FRICTION

Belgrade City Library – Gallery Atrium

Friction

A Judeo-Christian view of the West is characterized by the belief that history has an objective or at least a direction. Conversely, the understanding of history in non-Western cultures and inPre-Socraticopinion was determined by the cyclical idea of eternal return. Then, the Enlightenment changed the idea of the time flow…..

Georg G.Iggers: Historiography in the Twentieth Century.

Friction is a multimedia exhibition resulting from the experimental film Friction[1](premiered at the 65^th edition of The March Festival – Belgrade Documentary and Short Film Festival, 2018).

The idea of this exhibition is to transgress the line between certain media, where the content would flow from one medium into another, while constantly emphasizing the threshold between them.

It is a postmodern process which draws the basic content into several directions, diversifying it, where each branch still belongs to the source, but is at the same time a new conceptual and thought form with its own narrative and its own artistic identity. By examining the narrative as well as the abstractness of the form, this exhibition accentuates the multitude of interpretation of the works themselves and the diversity of experience in the observer.

A symbolic intent permeates throughout the film - different circular forms which suggest the continuity of the time flow through cyclical processes. Through works in the artistic form, the time flow itself is reduced to abstract images, which have no beginning or end (as features defining the abstraction), however,micro manifestations may be perceived in them, which, by their presence, deconstruct the entire idea of Absolute-abstraction, placing the movie and artistic manifestations emerging from it in an ambivalent and interactive relationship. By building a boundary zone, open to all types of interpretation and reading, the boundary zone of indeterminacy, this exhibition emphasizes that the only valid gravity point is our own individual experience, the viewpoint which participates in the transmutation of consciousness and helps us to see reality in a completely new and extraordinary way.

Such a view allows for a wide array of expressive means and experimental complexity by examining the stylistic crossing of abstract and figural (real) elements and not relating to one expressive style only. By establishing the framework of the inner system, this exhibition seeks to develop the language capable of causing various paths of penetration into an inert everyday life, thus creating a language system through which the effects of deconstruction, nominalism, recycling, permeation and eclecticism pervade.

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[1]The film Friction, through various formal manifestations and their simultaneous perception, refers to the very process of perception and re-examination (of the perception process) through different thinking systems.

THE METAMORPHOSIS OF THE BLACK GODDESS

 The Cultural Centre/ Kovin

THE METAMORPHOSIS OF THE BLACK GODDESS

The eye, which Stevenson so wonderfully calls a treat for cannibals, for us is such a disturbing object that we will never bite it...^[1]

The cycle of paintings THE METAMORPHOSIS OF THE BLACK GODDESS is the sequel and further elaboration of the cycle The Black Goddess in Pompeii, in which I dealt with the existence of the mythical Black Goddess, which is present in different civilizations and religions, in different shapes through the entire human history (Through the return to the narrative, I tried to deconstruct the creation of the myth, and to base that myth on personal fiction. The research on the Black Goddess combines fiction and facts in order to relativize any common ground in the interpretation of history, which is not inclined towards repeated reassessments and changing).

By elaborating the cycle The Black Goddess in Pompeii, I have reached space-images on a formal level, which build their existence in three dimensions with specific material artefacts built into them.

Each of the built-in materials (nails, apples, ceramic eyes, chestnuts, chess figures and boards, parts of sewing machines, pieces of ceramics) has its own precise symbolic value and a precise place of installation, but it is important to stress that all the artifacts have a double, ambivalent role. The first one involves supporting the narrative flow on a symbolic level, and the second one to use their existence to break the illusionistic concept of the painting, emphasizing the physical conditioning of the space and factual matter, all the while relativizing the line between illusion and reality.

Space images refer to several concepts in modern art (ready-made, counter-reliefs), in order to also be perceived as postmodern products that problematize the relationship between modernist research and the narrative in visual arts.

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[1] Ž. Bataj, The Documents 1929

  

 Novi Sad – Shock Cooperatives Central Gallery

Ambient installation:

THE TREAD

The ambient installation THE TREAD consists of 1000 breads laid on the floor. QUICKLIME is poured over the breads. The visitor is meant to walk over the breads in order to pass from one room into another, or to cross over from one end of the room to another.

THE TREAD marks the space that bases its visual existence on a blend of simple elements, BREADS[i] AND QUICKLIME[ii] (the elements that are not deprived of their deep symbolic values).

The amalgamation of these elements and the act of crossing over the final product of this amalgamation allows for a wide spectrum of meanings, emotional states and readings, depending on the discourse used to approach this work (psychological, mythically-ceremonious, ecological, historical, philosophical, socially-engaged).

-          Quicklime is the personification of the Libido that is penetrating the Unconscious (Breads, Mother, Earth), for the purpose of self-actualization. Since the mother represents the unconscious, the tendency towards incest in fact represents the demand of the unconscious to be taken into consideration. Refusing this demand usually has negative consequences, which are manifested through a destructive act. By crossing over the blend of breads and quicklime, the visitor physically participates in self-actualization and personal individuation on a symbolic level.

-          Through a mythical reflection, we can perceive the covering of the breads with quicklime, as an act of taming of the unconscious, and the destructive potential (Earth), all for the sake of permanent fertility which is the primary condition of existence.

-          From an ecological standpoint, the blend represents a destructive product, the exploatation of resources (Earth, Nature) in which the human race perpetually participates, conserving its acts with the symbolic quicklime, accentuating the destrictive raod we take over and over every day.

-          The socially-engaged aspect of this work refers to the personal story of the author. Every day, I pass by two Roma men who sell sacks filled withold bread and quicklimein plastic bags on the fringes of the farmer's market. By creating this work, they would be the unwitting participants of the project, because the bread and quicklime would be bought from them, which would improve their situation on an economical level, but on a content-engaged level, the attention would be directed towards people who make their living and base their existence on this sort of work, on a wide social scale of existence. I am fully aware that this does not solve the problem, but at least this act makes their presence visible and socially polemical.

The value of this work is reflected in its multitude of meanings, both on the level of content and on the level of form. This work can be perceived as an ambient instalation, a specific Ready-MADE, but also as a performance.

The entire work offers an indication of a story, but it still remains solely on the level of indication.

The place of synthesis of the story can only be the observer (participant), and the manner in which this synthesis occurs depends solely on it (the act of observation, participation-walking).

This work to a large extent insists on a specific type of perception, which is defined by the entire ambiance, and acts as a carrier of specific messages, which are translated form a visual language into a language of everyday experience.

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[i] Bread is a symbol of essential food, a symbol of spiritual transformation. The Christian liturgy speaks of the holy bread of eternal life.

[ii]Quicklime is the material used in construction, but in this case, quicklime is seen as the material whose purpose is usually the decontamination of mass graves, especially in the history of the 20^th century, ever since the Spanish Civil War, World War II, all the way to the last conflicts in the territory of the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY). Its symbolism is in the role of decomposition, which gives this work a unique energy.