Art outside of its comfort (i.e., autonomous, apolitical) zone
Wednesday, March 12 Filodrammatica (Rijeka, Croatia), 7 PM

What is the connection between art and urban politics? What is the role of an artist in spatial organization of a public sphere? In what ways does artistic intervention affect political experience of all citizens?

A round table will be held, organized by Drugo More, discussing Spacial Politics in Contemporary Art.

The guests are Nikoleta Marković (Elevator Art), Branka Ćurčić (New Media Center_kuda.org), and Vesna Vuković ([BLOK]. The discussion will be moderated by Andrej Mirčev.

The round table is imagined as a dialogue that should bring up themes of the impossible and ambivalent interventions in commodity-oriented urban configurations/relationships. The artistic activity will be re-thinked as a mode of critical spatial operation. The relation between artistic, spatial and participational practices will be questioned as well as art itself outside of its comfort (i.e., autonomous, apolitical) zone. In other words, art production in the context of a political experience will be examined. When treated as a medium, i.e. an event that reflects social and economic tension, space isn’t only a neutral and also objective category of perception, but a result of different relationships, practices and protocols, conditioned by manufactured ideological and gender antagonisms.

Assuming that the existing social order wants to suppress, conceal or naturalize these antagonisms, we seek to examine those types of social practices whose aim is not mere aestheticism of the public sphere, but unmasking the political hegemony and articulating the artistic activity.

Organized by: Drugo more

Supported by: National Foundation for Civil Society Development, Foundation Kultura nova, Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Croatia, City of Rijeka – Department for Culture