From the Archives of the Transition: The Collages of Josip Vaništa 1990–2000

Petar Ćuković

Authors

Petar Ćuković

Keywords:

century, post-communism, transition, art, appropriation, collage, media

Abstract

Following the analysis of the 20th century, carried out by Alain Badiou in his book The Century, the text begins with the quotation of Osip Mandelstam's poem The Age, in which the new century is seen in organic metaphors such as the “beast”, whose “spine” has already “broken” while emerging, thus foreboding that already in 1923, when the poem was written, the century of hope, the Soviet Century in its very nature, carried the seed of its own destruction. Consequently, the breakdown of this “century” in the field of so-called transitional social processes in all post-Communist societies is seen as a tragic, cruel privatization, a wild initial accumulation/pillage of capital in a new historical context, with new protagonists, and a new soulless morality.

For the most part, this text deals with analysis of the collages of Croatian neo-avantgarde artist Josip Vaništa, created during the period of transition and war in Croatia and the former Yugoslavia from 1990 to 2000. With minimal artist intervention, by simple collage and cutting of titles, short texts and photographs from the quondam press, Vaništa draws attention to the tragedy and absurdity of transitional social space.

Article received: March 31, 2018; Article accepted: April 10, 2018; Published online: September 15, 2018; Original scholarly paper

How to cite this article: Ćuković, Petar. "From the Archives of the Transition: The Collages of Josip Vaništa 1990–2000." AM Journal of Art and Media Studies 16 (2018): 29−41. doi: 10.25038/am.v0i16.252

Author Biography

Petar Ćuković

Faculty of Visual Arts, University Mediterranean, Podgorica
Montenegro

Petar Ćuković is a lecturer/teaching assistant at the Faculty of Visual Arts in Podgorica. He has also been a guest lecturer at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Cetinje (1991–2000). He was director of the National Museum of Montenegro in Cetinje (1995–2007), co-curator of the Cetinje Biennial of Contemporary Art (1991, 1994, 2004), and co-curator of the exhibition Aspect-Positions: Central European Art 1949–1999, curated by Lorand Hegy (1999, Vienna). He also served as commissioner and curator of the Yougoslav pavillion on 49th Biennial in Venice (2001), co-commissioner of the Montenegrin national pavilion on 54th Biennial in Venice (2011), co-commissioner of the First Biennial of Contemporary Art D-0 ARK Underground, Sarajevo-Konjic (2011), and art director of the Dukley European Art Community (2015–2017). Born in 1954, he graduated and obtained his M.A. degree in History of Art at the Faculty for Philosophy in Belgrade. He is currently a Ph.D candidate at the Faculty of Media and Communication in Belgrade.

References

Badiou, Alain. The Century. Translated by Alberto Toscano. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2007.

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Groys, Boris. “Privatization or Artificial Paradises of Post-Communism.” In Boris Groys. Art Power, 165–72. Cambridge, Massachusetts, London: The MIT Press, 2008.

Lasić, Stanko. “Svijet bez neba.” In Ukidanje retrospektive, edited by Nada Beroš, 29–34. Zagreb: Muzej suvremene umjetnosti, 2013

Mandelstam, Osip. 24 selected poems, edited and translated by A. S. Kline. https://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/Russian/Mandelstam.php. Accessed May 13, 2018.

Vaništa, Josip. “Misli za mjesece, 1964.” In Gorgona, edited by Marija Gattin, 14–17. Zagreb: Muzej suvremene umjetnosti, 2002.

Vaništa, Josip. “Gorgona.” In Gorgona, edited by Marija Gattin, 156–60. Zagreb: Muzej suvremene umjetnosti, 2002.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.25038/am.v0i16.252