new media center_kuda.org

In framework of the project POLITICAL PRACTICES OF (POST-) YUGOSLAV ART there are two exhibitions currently opened in Novi Sad, Serbia:

- TV GALLERY
- APPLIED PUBLIC

Museum of Contemporary Art of Vojvodina, Dunavska 37, Novi Sad

Photo documentation of the TV GALLERY exhibition in Novi Sad: http://www.kuda.org/?q=en/tvgallery_ns

Photo documentation of the APPLIED PUBLIC exhibition in Novi Sad:
http://www.kuda.org/?q=en/applied_public

Project initiators and exhibition curators:
New Media Center_kuda.org (Novi Sad), www.kuda.org
Prelom kolektiv (Belgrade), www.prelomkolektiv.org
SCCA/Pro.ba (Sarajevo), www.scca.ba, www.pro.ba
WHW (Zagreb), www.whw.hr

Co-organizers of the exhibition in Novi Sad:
Museum of Contemporary Art of Vojvodina, www.msuv.org
Napon – Institute for flexible culture and technologies, www.napon.org

TV GALLERY
Curator and art historian Dunja Blazevic ran a gallery of Student's Cultural Center in Belgrade during the 1970ies and profiled it into a space open to artistic experiments, new media and critical perspectives, strong international cooperation and collaboration among the artists in the cities of the former Yugoslavia. In 1981 she became the editor of contemporary art segment in the TV shows "Friday at 22" and "Other Art" at the national TV station TV Belgrade. These series grew into regular monthly show entitled TV GALLERY, which was broadcasted on the Yugoslav TV network from 1984 - 1991. TV GALLERY represents important document of interdisciplinary, socially engaged artistic and curatorial practice and it is unsurpassed example of a public TV concept and art's place within it.

Reasons for an exhibition about a TV show from the second half of the 1980ies are multiple and concern the media itself (TV medium and medium of gallery exhibition) as much as the content (contemporary art in its broadened sense that emerged in the 1970ies), as well as their interrelation in the context of culture, culture policy and culture practices of what is today called an era of "decadent Yugoslav socialism" of the 1980ies in the 20th century.

Emergence of TV GALLERY in the medium of television in the Yugoslav context in a certain way was made possible by contemporary art of the 70ies and 80ies, characterized by the ideas of democratization, perception and production of contemporary art (such as activities of number of artists within the so called 'new art practice'), abandoning of traditional artistic spaces and traditional artistic media, tactical use of media, participation, collectivity and change of the author's status. Television was understood as "natural" media surrounding for video art, and gallery presentation of video was a considered a second-best solution. Today, that idea, or hope, is almost completely abolished and forgotten.

TV shows of Dunja Blazevic dealt with broad understanding of contemporary art (from historical avant-garde to conceptual art and so called new artistic practice, video art, design, comics, and literature as well...), were not limited by "genre", show duration was not always the same, the choice of music was obviously influenced by then still current "new wave". Shows are interesting as a symptom not only of cultural and artistic scenes of that period in Yugoslavia, but also of public television, society and the state in which these projects were possible. Today the preserved tapes of these shows could be viewed as materialized remaining of an ideology, that clearly show how these experiments are unacceptable in contemporary media space of public television, where they would be formally and content-wise considered as elitist, noncommercial, uninteresting.

Out of this ensues a paradoxical fact that the TV shows aiming at mass media public today can return only in a 'closed', 'elitist' space of a white cube gallery. In the world of Big Brother and programmed social oblivion, 'obsolete' media space of a gallery reaffirms itself as one of a rare spaces of freedom and experiment, a place of reminiscence that social and media reality are not unambiguously marked with politics nor economy. Although socio-political context enabled these shows, nothing would have happened without initiative, creativity, and even boldness of editors, redactors, directors and artists that produced the shows and had clear ideas about theory and ideology of media, art and personal action.

The exhibition TV GALLERY is the first showing of the program after Dunja Blazevic stopped working at TV Beograd at the end of 1990. The exhibition is already held in Zagreb in December 2007, and TV GALLERY will be presented in Sarajevo (May 2008) and in Belgrade (June-July 2008).

TV material is on loan from the archive of Radio Television of Belgrade.

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APPLIED PUBLIC
Sanja Ivekovic, Maj 75, Dalibor Martinis, Goran Trbuljak
curators: WHW, Zagreb

The exhibition APPLIED PUBLIC is being formed around very close congenial and generational artistic positions of Sanja Iveković, Dalibor Martinis, Goran Trbuljak and the artistic group called Grupa Šestorice. Activities of this generation had begun within the so called “new artistic practice” of the 70ties, that in search for the new means of production and presentation of artworks redefined the status of the art and ways of mediation between the artist and the public raising questions about the “autonomy” of the museum/gallery system, role and work of public institutions and public space and inaugurated participatory model of work with tactical use of different media. Establishing a relation between the work of these artists and the exhibition “TV Gallery” that thematises series of tv shows by Dunja Blažević, exhibition APPLIED PUBLIC is trying to, from the artistic perspective, reflect on series of even today current questions concerned with the relation between medium of video and television in the broader constellation of artistic production and socially sensitive work of the artist in the context of the need to rethink the concept of monolithic public.
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The exhibition TV GALLERY is part of the project "Political practices of (post)Yugoslav Art"
www.pp-yu-art.net
http://www.kuda.org/?q=node/555

The project "Political Practices of (post-) Yugoslav Art" is concieved as a long-term process in which four independent cultural organization are collaborating in multidisciplinary researching, mapping and analyzing of the historical, socio-political and economic conditions that led to current constellation of art practices or intellectual and cultural production in post-Socialist space of „Southeast Europe“ or, more preciselly, of „Western Balcans“, eg. former Yugoslavia. Project has been initiated by four organizations: Prelom Kolektiv Beograd; Sto, kako i za koga/WHW, Zagreb; pro.ba/SCCA, Sarajevo and New Media Center_kuda.org from Novi Sad.

At the opening of the exhibitons, public debate was organized and speakers were:
- Dunja Blazevic, curator and art historian, author of the TV show “TV Gallery” on the TV Belgrade, since 1984 – 1991, at the moment director of the Sarajevo Center for Contemporary Art
- Dalibor Martinis, visual and video artist from Zagreb, one of the pioneers of video art in former Yugoslavia
- Branislav Dimitrijevic, art historian, curator, Belgrade
- Dusan Grlja, theorist, chief editor of the PRELOM magazine and member of the Prelom kolektiv, Belgrade
- Jelena Vesic, art historian, co-editor of the PRELOM magazine and member of the Prelom kolektiv, Belgrade; moderator of the debate

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Partners:
kuda.org (Novi Sad), www.kuda.org
Prelom kolektiv (Belgrade), www.prelomkolektiv.org
SCCA/Pro.ba (Sarajevo), www.scca.ba, www.pro.ba
WHW (Zagreb), www.whw.hr

Co-organizers of the exhibition in Novi Sad:
Museum of Contemporary Art of Vojvodina, www.msuv.org
Napon – Institute for flexible culture and technologies, www.napon.org

Project is supported by:
European Cultural Foundation, Amsterdam
Ministry of Culture of Republic of Serbia
Swiss Cultural program in Serbia Pro Helvetia
DOO K.D.S., Novi Sad
HALOGEN, Novi Sad
Radio TV Serbia
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APPLIED PUBLIC
curators: Sto, kako i za koga/WHW, Zagreb

The exhibition is supported by Ministry for Culture, education and sport of the City of Zagreb.
Video works from the archive of Croatian Film Clubs' Association have been presented.
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The exhibitions are opened until 12.04.2008.
Museum's working hours:
Tuesday – Friday 09 – 17 h
Saturday - Sunday 09 – 14h
Closed on Monday