Ana Kuzmanić’s interdisciplinary artistic research commences with in depth reading of children’s books from different periods and places, but with a specific focus on Yugoslavia. The book I can’t wait to grow up: children’s messages to grown-ups by Branka Praznik was especially important for the research. The book, published in Zagreb in 1980, gathered various childeren’s statements about their everyday life. The book mirrors the local history, as well as the author’s personal experience of childhood (Ana Kuzmanić was born in 1980). However, while the children’s statements in this book are interpreted as politically neutral, the artist reads them through the ideology of time and space in which they were created.
Inspired by the book, Ana Kuzmanić created a series of interactive workshops for children aged between six to eight years (altogether three workshops were held during October and November 2015, in collaboration with the pedagogues Ivana Ðula and Milica Kostanić from the Artarea platform). The workshops were a means by way of which Ana gathered written and visual reactions of children on four topics: relationships with grown-ups, experience of public space, war and conflict, and personal desires.
During the workshops a number of children’s books were used as the basis on which certain topics and discussions were introduced, but the artist developed her own methodology for the gathering of children’s testimonies. The central theme of her work is to recognize how children´s ideological assumptions are manifested in words, images and captions. Childhood is always the product of ideological structures – children convey what they see in the media, hear at home, and learn in kindergarten or school.
Exhibition is supported by Ministry of Culture and City of Zagreb.
Gallery is supported by Kultura Nova.
Exhibition is open till 23/1/16
