs
Dear President Boris Tadic:
I am writing to express my outrage at the recent racist expulsion of 50 families from the Roma community of Block 67, near Belvil in New Belgrade.
I implore your government take all necessary measures to sanction the Belgrade City Authorities and ensure they provide restitution to the residents of this Roma community and work towards preventing any further expulsion of Roma families or their further social exclusion in Serbia.
Belgrade can not expect to rebrand itself in the eyes of the world by hosting Universiades or Eurovision contests while it continues to deny fundamental rights to housing, employment, life and security to its residents, particularly the most vulnerable and socially excluded.
I demand that your government respond and meet its obligations under a number of international conventions and work towards securing the rights of Roma residents instead of deploying police forces to suppress them and engaging in "social cleansing."
Kind regards,
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Roma settlement in Belgrade destroyed.
05th of April 2009
The Belgrade municipal authorities destroyed a Roma settlement by force last Friday morning (3. April 2009). 50 houses were demolished. Approximately 250 persons, amongst them many children and ill persons, were made homeless. In the past nights many of the evicted had to sleep under the open sky. Through negotiations of international organizations a part of the evicted were offered some containers in the suburb of Boljevci on Saturday night (4. April 2009). Protesting locals prevented the Roma to go to Boljevci and tried to destroy the containers. At the moment (5. April) there is no alternative solution in sight.
The eviction is for different reasons a scandal:
1) For the Belgrade municipal authorities under mayor Dragan Djilas (Democratic party ) the building of a new road for the sports festival "Universiade" is obviously more important then the health and conditions for the existence of 300 citizens.
2) Belgrade municipal authorities did not offer alternative housing.
3) The destruction of the "illegal" settlement was not announced on time. The bulldozers came as a surprise to the affected persons.
4) Many of the affected persons (around 50 percent) are refugees from Kosovo, which were expelled by Albanian nationalists. They found precarious conditions to survive in Belgrade. Now there existence is attacked a second time.
Since Friday there are daily protests in front of the municipal palace (Skupština grada) in Belgrade.
More Information and Videos:
http://www.b92.net
http://www.youtube.com/user/pravonanaseljetv
Please send protest letters to the Belgrade authorities. Here is a possible text:
Solidarity Appeal: Support Roma Housing Struggle in Belgrade, Serbia
Today, Roma organizations and allies in Belgrade, Serbia are organizing a demonstration in response to the demolition of the Roma community's housing units in Block 67 situated in the New Belgrade. The violent and surprising move to destroy people's homes and an entire community was organized by the City of Belgrade authorities with the support of Belgrade City Major Dragan Djilas. Your solidarity is needed!
On Friday morning (April 3rd), the forcible and violent eviction of Roma families living in the Block 67 neighbourhood began. The residents of this community say that the demolitions began during a surprise invasion beginning at six in the morning led by heavy police presence and special forces. Police brutality resulted in an emergency evacuation of two women from the community. Peoples' entire belongings were left behind in the ruins. A part of the community is now spending the night in front of the City Council. They are without warm clothes, blankets, food, and medicine (many people had to leave them behind). Residents say that during the day unidentified youth on motorcycles were provoking and instilling fear in the community.
In the meantime, no alternative housing has been secured by the city government, nor is anyone taking care of these needs. Belgrade's Major Djilas announced that it is "necessary that they be removed from that area so that we can build a new boulevard necessary for the development of the city, and holding of events being planned in the future." He also threatened to deploy police forces to remove any protesters attempting to bloc the streets. These actions were preceded by a media campaign that justified the expulsion of Roma living in New Belgrade under "security" and "city image" considerations in the lead up to the Universiad 2009. Through his statements, Major Dragan Djilas has contributed to the fascist relationship towards Roma citizens and justified the destruction of their homes. as An "alternative" the city officials are suggesting to remove the building of a fence around the community so that "the city's deformities won't be seen during the Universiade."
Does this mean that the Universiade will be paid for with human lives if necessary?
Our fellow citizens who have been left without home are determined to fight for their rights, their right to life, freedom, housing and work.
Today (Saturday) at 1pm a protest is being organized against the brutal behavior through which the Belgrade government prefers to solve the city's problems. Support people that have been thrown onto the streets in this violent way. We must stand in solidarity with the Roma of Belgrade, we must not allow that people's houses are destroyed, that fascist walls are built and that people are fenced into ghettoes!
MARCH 2009
25.02. -20.03.
Exibition, Belgrade Notes, Minna L. Henriksson
Minna L. Henriksson spent three months in Belgrade as guest of Kontekst gallery. During that time she explored the Belgrade contemporary art scene by finding out professional and private/personal connections between its members. She carried out her research by meeting people active in the scene for informal talks. The result is an exhibition of notes and findings that the artist mapped during her three months of insight into the local cultural and social network.
In the recent years the artist has made similar research also in Istanbul, Zagreb and Ljubljana.
Minna L. Henriksson (b. 1976) is a visual artist whose work is based on research. She is interested in recording and analyzing the hidden and obvious ideological sets and power structures in contemporary societies. Currently she focuses especially on nationalism and other
forms of collective identities. She is based in Helsinki and Istanbul. In recent years she has been exhibiting and participating in artist-in-residency programs in southeastern Europe.
The project is supported by the Finnish Cultural Foundation.
FEBRUARY 2009
21.02. Saturday from 3 pm till 8 pm
Matinee party, Kontekst Gallery birthday!!!
23.02. Monday, 7 pm
Abstract cabinet and a story about modern art
Alfred Barr, colaborator of the Museum of American Art Berlin
lecture and slide projection
http://whatismodernart.de/
25.02. Wednesday, 8 pm
Exibition, Belgrade Notes, Minna L. Henriksson
Minna L. Henriksson spent three months in Belgrade as guest of Kontekst gallery. During that time she explored the Belgrade contemporary art scene by finding out professional and private/personal connections between its members. She carried out her research by meeting people active in the scene for informal talks. The result is an exhibition of notes and findings that the artist mapped during her three months of insight into the local cultural and social network.
In the recent years the artist has made similar research also in Istanbul, Zagreb and Ljubljana.
Minna L. Henriksson (b. 1976) is a visual artist whose work is based on research. She is interested in recording and analyzing the hidden and obvious ideological sets and power structures in contemporary societies. Currently she focuses especially on nationalism and other
forms of collective identities. She is based in Helsinki and Istanbul. In recent years she has been exhibiting and participating in artist-in-residency programs in southeastern Europe.
The project is supported by the Finnish Cultural Foundation.
Exibition is open till 20.03.
27.02. Friday, 7 pm
Discussion about work Belgrade Notes by Minna L. Henriksson
JANUARY 2009
28.01. Wednesday, 8 pm
Danilo Prnjat, Art as an Action in the Public Space
exhibition opening
)
As performances of Danilo Prnjat represents actions/interventions in everyday, public, "real" but not in special (gallery, museum, scenic) space and time, exhibition in Context Gallery offers unique opportunity to have an insight into artist's opus. On six monitors video records of the performances, that Prnjat had carried out in last couple of years, will be broadcasted with following documentation of the works.
As an artist Prnjat intervenes in political reallity domain by performing controversal and sometimes legally problematic actions and manipulations for expressing certain social problem. His work intrudes into activism domain, at which the artist acts by way of excess, as guerrilla (free lancer) or hacker that birsts in the system and attacks it from inside. He most commonly uses controversial method that consists of isolating specific socially-politically problematic phenomenon which he exposes by carrying it out to its extreeme.
Works of Danilo Prnjat have been performed and exhibited in Serbia, Montenegro, Italy, Austria, Russia, Slovenia, France, Czech Republic, Singapore etc. Rewarded several times at home and abroad for his works, but he came across disputes as well.
Danilo Prnjat was born 1982 in Herceg Novi. Graduated at Academy of Fine Arts in Novi Sad. He creates in performance and intermedia research field. Prnjat is one of the most provocative artists of his generation. He lives and works in Belgrade.
Exhibition is open till 20.2.2009.
DECEMBER 2008
15.12. Monday, 8 pm
Dimtrije Bašićević Mangelos award finalists show
Marina Marković, Goran Micevski, Andrea Palašti, Ivan Petrović - awarded artist, Ivana Smiljanić
The winner was selected by artists who applied and jury whose members were: Nikola Dedić (art historian and theoretician, Niš), Maida Gruden (curator, Gallery of Dom kulture Studentski grad, Belgrade), Gordana Nikolić (curator, Museum of Contemporary arts of Vojvodina, Novi Sad), Miroslav Karić (art historian, Belgrade), Jelena Radić (artist, DEZ ORG, Belgrade) and Katarina Zdjelar (artist, Mangelos award winner for 2007, Roterdam).
Exhibition is open till 23.01.2009.
http://www.mangelosnagrada.org.rs
NOVEMBER
20.11. 7 pm
Projection of the film "5 Factories-Worker Control in Venezuela" (by Dario Azzellini and Oliver Ressler) + discussion on the topic of workers' struggle in Jugoremedija factory (Zrenjanin)
Participants: Nina Hoechtl, Vladan Jeremić and Ivan Zlatić
Moderator: Marko Miletić
)
In their second film regarding political and social change in Venezuela, after "Venezuela from Below" (67 min., 2004), Azzellini and Ressler focus on the industrial sector in "5 Factories-Worker Control in Venezuela" (81 min., 2006). The changes in Venezuela's productive sphere are demonstrated with five large companies in various regions: a textile company, aluminum works, a tomato factory, a cocoa factory, and a paper factory. In all, the workers are struggling for different forms of co- or self-management supported by credits from the government. "The assembly is basically governing the company", says Rigoberto López from the textile factory "Textileros del Táchira" in front of steaming tubs. And coning machine operator Carmen Ortiz summarizes the experience as follows: "Working collectively is much better than working for another-working for another is like being a slave to that other".
The protagonists portrayed at the five production locations present insights into ways of alternative organizing and models of workers' control. Mechanisms and difficulties of self-organization are explained as well as the production processes. The portrayal of machine processes could be seen as a metaphor for the dream machine of the "Bolivarian process", and the hopes and desires it inspires among the workers. The situation in the five factories varies, but they share the common search for better models of production and life. This not only means concrete improvements for the workers. Aury Arocha, laboratory analyst at the ketchup factory "Tomates Guárico", emphasizes that the difference between "social production companies" (EPS) and capitalist corporations is that the EPS "work for the community and society". Carlos Lanz, president of the second largest aluminum factory in Venezuela, Alcasa, coins the key question: "How does a company push toward socialism within a capitalist framework?"
The film ends with an extended sequence from a management meeting at Alcasa, a company with 2.700 workers, with discussions about co-management and the changes of production relations they aspire towards.
The film will be introduced by Nina Hoechtl, an artist from Vienna who is at the moment in Belgrade on the artist residency program "AIR 08" organized by Rotor from Graz (Austria) and Kontekst gallery. During the stay in Serbia she will make a research about workers struggle in the factory Jugoremedija in Zrenjanin, and about workers' temporary control of the factory. In her project proposal for the residency in Belgrade Nina Hoechtl was referring to "5 Factories -Worker Control in Venezuela" by Azzellini and Ressler discussing the possible models of workers control that she wants to research on the example of Jugoremedija factory. Jugoremedija is a Serbian pharmaceutical factory, from Zrenjanin, that was privatized in 2000, in such a way that 58% of the shares were given to the workers, and the state took 42%. In 2002, the state sold it's shares to Jovica Stefanovic, an infamous local capitalist, who made his fortune smuggling cigarettes, and who was wanted by Interpol at the time he bought the shares of "Jugoremedija". As all the other buyers in Serbian privatization, Stefanovic was not even investigated in money laundering, because the Serbian Government's position at that time was, and still is, that it's better to have dirty money in privatization, than to let workers manage the company, because that will "bring us back to the dark days of self-management"...
After the screening Nina Hoechtl, Vladan Jeremic (Biro za kulturu i komunikaciju) and
Ivan Zlatić (Freedom Fight) will open a discussion on the issue of workers struggle in Jugoremedija factory.
http://freedomfight.net/cms/index.php?page=jugoremedija-fabrika-lekova-ad-zrenjanin---lek-za-srbiju
http://www.ninahoechtl.org/
http://www.ressler.at/content/view/93/lang,en_GB
12.11. Wednesday at 7 pm
Lana Zdravković, On Her Pleasure: Naked Reading of Lacan~
Author: Lana Zdravković, Institut za umetničku produkciju i istraživanje Kitch, Ljubljana
www.kitch.si
)
Video was made in co-production of the Institute of Art Production and Research Kitch Ljubljana (www.kitch.org), festival City of Women Ljubljana (www.cityofwomen.org) and Multimedia - Performing Art Centre Skopje (www.multimedia.org.mk).
Video was presented on March 8th 2007 within the festival Red Dawns in Ljubljana(http://www.kudmreza.org/rdece/2007/ENGLISH/index.html) and on September 8th 2007 within the festival of women art Pitchwise in Sarajevo (http://pitchwise.fondacijacure.org).
Exhibition is open till 19.11.
OCTOBER
24.10. Friday, 8 pm
Commonplaces of Transition
A screening and talk by Joanne Richardson
Organized in collaboration with Biro for Culture and Communication
)
Joanne Richardson will present the collaborative video project Commonplaces of Transition and discuss some of the issues raised by the project, focusing on the 1989 revolution and post-communist "transition" in Romania and on the difference between political art and making art politically. The presentation will include a screening in full of In Transit and excerpts from Two or Three Things about Activism.
Commonplaces of Transition is a collaborative video project by D Media (Romania), in collaboration with Ak-Kraak (Germany), Interspace (Bulgaria) and K:SAK (Moldova). The aim of the project is to open up a critical dialogue about the shape of transition and other alternatives than simply "catching up" with the global market. The project has produced 8 videos on themes including the remapping of borders and identities, the transformation of labour and the evolution of activism.
In Transit (30 min, 2008) is a diary of a journey through space and time, composed of subjective impressions of the present and childhood memories of the past. While traveling across Romania in the year of its EU accession, the narrative reflects on the meaning of transition, the re-writing of history and the relation between images and memory.
Two or Three Things about Activism (73 min, 2008) is a counter-documentary based on a distinction once made by Godard between making a political film (a film about a political struggle) and making film politically. While 13 protagonists, from anarchist groups and environmentalists to NGOS, discuss activism in Romania and its historical context, the filmmaker reflects on her own motivations.
The talk will focus on aesthetics and politics, on strategies of counter-documentary and on what Godard meant by "making film politically," which has important implications for activist art. Making film politically means questioning the dominant forms of producing images and sounds, but also those of the "opposition." Today much activist art has become propaganda in reverse, a cheerleader for social movements that is devoid of self-reflection. The videos in the Commonplaces project attempt to find different forms of expression where art and resistance can meet, forms that question the automatisms that have become part of activism itself.
Joanne Richardson is living and working in Cluj (Romania) as a theorist, artist and program director of D Media (www.dmedia.ro). She is the editor of Subsol (subsol.c3.hu), a webzine on activist art and media theory, and of two books on digital culture. She has written essays on the radical left, experimental film, video activism, tactical media, free software, the myth of authorship and copyleft.
Her videos reflect an ongoing interest in globalization, nationalism and postcommunism, and manifest a critical perspective toward the status of documents, history and memory.
Commonplaces project: http://www.dmedia.ro/index-e.htm
Memoirs of a video activist: http://translate.eipcp.net/transversal/0307
Est-ethics of counter-documentary:
http://www.artmargins.com/content/feature/richardson.html
Bio and links to other texts:
http://subsol.c3.hu/subsol_2/contributors0/richardsonbio.html
26.09 - 09. 11.
49th October Salon, Belgrade
Artist-Citizen
Contextual Art Practices
)
Artists: Ana Adamović / Antea Arizanović / Reli Avrahami / Maja Bajević / Yael Bartana / Lutz Becker / Cristiano Berti / Pauline Boudry / Renate Lorenz / Dan Calin / Chto delat? / DAH teatar / Danica Dakić / Braco Dimitrijević / Lina Dokuzović / Andrej Đerković / Eva Filova / Kendell Geers / Girls on Horses / Kaspars Goba / Ion Grigorescu / Živko Grozdanić / Igor Grubić / Marina Gržinić / Aina Šmid / Driton Hajredini / h.arta / Ana Hoffner / International strike of artists / Fitore Isufi Koja / Sanja Iveković / Vladan Jeremić / Šejla Kamerić / Gülsün Karamustafa / Sigalit Landau / Wei Liu / Milovan Destil Marković / Nikoleta Marković / Dalibor Martinis / Goranka Matić / Mladen Miljanović / Monument Group / Damir Nikšić / New Collectivism / Tanja Ostojić / Vesna Pavlović / Dan Perjovschi / Tadej Pogačar / Darinka Pop-Mitić / Marta Popivoda / Zoran Popović / Danilo Prnjat / Nurhan Qehaja / Queer Belgrade
Collective / Jelena Radić / Eduard Freudmann / Oliver Ressler / Pipilotti Rist / Martha Rosler / Katya Sander / Judith Siegmund / Ivana Smiljanić / Sašo Stanojkovi? / Hito Steyerl / Mladen Stilinović / Branimir Stojanović / Saša Stojanović / Balint Szomabthy / Škart / Ilija Šoškić / Frank Thiel / Raša Todosijević / Jelena Tomašević / Milica Tomić / Ranko Travanj / Goran Trbuljak / Egbert Trogemann / Ulay / Gergelj Urkom / Valie Export / Katarina Zdjelar / Artur Zmijewski
Curator: Bojana Pejić
Assistents: Vida Knežević i Ivana Marjanović
More information about exhibition, venues and program http://www.oktobarskisalon.org
SEPTEMBER
26.09 - 09. 10
49th October Salon, Belgrade
Artist-Citizen
Contextual Art Practices
Artists: Ana Adamović / Antea Arizanović / Reli Avrahami / Maja Bajević / Yael Bartana / Lutz Becker / Cristiano Berti / Pauline Boudry / Renate Lorenz / Dan Calin / Chto delat? / DAH teatar / Danica Dakić / Braco Dimitrijević / Lina Dokuzović / Andrej Đerković / Eva Filova / Kendell Geers / Girls on Horses / Kaspars Goba / Ion Grigorescu / Živko Grozdanić / Igor Grubić / Marina Gržinić / Aina Šmid / Driton Hajredini / h.arta / Ana Hoffner / International strike of artists / Fitore Isufi Koja / Sanja Iveković / Vladan Jeremić / Šejla Kamerić / Gülsün Karamustafa / Sigalit Landau / Wei Liu / Milovan Destil Marković / Nikoleta Marković / Dalibor Martinis / Goranka Matić / Mladen Miljanović / Monument Group / Damir Nikšić / New Collectivism / Tanja Ostojić / Vesna Pavlović / Dan Perjovschi / Tadej Pogačar / Darinka Pop-Mitić / Marta Popivoda / Zoran Popović / Danilo Prnjat / Nurhan Qehaja / Queer Belgrade
Collective / Jelena Radić / Eduard Freudmann / Oliver Ressler / Pipilotti Rist / Martha Rosler / Katya Sander / Judith Siegmund / Ivana Smiljanić / Sašo Stanojkovi? / Hito Steyerl / Mladen Stilinović / Branimir Stojanović / Saša Stojanović / Balint Szomabthy / Škart / Ilija Šoškić / Frank Thiel / Raša Todosijević / Jelena Tomašević / Milica Tomić / Ranko Travanj / Goran Trbuljak / Egbert Trogemann / Ulay / Gergelj Urkom / Valie Export / Katarina Zdjelar / Artur Zmijewski
Curator: Bojana Pejić
Assistents: Vida Knežević i Ivana Marjanović
Program
Friday, September 26 2008, at 19:00
The opening ceremony and the presentation of the 49th October Salon awards
The May 25 Museum - the Museum of the History of Yugoslavia, Botićeva 6
21:00 - The Queer Belgrade Collective, Women at Work and Queeria
"Soldier" - based on interview with Boban Stojanović, script - Jet Moon
"Girl with Cigarettes" - in cooperation with Marija Savić, script - Jet Moon
"Techno-ballerinas", collage from the performance Transkitchen Rhythmic Therapy, Biljana Stanković-Lori and
Zoe Gudović, Women at Work
Saturday, September 27th 2008.
Beogradsko psihoanaliticko drustvo, Smederevska 9a
Opening of the archive of texts and publications written by N.M. Šugar
Every Saturday guided tour through archive by Branimir Stojanović
The May 25th Museum - the Museum of the History of Yugoslavia, Botićeva 6
17:00 - Guided tour of the exhibition by Bojana Pejić, curator of the 49th October Salon
18:00 - Ana Hoffner, Gazimestan 08, performance
The Monument Group, Matems of Reassociation:
19:00 - Dr Damir Arsenijević, cultural theorist and critic
Gender the Bone, lecture
The facade of the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, Kralja Milana 14
21:00 - Gergelj Urkom, Proposal for a Complete Society, projection
Sunday, September 28th
The Legacy House, Knez Mihailova 46
The Monument Group, Matems of Reassociation:
18:00 - Dr Jasmina Husanović, Senior Lecturer in Cultural Studies
Faculty of Philosophy, Tuzla University
The Regimes of Trauma Management and Therapeutic Justice on the Local/Global Boundaries of Traumatic
Nationalism/Capitalism: Towards an Emancipated Policy of Testifying, lecture
Tuesday, September 30th
The Legacy House, Knez Mihailova 46
The Monument Group, Matems of Reassociation:
18:00 - Šejla Šehabović, writer
Reading and discussing the story "Ruvejda"
More information about exhibition, spaces and program http://www.oktobarskisalon.org
19.09. Friday, 7:30 pm
Ana Hoffner, Panic: Perverted, performance
Intervention by Kontekst gallery in Queer Beograd festival
Place: Cultural Center Rex, Jevrejska 16
)
Expanded Cinema: In 1969 Valie Export enlarged the parameters of cinema with her body. She appeared in trousers that displayed her genitals in a cinema in Munich to show that the division between the stage/screen and the audience is not only a question of media but also a question of gender. As a feminist, Valie Export placed herself in opposition to men in order to establish a different point of view than that of the male viewer and female object. Today, engagement as the common subject "woman" has become difficult for many reasons. We see ourselves faced with the end of identity politics where being a woman is not enough. Global neoliberal capitalism has made phallocentrism its highest order. Raised to an abstract level, the power of the ONE (phallus) is reducing every antagonism to a set of differences that can be evacuated, controlled and normalized. The question is how to act in a world of abstraction and empty signs, how to find a position in a state of exception, where one is continuously watched and supervised.
Like Valie Export, I choose to include my own body in a media installation that provokes self-reflection. The audience is projected on to a square between my legs and is confronted with its own involvement within the closed circle of power. Who is allowed to watch and who is supposed to be under surveillance? If strategies of feminism have to be articulated for the present (and this is my intent) than it is necessary to put them into a broader setting of politics and histories. That means that "Panic: perverted" cannot remain a silent reconstruction of what happened 40 years ago. We have to ask even bigger questions like: Who is allowed to speak and take the position of an active subject?
Queer Beograd festival program:
http://eng.queerbeograd.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=52&Itemid=1
AUGUST
There are no programs in August.
JULY
09.07. Tuesday, 7 pm
Talk about Mangelos Award 2008
Participants: The winner, finalists and jury members
Winner: Ivan Petrović
Finalists: Marina Marković, Goran Micevski, Andrijana Palašti and Ivana Smiljanić
07.07.-31.07.
Poster campaign
Land of Human Rights
Artistic analyses and visions of the human rights situation in europe
Artists for the 2nd campaign: bankleer (Berlin), Miklós Erhardt & Dominic Hislop (Budapest), Tadej Pogačar (Ljubljana), Alexandros Georgiou and Jennifer Nelson, in collaboration with ITYS, Institute for Contemporary Art and Thought, Athens and Konate Mamadou and Theophile
Yerbanga.
)
Land of Human Rights is a project dealing with the status quo of the human rights in Europe seen from the perspective of visual art, which will also work on the issue in an analytical and visionary manner. Over a period of three years the discourse on human rights in Europe will be disseminated in the general public with the means of art. The discussion shall purposely be based on issues "in front of one's own door" or "inside one's own house". The planned activities are supposed to reach a broad audience and shall make us aware of the following fact: In many respects the observance of human rights is not guaranteed in Europe too!
One integral part of the long-term project Land of Human Rights is a poster campaign that will be realized in the KONTEKST gallery as well. Starting in September 2007, a set of 4 posters will be printed every half a year. The front side of the posters will present works of artists and on the back side there will be short texts of theorists or human rights activists who will thematize current human rights issues.
The aim of the campaign is to inform the people about their rights in connection with the human rights and to raise awareness of current human rights issues in a large part of the population.
Land of Human Rights is developed and organized by < rotor > association for contemporary art Graz, Austria in cooperation with 5 countries - Slovenia, Croatia, Germany, Czech Republic, Hungary.
Posters are for free! They can be taken away every working day from 4pm till 8 pm in KONTEKST Gallery.
http://www.landofhumanrights.eu/
JUNE
19.06. Thursday, 7 pm
Presentation of artists participationg in exhibitions 1/1 and BUG
)
Exhibitions 1/1 (Kontekst Gallery, june 2007) and BUG (Kontekst Gallery, june 2008) are exhibitions of the Belgrade Fine Arts Academy students who took part in the workshops in the intermedia art subject by professor Zoran Todorovic.
Download catalogue 969 KB
03.06. Tuesday 8 pm
Woo and Remarcable Bob
concert
)
WoO is an experimental guitarist from Belgrade with unique approach to his instrument. He uses electric guitar as a receiver of various signals that are broadcasted from different "everyday" devices such as mobile phones, remote controls, various computer equipment, radio and others. WoO released Mobi Rock album last year for slovenian electronic label RX:TX and got positive reviews around the World (The Wire magazine, Unijazz Magazine etc.). This year, he released an album called Come Blue for A.Star Recordings from USA, and it will be available for purchase at the concert. With his friend and visual
artist Incredible Bob, he performed a lot of shows in Belgrade (Dis-patch, Soundscapes, Improve @ Distrikt, CZKD, REX, Dom Kulture...), Ljubljana (Relax - split show with Fennesz, Trn Fest), Zagreb ( Mars Festival ) and Berlin ( Salon Bruit ). WoO & Incredible Bob will perform new material in Kontekst gallery. Incredible Bob will be playing cymbals, gong, bicycle wheel and various objects and WoO will play electric guitar and various electronic devices.
06.06. Friday 7 pm
BUG exhibition opening
Exhibition of the Belgrade Fine Arts Academy students - workshop on the intermedia art subject
Exhibition is open till 20. 06.
Download catalogue 969 KB
MAY
15.05. Thursday at 7 pm
Control and Resistance on the Street
exhibition opening
Curators: Marko Miletić, Srđan Prodanović
Participants: Danilo Prnjat, Dušan Rajić, Szu-Szu galerija, Alban Muja, Ilegalni poslastičari, Građanska inicijativa Peti park, Miloš Čvorić,Darinka Popmitić
)
Control and Resistance on the Street project tends to pinpoint certain mechanisms by which public space is constituted; meaning overlapping of control and resistance as well as extensive relations of power formed within social perception of "public space". Within this conceptual framework, phenomena of otherwise "marginal relevance" gain significance, and in a way open possibilities for different handling of problems which are, mainly and without any probable cause, misinterpreted in local context.
Social reality of the 20th Century is marked by increased rationality, and simultaneously public space is subjected to interests of numerous social groups that tend to identify consumption with egalitarian principle within their newly acquired social rights. Availability and consumption of space became responsibilities of various kinds of experts; increasing, in a way, the complicity of public space policy. However, latent outcome of this process was deconstruction of the centralised structure of power, so that individual involvement within the public space includes a chain of self-disciplinary techniques usually legitimised by the principle of integration as well as by common request for greater safety. Hence, the conditions of consumption and interaction on the street are determined by adoption of various "self-techniques" within the new dispersive and shifting structure of power. Now the control is mainly manifested symbolically and has to remind the individual of the omnipresence of the System. The situation in post-communist societies is, therefore, more confusing because within the public space different visions of social structure are interwoven; analogically these visions imply different understandings of the nature of the public space and therefore, every action is more or less political.
According to Foucault, the analysis of power relations requires great theoretical caution, for due to aforementioned dispersive character of power in contemporary society, there is always a danger that our opinion is already determined by some discourse. Nevertheless, it is important to mention that, according to this author, the freedom (of opinion) is not in avoiding this determination (which is however impossible) but in making personal efforts in decoding the nature and mechanisms of this determination. Even so, it is clear that this kind of "revelation" does not appear from nowhere; it requires a mediator, someone or something to move us to start "taking care of ourselves" in aforementioned way. This is the exact role of "marginal phenomena" (that is the initiatives of various social groups and individuals in resistance to the System). They tell us their wild and untamed history which reveals the shifting structure of power and control by its radical "incorrectness" and resistance. Therefore, our experience with "marginal phenomena" is more than ironical and superficial politicisation of certain subject; this experience is absolutely necessary in today's world in order to know ourselves and take care of ourselves.
Following works will be presented: Danilo Prnjat, Red; Dušan Rajić, The place is under survaillenc; Szu-Szu gallery, Star; Alban Muja, Citty for turists; Ilegalni poslastičari, Salvador Dali corner; citizens initiative Fift park; Darinka Popmitić, restauration of mural in front of SKC Belgrade; Miloš Čvorić, action Bulevard AVNOJ. Also following artefacts will be presented: CCTV cameras in front of gallery whit projection inside exhibition space, collection of boards whit streat names.
The exhibition is open till 01.06.
Download katalog 516 KB
06.05., Tuesday, 7 pm
Projection of the film In the Midst of the Malestream
Director: Helke Sander
Intro: Natalja Kyaw
Organization: KONTEKST galerija, WOMEN AT WORK and Goethe institute in Beolgrade
)
www.kontekstgalerija.org
http://www.zenergija.org/
APRIL
24.04., Thursday, 7 pm
Projection of the film The Subjective Factor
Director: Helke Sander
Intro: Marijana Stojčić
Organization: KONTEKST galerija, WOMEN AT WORK and Goethe institute in Beolgrade
)
www.kontekstgalerija.org
http://www.zenergija.org/
http://www.awin.org.yu
http://www.goethe.de/INS/cs/bel/uun/srindex.htm
FEBRUARY/MARCH
PRESS CONFERENCE
MEDIJA CENTAR, Wednesday, 13 February, 2008. at 12 h
Milentija Popovića 9 (Sava Centar)
TOPIC
Freedom of thinking and expressing - violent prevention of the opening of exhibition "Exception"
ORGANIZATION
Cultural workers, Napon and Kontekst gallery
PRESS RELEASE/PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT
Exhibition "Exception / Contemporary art scene from Prishtine", that was planed to be exhibited in Kontekst Gallery in Cultural Centre "Stari Grad" in Belgrade from 7th of February until 15th of February, was closed because of police valuation that safety of visitors and organizers was jeopardized. Therefore exhibition will not be opened in planned terms. During the opening of the exhibition organized group stopped opening of the exhibition by violent means and also destroyed artistic work "Face to face" by artist Dren Maliqi.
Exhibition "Exception / Contemporary arts scene from Prishtine" was exhibited in Museum of Contemporary Art Vojvodina in Novi Sad, from 22 nd of January until 5th of February without incidents. Organizers of exhibition are organizations "Kontekst" from Belgrade and Institute for Flexible Cultures and Technologies - Napon from Novi Sad.
We invite Ministry of Culture of Republic of Serbia and Secretariat for Culture of City of Belgrade to react and publicly condemn this violent act and allow exhibition "Exception" to be exhibited in this moment when democracy, tolerance and openness of Belgrade and Serbia are most needed.
Curators:
Vida Knezevic, Kristian Lukic, Ivana Marjanovic and Gordana Nikolic
www.kontekstgalerija.org
www.napon.org
PETITION FOR REOPENING OF THE EXHIBITION
We are forwarding petition initiated by interested citizens, cultural workers and artists.
....
On the following link you can sign the petition for opening of the exhibition Petition for opening of the exhibition "Exception/Contemporary Art Scene From Pristina" that was planned to be exhibited in Kontekst Gallery in Centre for Culture Old Town in Belgrade from 7th until 15th of February, and was censored through closing of the event even before it was opened. This happened due to violence expressed by nazi-clerical organisations.
Petition is directed to Ministry of Culture of Republic of Serbia, Secretariat for Culture of City of Belgrade, as a demand for express and direct support to the organizers for opening of this exhibition.
http://www.petitiononline.com/odstupi/petition.html
This petition is the initiative of interested citizens, cultural workers and artists that consider that state institutions cannot allow nazi-clerical organizations to lead cultural politics of one state.
VIDEO CLIPS OF THE VIOLATION OF THE EXHIBITION OPENING
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v
PUBLIC SUPPORT FOR THE EXHIBITION REOPENING:
Ministarstvo kulture Republike Srbije
Sekretarijat za kulturu and Grad Beograd
Koalicija protiv diskriminacije:
Anti Trafiking Centar
Centar za unapređivanje pravnih studija
Gayten-LGBT
Gej strejt alijansa
Inicijativa mladih za ljudska prava
Inicijativa za inkluziju VelikiMali
Labris - organizacija za lezbejska ljudska prava
Mreža Odbora za ljudska prava u Srbiji
Švedski helsinški komitet za ljudska prava
Udruženje studenata sa hendikepom
Žene u crnom, Beograd
Komitet pravnika za ljudska prava , Beograd
Centar za kulturnu dekontaminaciju, Beograd
Fond za humanitarno pravo, Beograd
Incest trauma centar, Beograd
Glas razlike, Beograd
Rekonstrukcija ženski fond, Beograd
Inicijativa mladih za ljudska prava, Beograd
Helsinški odbor za ljudska prava, Beograd
Škart, Beograd
Mreža Žena u crnom Srbije : Boljevac, Bor, Vranje, Vrbas, Vlasotince, Velika Plana, Zaječar, Kikinda, Kraljevo, Kruševac, Leskovac, Novi Sad, Novi Bečej, Novi Pazar, Niš, Pančevo, Preševo.
Druga scena
Društvo istoričara umetnosti Srbije (DIUS)
Kulturni centar REX
"Građanska Vojvodina" (Nezavisno društvo novinara Vojvodine, NVO Centar za regionalizam, Helsinški odbor za ljudska prava u Srbiji, Građanski fond "Panonija", NVO "Otvoreni licej" iz Sombora i Građanska akcija iz Pančeva).
______________________________________________________________________
Statement issued on February 10, 2008
STATEMENT OF SUPPORT FOR ARTISTS, CURATORS and INSTITUTIONS involved in the exhibition EXCEPTION: Contemporary art scene from Prishtina, scheduled to be open on the 7.02.2008 in Belgrade, Kontekst Gallery
The statement is a reaction to the fact that the exhibition EXCEPTION,
Contemporary art scene from Prishtina (Kosova) that was scheduled to open
on 7 February 2008 (and to be on display until 15 February 2008) at KONTEKST
Gallery in Belgrade WAS FORCED TO CLOSE JUST BEFORE THE OPENING.
The Serbian police that had to intervene just before the opening as they
estimated that they cannot guarantee safety to the curators and
the public, after an organized group of Serbian nationalist forces
attacked the gallery space and even destroyed Dren Maliqi's work Face to
face.
The artists taking part in the exhibition are Artan Balaj, Jakup Ferri, Driton Hajredini, Flaka Haliti, Fitore Isufi Koja, Dren Maliqi, Alban Muja, Vigan Nimani, Nurhan Qehaja, Alketa Xhafa and Lulzim Zeqiri
On 8 February 2008, the curators of the project Vida Knezevic, Kristian
Lukic, Ivana Marjanovic and Gordana Nikolic asked PUBLICLY the Ministry of
culture of Serbia and the city of Belgrade to react firmly against such
nationalist forces in order to protect the exhibition in the
future. The curators insist on the right to present the project in Belgrade
in the near future.
On 8 February, these violent nationalist forces attacked again, they threw
stones in the windows of the KONTEKST gallery and broke them and as well they destroyed gallery's sign on the door.
All of us signed under this statement are expressing our support TO ARTISTS,
CURATORS and INSTITUTIONS involved in the exhibition EXCEPTION:
Contemporary art scene from Prishtina.
We ask the Serbian Government and the governmental bodies of the Serbian
Ministry of Culture as well as the Belgrade city council and city
institutions to ACT and PROTECT (in accordance with the law) the artists,
curators and institutions involved in the organization of the exhibition
project. Also, we apply to these bodies to ask for the SUPPORT and help in
organizing the reopening of the project and to allow an open non violent
platform discussion on the topic.
The exhibition is an important project by the young generation in Serbia who
is willing to see, discuss and understand historical and current relations
between Serbia and Kosova.
The exhibition was presented previously at the Museum of Contemporary Art
Vojvodina, Novi Sad (22.01 - 05.02.2008). The exhibition is a joint effort
of two organizations Kontekst, Belgrade, and Napon, Novi Sad.
THE SIGNED STATEMENT WILL BE SEND TO ARTISTS, CURATORS AND INSTITUTIONS INVOLVED IN THE PROJECT, TO SERBIAN'S GOVERMENTAL BODIES, BELGRADE CITY COUNCIL'S BODIES and SERBIAN MASS MEDIA.
SIGNATURES:
1. Rosa Reitsamer, gallery aRtmosphere, Vienna
2. Marina Grzinic, artist and researcher, Ljubljana, Vienna
3. Manuela Schreibmaier, gallery aRtmosphere, Vienna
4. Laszlo Najmanyi, writer, artist, New York, Budapest
5. Tanja Passoni, freelance translator, Ljubljana
6. Zoya Kocur, professor, Department of Art and Art Professions, New York University
7. Sebastjan Leban, artist and theoretician
8. Razvan Ion, editor Pavilion magazine, Bucharest
9. Eugen Radescu, director Bucharest Biennale
10. Staš Kleindienst, artist and theoretician
11. Reartikulacija, artistic-political-theoretical-discursive platform
12. Eva Khachatrian, curator and art critic, Yerevan/Armenia
13. Johanna Schaffer, translator, teacher, writer, Vienna
14. Louisa Avgita, art historian and theoretician
15. Geert Lovink, media theorist and net critic
16. Gabrijela Ivanov, Expanse of Gender and Media Culture 'Common Zone', Zagreb
17. Ricarda Denzer, artist, Vienna
18. Sebastian Bodirsky, filmmaker, Berlin
19. Claudia Reiche, theoretician, artist, curator, Hamburg
20. Catherine Quéloz Professor, University of Art and Design, Geneva
21. Pier Luigi Capucci, theoretician and teacher
22. Felix Vogel, curator and theoretician, Kassel
23. Reni Hofmueller, activist, artist, ESC Graz
24. Alexander Nikolic, artist and activist
25. Sabine Breitwieser, Vienna
26. María José Belbel Bullejos, researcher, Spain
27. Tanja Ostojic, Artist/ cultural activist, Belgrade/Berlin
28. Ljubomir Bratic, philosopher and curator, Vienna
29. Eva Moschitz, photographer, Vienna
30. Jasmina Jankovic, freelance translator, Vienna
31. Joanna Hoffmann, artist and academic
32. Martina Hochmuth, Tanzquartier, Vienna
33. Goran Petrovic, freelance curator, Beograd, Brussels
34. Anca Daucikova, artist and teacher, Bratislava
35. Joeri Smet, theatre maker, Brussels
36. Karl Ingar Roys, artist
37. Biljana Marinkovic, artist and activist, Belgrade
38. David Rych, artist, Berlin
39. Dejan Atanackovic, artist, Belgrade / Florence
40. Anna Balint, curator, Budapest
41. Anja Kovacs, researcher, Delhi/India
42. Jan Ritsema/Association PAF, St Erme Outre et Ramecourt, France
43. Ines Garnitschnig, psychologist, Vienna
44. Katarina Popovic, designer and visual artist, Belgrade
45. Aleksandar Covic, IT marketing professional, Belgrade
46. Katharina Prinzenstein, feminist researcher, scientist, equal rights office worker, Vienna
47. Michael Blum, artist, New York-Vienna
48. Claire Daudin, artist, France
49. Irene Hana, editor, Vienna
50. Kirsten Forkert, artist, writer and researcher, London
51. Oliver Ressler, artist and film-maker, Vienna
52. Beatrice Leanza, Beijing, art writer, researcher and curator
53. Corrado Folinea, artist and lawyer, Napoli/Italy
54. Emma Hedditch, artist and writer, London
55. Vlatka Frketic, Diskursiv - Association for Queering the Society, Vienna & Zagreb
56. Virginia Villaplana, artist and independent cultural producer
57. Margarethe Makovec, < rotor >, Graz, Austria,
58. Anton Lederer, < rotor >, Graz, Austria
59. Sonja Hofstetter, < rotor >, Graz, Austria
60. Karin Schagerl, < rotor >, Graz, Austria
61. Gulsen Bal, curator, writer, London, Vienna
62. Nino Jaeger, artist and freelance media educator, Vienna, Berlin
63. Romana Hagyo, artist, Vienna
64. Sophie Eliot, PhD, freelance curator, Berlin
65. Anca Gyemant, h.arta, artist collective, Timisoara, Romania
66. Rodica Tache, h.arta, artist collective, Timisoara, Romania
67. Maria Crista, h.arta, artist collective, Timisoara, Romania
68. Inge Manka, architect, Vienna
69. Anthony Gardner, Lecturer and writer, Melbourne/Sydney, Australia
70. Franco Torriani
71. Geska Helena Andersson, artist, Kista/Sweden
72. Florian Malzacher, co-programmer Steirischer Herbst Festival, Graz
73. Lisl Ponger, artist, Vienna
74. Dmitry Vilensky, editor of Chto Delat newspaper St. Petersburg
75. Monika Szewczyk, Galeria Arsenał, Białystok, Poland
76. Thomas Campbell, writer and translator, St. Petersburg
77. Richard de Boer, De Balie - Centre for culture and Politics, Amsterdam/The Netherlands
78. Vincenza Perilli, Italy
79. Ilina Koralova, curator, Leipzig
80. Jesse Birch, curator, Amsterdam
81. Marta Deskur artist, Cracow, Poland,
82. Leila Cmajcanin, artist, Sarajevo
83. Marta Deskur artist, Krakow, Poland
84. Ruth Weismann, student-artist , Vienna
85. Aleksandra Petkova, artist-sculptor, R. Macedonia
86. Mario Strk
87. Raphaël Grisey, artist, Paris,
88. Andreas Fogarasi, artist, Vienna
89. Piotr Krajewski, Artistic Director, International Media Art Biennale WRO
90. Zbigniew Libera, artist, Praha, CZ / PL
91. Grzegorz Klaman artist, media art proffesor, president Wyspa Progress Foundation Gdansk Poland
92. Mariola Przyjemska, artist, Praha, CZ / PL
93. Elke Boon, artist, Ghent, Belgium
94. Pai Dusi (progettozero+), artist and curator, Venezia, Italy
95. Gon Zifroni, spatial designer, Metahaven.net, Brussels
96. Justin McKeown, (SPART Action group) Artist, Researcher, Belfast, Northern Ireland
97. Marco Baravalle, researcher and curator (S.A.L.E. Docks - independent art space), Venezia, Italy
98. Krzysztof Czyzewski, Borderland Foundation, Sejny, Poland
99. Tshiung Han See
100. Alessandro Bertoncello (progettozero+), Venice, Italy, artist and curator
101. Sigrid Gareis, artistic direction Tanzquartier, Vienna
102. Lotta Rüger, student, Maastricht
103. Vladimir Todorovic, Singapore, isea2008.org, artist
104. Fedja Klikovac, Handel Street Projects, London
105. BBB Johannes Deimling, Port Performance, Berlin, Germany
106. Angelika Fojtuch, Port Performance, Gdynia, Poland
107. Michael Lumb, artist and educator, Ipswich, England
108. Francesco Fonassi, student-artist, Venezia
109. Esther Straganz, Vienna
110. Tea Hvala, writer and activist
111. Monica Restrepo, artist, Lugar a dudas, Colombia
112. Sally Mizrachi, Lugar a dudas Coordinator, Colombia
113. Anna Ehrlemark, student and activist
114. Biljana Marinkovic, artist and activist, Belgrade
115. Goran Djordjevic, artist, Belgrade/ New York
116. Natasa Kokic, artist, Belgrade
117. Azucena Vieites, artist
118. Gita Hashemi, Artist, Curator, Writer, Adjunct Faculty, York University, Editorial Board, Fuse Magazine, Canada
118. Walter Seidl, curator, artist, Vienna
119. Dr. Matthew Fuller, David Gee Reader in Digital Media, Centre for Cultural Studies Goldsmiths College, University of London
120. Antonia Majaca, g-mk | galerija miroslav kraljevic, Zagreb, Croatia
121. Ivana Bago, g-mk | galerija miroslav kraljevic, Zagreb, Croatia
122. Tamas St.Auby, IPUT/NETRAF, Hungarian Fine Art University
123. Shuddhabrata Sengupta (Artist and Writer, Raqs Media Collective), Delhi
124. Naeem Mohaiemen, artist, Dhaka, Bangladesh
125. Cosmin Costinas, theoretician and curator, Vienna/Paris
126. Federica Timeto ( Italy)
127. Francesco Paolo Marineo ( Italy)
128. Marko Stamenkovic, curator
129. Marcin Lodyga, artist, theoretician and curator, Poland
130. Jasmina Metwaly, artist and curator, Poland
131. Vladimir Umanets, artist and curator, Poland
132. Maria Puig de la Bellacasa, Marie Curie Research Fellow, Philosophy Department,
Université Libre de Bruxelles
133. Duba Sambolec, Artist & Prof. of Fine Art
134. Stefanie Busch, artist, Dresden, Germany
135. artists space "7.Stock", Dresden, Germany
136. Georgie Gruber, queer activist, Vienna
137. Ursula Scherrer, New York
138. Nicolas Vass, artist
139. Nina Höchtl, artist, Vienna and Mexico City
140. Pery Bard
141. Lee Mayr
142. Pauline von Bonsdorff, professor, Helsinki/Jyväskylä ( Finland)
143. Christiane Erharter, program culture, ERSTE Foundation, Vienna/Austria
144. Veronica Kaup-Hasler, Director, Steirischer Herbst Festival, Graz
145. Franziska Sauerbrey, sauerbrey | raabe, büro für kulturelle angelegenheiten, Berlin
146. Anton Koslov, Associate Professor, American Graduate School, Paris
147. NextGENDERation, transnational European feminist network
148. Carolee Schneemann, artist, New York
149. Robert Atkins
150. Svetlana Mintcheva, Ph.D.Director Arts Program National Coalition Against Censorship, USA
151. Alexandra Ganser, assistant professor, cultural studies, Erlangen / Vienna
152. Eduard Freudmann, artist, Vienna/Belgrade
153. Zoran Petrovski - curator, Museum of Contemporary Art Skopje
154. Alex Villar, artist, New York
155. Maja Pan, human rights activist, Ljubljana
Status on 12.02.2008
__________________________________________________________________________________
07.02. Thursday at 7 pm
EXCEPTION
Contemporary art scene from Prishtina
exhibitions / panel discussions / presentations / publications
Exhibition opening in KONTEKST Gallery
)
Artists: Artan Balaj / Jakup Ferri / Driton Hajredini / Flaka Haliti / Fitore Isufi Koja / Dren Maliqi / Alban Muja / Vigan Nimani / Nurhan Qehaja / Alketa Xhafa / Lulzim Zeqiri
Curators: Vida Knežević (Belgrade), Kristian Lukić (Novi Sad), Ivana Marjanović (Vienna/Belgrade), Gordana Nikolić (Novi Sad)
The exhibition represents a segment of the production of young artists from Prishtina which emerged during specific social, cultural, economic and political contexts of the contemporary Kosovo. The exhibition is about questioning dominant cultural hegemonies, national and gender identities in the field of visual art which are defined by Balkan particularities, doctrines of limited sovereignty, conflicts of global security alliances, nationalisms, conditions and consequences of Euro-Atlantic integrations and strengthening of neo-liberal capitalism.
Production and organization
Institute for Flexible Culture and Technologies - Napon, Novi Sad
Kontekst, Belgrade
Co-production and co-organization:
Rhizoma, Prishtina
The project is supported by Pro Helvetia Belgrade, European Cultural Foundation, Youth Initiative for Human Rights, Cultural Centre "Stari Grad" and Museum of Contemporary Art of Vojvodina, Novi Sad.
The exhibition was planed to be open from 07.02. till 15.02.
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