Neighborhood

The project is a part of the ‘Contact Program‘, an experimental G-MK program line that involves working with students.
The project was based on a simple opservation: in search of any of the city’s gallery spaces, it is most likely that one wouldn’t be able to get directions by entering and asking in a neighbouring store, office or bar, even if the gallery in question is situated “just behind the corner”. The Neighbourhood project developed in relation with two of this year’s programmatic orientations of the Gallery Miroslav Kraljević: the initiation of a process of “opening up” of the hermetic gallery space and encouraging the communication “towards the outside”, and also the tendency to involve students actively in the program of the gallery, through workshops, exhibitions, lectures and mediation projects with artistic guidance.

In this case, establishing contact with the immediate physical surroundings – the gallery neighbourhood – evolved through a weekly interdisciplinary workshop with students of Academy of Fine Arts, School of Design and Faculty of Philosophy, during which the gallery was transformed into an active work space and laboratory for research and creation. By doing “field work”, the group of students were not only exploring the gallery’s visibility in the neighbourhood, but also seeking to initiate mutidirectional communication – among inhabitants, tradesmen and workers along the lines of Martićeva street – Gorica Market – šubićeva street.
The gallery, with its activities, is here perceived as just another neighbourhood facility, a space for potential rest, encounter, exchange and informal communication just like the one occurring at the hairdresser’s, car mecanich’s or the neighbouring restaurant.
The initial concept of the project was further developed and defined through the workshop, which included several phases: research and “mapping” of the neighbourhood, production of video-interviews, editing, photo-documentation of the whole process, developing of visual identity of the project and its presentation and promotion.
In interviewing the neighbours, the students have primarily sought to find out about the awareness of the gallery’s presence in its surroundings, asking the participants to give their own suggestions for a higher visibility of the gallery, exploring their opinions on contemporary art in general and, finally, asking them for concrete suggestions for programs they would like to see in the gallery. This exhibition presents some of the participants’ wishes for practical and unusual ways for using the gallery space, such as the crazy haircut show, box match, something that makes you think, oldtimer cars exhibition, massage, etc.
The various responses channelled an energetic and important impulse from the “outside”, which was an additional motivation for organizing the final socializing event. The opening of the exhibition is in this case conceived as an opportunity for new encounters, initiating connections among neighbours, as well
as establishing a two-way communication from and towards the art system, on whose intersections some new social and communication space can arise.

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Concept: Ana Bilankov & Antonia Majača

Artistic guidance: Ana Bilankov, artist and mediator of contemporary art, Berlin/Zagreb,

Participants at the workshop / co-authors of the project:

Dora Budor
, student, Faculty of Design, Zagreb

Anita Celić Cella, student, Academy of Fine Arts, Zagreb

Maja Čule, student,Faculty of Design, Zagreb

Zdravko Horvat, student, Academy of Fine Arts, Zagreb

Marta Klepo, student, Faculty of Philosophy, Zagreb

Elvis Krstulović, student, Academy of Fine Arts, Zagreb