JASMINA CIBIC / Beneficial Demolitions, 2021
PRESENTNG EKO 8 ART PROJECTS
JASMINA CIBIC / Beneficial Demolitions, 2021
performance for three snare drums; performers: Maja Povše, Janja Nagode in Tajana Novak; score composed by Maja Povše
courtesy of the artist
For EKO 8, Cibic has devised a new performance to take place at the opening of the Triennial. The opening performance will be filmed and presented on a screen in the exhibition space. This performance is part of the larger installation All that Power Melts into Noise, first staged at MSUM Ljubljana last September.
The project centres on the artist's interest in the subject of the double game between cultural capital and political powers. Here, an all-female percussion trio meets in a staged composition for three snare drums, which amongst a replay of historical hymns and marches of foregone national powers incorporate an SOS message in morse code – performed in a looped rhythm exchange. This message to the future draws on the historic abuse of culture by nationalist forces and encodes a message: When art bleeds, chaos reigns.
Each snare drum is hand painted with a different slogan, drawn from moments of cultural protest against political servitude. The historical case studies of scores the artist draws on speak directly to the present moment, in which culture has become a battleground for the forces of populism in their systematic attack on critical thought, bringing once again to the fore the complex relationship between culture and the state. Cibic continues to use performance strategies as a way to reveal weak spots and places of real lacking as well as the contradictions and elisions of cultural policy, which manifest in a collapse of the social contract between the citizens and the state.
Jasmina Cibic (b. 1979, Ljubljana, Slovenia) is a London based artist who works in performance, installation, and film. She represented Slovenia at the 55th Venice Biennial with her project For Our Economy and Culture. Her recent exhibitions include solo shows at Museum of Contemporary Art Ljubljana, CCA Glasgow, Phi Foundation Montreal, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art Gateshead, Kunstmuseen Krefeld, Aarhus 2017, and Esker Foundation Calgary, alongside group exhibitions at Steirischer Herbst '19, MOMA NY, MUMA Monash Museum, CCS BARD, and Guangdong Museum of Art, China. Cibic's films have been screened at Whitechapel Gallery, CCA Montreal, Pula Film Festival, HKW Berlin, Louvre, Les Rencontres Internationales Paris, Dokfest Kassel, and Copenhagen International Documentary Festival. Cibic has been shortlisted for the Jarman Award (2018) and was the winner of the MAC International Ulster Bank and the Charlottenborg Fonden awards (2016), as well as the B3 Biennial of the Moving Image Award (2020). Forthcoming solo exhibitions include MAC Lyon and Museum der Moderne Salzburg.
