(Ljubljana, Slovenia)
“Interruption” is the 30th edition of the Ljubljana Biennial of Graphic Arts. This installation considers the evolutionary graphic field of contemporary times. Printerly processes touch many types of present-day art. Select, traditional media have evolved and adapted to maintain their relevance, while digital processes, after a long fermentation, have finally taken legitimate hold as artistic tools in their own right. Interruption surveys the extension of traditional as well as new approaches to printmaking in response to our 21st-century communications.
The works included in the Biennial echo and comment on the conditions of the world in which we live: how we receive our information, how we interact – or attempt to – with each other, how we (mis)perceive our world. Clamouring, unfiltered data bombards us. Masquerading commercial and political agendas vie for our attention alongside personal thoughts and images that are more than we can ever possibly absorb. The hyperactivity of text and image begs for our attention. While some artists respond by returning to basic, even primal, forms of image reproduction (fire, shadows, tattoos, gunshots), others embrace the randomness of social media picture boards, the ghostliness of heat-sensitive live-feed video, endless streams of leaked governmental documents, or the brief haikus of the Twittersphere.
Interruption considers both the fresh application of traditional means by leading-edge artists and the innovative incorporation of new printerly technologies in fine-art investigations. Both approaches contemplate our contemporary transmissions as the basis of their works. Interruption explores the graphic as both form and content, in an invigorated polygraphic terrain that links the work of diverse contemporary artists from around the world.
Curated by Deborah Cullen, PhD.
Participating artists: Allora & Calzadilla, Burak Arıkan, Dennis Ashbaugh & William Ford Gibson, Tammam Azzam, Xu Bing, Luis Camnitzer, caraballo-farman, Alex Cerveny, Mario Čaušić, Vuk Ćosić, Milos Djordjevic, Tomás Espina, Giorgi Gago Gagoshidze & Gianluigi Scarpa, Mihael Giba, Ana Golici, María Elena González, Meta Grgurevič and Urša Vidic, Dragan IIic, Sanela Jahić, Charles Juhász-Alvarado, Thomas Kilpper, André Komatsu, Gorazd Krnc, Volodymyr Kuznetsov, Nicola López, Ivan Marušić Klif, Yucef Merhi, Ottjörg A.C., Renata Papišta, Adam Pendleton, Agnieszka Polska, Zoran Poposki, Marjetica Potrč, Gerhard Richter, Venelin Shurelov, Dario Šolman, Nika Špan, Teo Spiller, Waltraut Tänzler, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Vargas-Suarez Universal, Tomas Vu-Daniel
The Ljubljana Biennial of Graphic Arts, founded in 1955 – the same year as documenta in Kassel – enjoys a long and uninterrupted tradition. In an international context, it established itself as an event that, in the post-war decades, has managed to present art in “global” terms – regularly hosting artists from both sides of the Iron Curtain and, very early on, transcending the Eurocentric viewpoint by showing art works from the Third World, in particular from the non-aligned countries.
At the same time, the Biennial has recognized and included new art trends and changes in style. The Biennial’s responsiveness has been in part the result of its close ties with a number of art experts and curators, including, among others, Gulio Carlo Argan, Jorge Glusberg, Pontus Hulten, Pierre Restany, and Ryszard Stanisławski.
At a local level, the Biennial has been an inspiration and support to Slovene artists, bringing them closer to what was happening internationally and introducing them to new contemporary art currents. In the 1990s, the global and local political changes, as well as new cultural and technological developments, meant the Biennial had to rethink its role and find new ways of working. The Biennial has started going beyond the boundaries of the printmaking medium and today includes various modes of artistic expression.
Venues: International Centre of Graphic Arts, Museum of Modern Art, Jakopič Promenade
THE 30TH BIENNIAL OF GRAPHIC ARTS: INTERRUPTION
14 September–24 November 2013
Mednarodni grafični likovni center / International Centre of Graphic Arts
Grad Tivoli, Pod turnom 3,
1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia
T +386 (0)1 241 38 00
F +386 (0)1 241 38 21
info@mglc-lj.si