exhibition in NI©
REX - Cultural Centre B92, Ressource Centre Nis and Cultural
Centre Nis
present works of art and documentaries whose theme is
OPEN SECRET
23 - 30 September
SALON 77
in fortress
The project focuses on the phenomenon of open secret. The
Law on Free Access to Information, one version of which is on the point
of being passed by the National Assembly, provided the motive for conceiving
the project.
The works were created in the course of the workshops held
over the summer at the Nis Resource Centre and led by Dragan Peric and
Nebojsa Milikic.
EXHIBITION
Here you can see photographs from opening of the "OPEN
SECRET" exhibition in Nis
WORKS
"AMNESIA - ANESTHESIA" (2003, photograph,
50x70cm)
author: Biljana Jankovic
This work makes us feel wedged in a situation/polygravitational space
imposing the suppression of instincts. Visual formulation of the message
- the very distortion of the space confronts us with the question: "Where
can we see that kind of notice and who could have written it? These questions
bounce off a cold tiled wall, wet and covered in dirt produced by unsavoury
but inevitable fumes that are successfully eating away the prohibition
itself.
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"DREAM" (2003, animated digital video, 2')
author: Milos Macanovic
In a dream-like animation, two adults negotiate on the ways of accepting
a bribe. The person being bribed comes up with an ingenious idea. The
author does not reveal the origin of this (reconstructed?) situation,
but the title lends an autobiographical note that every viewer can identify
with.
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"SECRET" and "THE CONTENTS OF LADIES'
BAGS" (2003, photographs)
author: Dragan Peric
His works imply that men envy some female privileges: women decorate their
bodies and carry handbags. Machos and homophobes tend to regard both as
odd if these habits are acquired by men. This kind of cultural pressure
is reduced through a massive presence of androgynous characters in popular
culture, especially in the fashion industry. The author lets us into the
well-hidden secret desire of every human to be self-sufficient and attain
the impossible perfection of a creature uniting the characteristics of
both sexes.
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"THE SECT" (2003, video, 40')
author: The TEA...EXCELLENT art group
The only intervention in the video, filmed quite a while ago, is the change
of its title. The hysteria caused by such a label reveals banal mechanisms
underlying slander: whatever people do in order to satisfy the cult(ural)
needs of their community, excommunication from some higher form of society
(or "a zero institution" as Rastko Mocnik defines nation) is
at hand. Namely, a harmless and unsuccessful performance by a group of
young artists can easily awaken the curiosity (yes, precisely curiosity)
of alert exorcists driving the devil out of the bodies of individuals
or an entire nation of the faithful.
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"UNPROTECTED" (2003, video triptych, 3'+5'+4')
author: The TEA...EXCELLENT art group
A formal and utterly non-fatal recognition of nepotistic dictates frustrates
us by its commonness and incredibility. The man who confesses to us makes
us his accomplices unable to understand the acceptance of the hereditary
right to a job in Civil Service. That is why we find that it is easier
to have fun watching the modified versions of this baffling account. In
the version in which the confessant's face is hidden from public view
as if he were a protected witness, the key words of his confession are
accompanied by the upsetting cries of (his) uneasy conscience. In the
second version, during the speaker's statement, background music of a
video game can be heard and video games are the most powerful tool for
testing one's unattainable traumas.
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UNTITLED (2003, object 6x2x9cm)
author: Stanisa Radojlovic
This work takes us for a walk along the long crossroads of childhood that
came to an abrupt end and an adolescence that lasts too long. The compression
and distortion of these ages are certainly the consequence of the existence
of mighty transmitters of the messages of the society based on spectacle.
Every five-year-old child endlessly exposed to TV programmes will astonishingly
quickly grow into an incurable consumer of images and goods offered by
Uncle Global Capital. Such a child will later be astonishingly slow to
give up its position of a consumer spending other people's money and become
a consumer earning and spending his/her own money instead. "Untitled"
combines these two tendencies - various needs of an adult and the frame
of mind i.e. "mental capacities" of a child.
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"NOTICE BOARD" (2003, installation, 101x10x50cm)
author: Tatjana Jovanic
This installation worries us and promises things exactly in the same way
as the notices that can be read at Employment Bureau. We all know that
the advertisements placed there cannot lead to finding a job and that
the tradition of inheriting privileges is being successfully transferred
from the old to the current social system: from the family to the community
of the people coming from the same town/region; from a technocratic interest
group of socialist self-management "development coordinators"
to the interest group consisting of people managing a non-political system.
The better part of this country's multiparty establishment is of that,
non-political, kind.
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"NA PRODAYU" ("YU ARE FOR SALE")
(2003, banner in a public space, 400x70cm)
author: Nebojsa Krstic
A handmade sticker that the author stuck on the wall of the once popular
Nis club "Tramvaj" ("Tram") read "NA PRODAYU"
("YU ARE FOR SALE"). Afterwards, he was taken to the police
station for questioning. Somehow he managed to explain what his sticker
meant. ("YU" was an official abbreviation of Yugoslavia). Nowadays,
hardly anyone is likely to be upset by this slogan. In one way or another,
we are all taking part in the transformation of state-owned property into
private one. Former leaders and their able cousins - lo and behold - they
are the ones who are buying up the ruined YUgoslav heritage. Only this
time, the police are on their side.
[The author and project organizers wish to thank KP Medijana for their
collaboration in carrying out this part of the Open Secret project]
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"HOT LINE" (2003, audio-telecommunication
performance, 5')
author: Dusan Vukic
After being introduced to each other and exchanging the usual personal
data, the participants in this dialogue are faced with an unexpected question.
The shattering power of a nearly broken taboo erases and at the same time
fortifies the postulates of this sort of communication. People start comforting
and encouraging one another - a new friendship is born…
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