P-RAZNO

In collaboration with the Arts Academy of the University of Split​

May 27th - June 3rd 

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Exhibited works of graduate students Đina Radulj, Hana Kalebić, Jelena Jurčević, Marija Bare and Matea Križanović were created as part of the Specialization – Painting II course in the summer semester of the academic year 2023/2024, under the mentorship of Assoc. Prof. Art. Lana Stojićević.

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The collaboration with the creative hub Prostor was initiated due to the desire for students to become acquainted with the work of various actors of the contemporary art scene in Split as early as possible, but also to have the opportunity to present their own works to the audience during their studies.

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The theme "Voids", as a reference to the project of the same name designed and implemented throughout 2020, 2021 and 2022 by the Culture Hub Croatia, was given to the students as a conceptual stimulus for the creation of the exhibited works. This project was primarily dedicated to the spatial and content gaps of the city of Split that arose as a result of mass tourism, while the students could refer to any aspect of this layered concept. The result of this process are works diverse in media and content, with individual interpretations of the concept of emptiness in the context of local industrial heritage, family heritage, unused agricultural land, artistic heritage, and traces of social voids in public space. 

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Đina Radulj, Three Generations
Drawing (perforations on paper)
3 x (50 x 70 cm)
2024

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I found the inspiration for this work in the writings of my late grandfather Marin, who spent the last ten years of his life writing an autobiography that was intended for the family archive and was never published. In a large number of handwritten pages, he recorded various life situations, including an event that led to the filming of two documentaries about him. The writings are not sorted, nor have they been transcribed, and they are difficult to read due to the illegible handwriting. The work consists of three transcriptions of the same writing with different levels of understanding of what was read – the cut-out rectangles represent parts of the text that my grandmother, my father, and I were unable to read. Understanding is conditioned by generation, but also by the experience of reading his handwriting.

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Hana Kalebić, Jadranka
Combined technique (facade paint and marker on MDF)
42 x 70 x 14.8 cm
2024

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Jadranka 1892. d. d. is a former fish processing and canning company founded in 1892 in Vela Luka on the island of Korčula. Jadranka, also known to the locals as Fabrika, employed a large part of the female population of Vela Luka in its plants, including my grandmother and great-grandmother. In 2005, Jadranka became a bare concrete body that, like many similar closed-down plants along the coast, is now devastated. With this work, I touch on the themes of deindustrialization and privatization with subtle criticism in the form of enlarged and empty canned fish packaging. I chose the original design from the 1990s because of the illustrated panorama of my native Vela Luka.

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Jelena Jurčević, Prohibition of Grazing
Drawing (rapidograph, marker and stamp on paper)
70 x 100 cm
2024

A square meter, as a less pronounced concept of rural life, has in a way begun to encompass the territory outside the city limits. Digital lines of the land parcel identification system laid out on pastures and arable land have put a price on the possibility of movement. Croatian Forests modernized a centuries-old tradition, setting strict boundaries for their neglected properties. And instead of incentives, a ban followed...

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Marija Bare, Meander Road
Interactive installation (carpet, Velcro, toy cars)
90 x 105 cm
2024

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Although limited by the format in which its trajectory is stopped, Julij Knifer's meander, as an almost archetypal motif, suggests infinity – it associates with the possibility of continuation and overflowing over the edge of the canvas. This reinterpretation of Knifer's work is prompted by the associative link of the meander with the feeling of infinity of travel, movement, and thus of the road, with a dose of humor and childish playfulness. By literally filling Knifer's "voids" with visual and symbolic content, the meander becomes a road, but not an ordinary one, but one inspired by a children's carpet depicting a road, which, in addition to its obvious purpose, also serves as a game, which at the same time gives this work an interactive character. The motif is taken from the oil on canvas Meander from 1960.

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Matea Križanović, Death Notices
Drawing (pencil on paper)
50 x 70 cm
2024

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Although at first glance the drawing on white paper shows an ordinary tree bark with pins stuck in it, Death Notices takes us through the layers of transience and human memory on a symbolic level. The motif of the work is taken from the immediate surroundings – an almost monumental tree in Solin served as a bulletin board for obituaries for years. The metal pins stuck into the tree bark have become silent witnesses to this custom characteristic of smaller towns and villages. Although a new fence now blocks access to the tree, which is why it is no longer used for its stated purpose, through the void created by the absence of paper obituaries, the numerous pins on the tree become a silent reminder of the transience of life.

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