Talk to the Other Side Unrealized project in public space by KOLEKTIVA (Vesna Bukovec, Lada Cerar, Metka Zupanič)
The idea for the project was developed during the Editing residency in Gorizia at the border between Italy and Slovenia.
The initial starting point of the project was the specific history of the region. Old Italian city of Gorizia was a regional center before the World War II. After the war the new border not only divided the two countries that were at war but it also divided the East and the West and cut neighboring Slovenian population from the supplies of the city. Yugoslavian government decided to build a new city on the verge of the border for local population. Nova Gorica was designed as the model for communist architecture and urban planning. The two cities were geographically attached to each other but strictly divided by the border. In the years following the border gradually became more open and people could pass to the other side easily. After the disintegration of Yugoslavia the new state of Slovenia inherited the border which was finally abolished in 2004 when Slovenia joined the Schengen Area.
With the project Talk to the Other Side KOLEKTIVA wanted to offer the citizens of both cities an opportunity to speak openly to the people in the other city. A special opaque phone booth was to be installed in each city’s main square in order to provide the speaker/participant with anonymity. It would offer a liberation and empowerment of expressing one's self in public. Expressing one's ideas or opinions vocally in a public space can be seen either as an intimate or as political act and it is not often possible in urban space. This project wanted to open up an opportunity for individuals of various perspectives, attitudes and opinions to express themselves to a potential audience in the other city.
The speaker in a phone booth would not know if somebody is listening on the other side. The square in the neighbor city could be empty and one could end up talking to buildings and birds. But a certain conversation between random speakers who don’t know or see each other could evolve.
The project was not realized because of a rejection from the Gorizia city council. The fear of encouraging hate speech and the lack of control of individual expression in public space prevented an interesting communication experiment.
About the Editing residency http://www.zerynthia.it/ram.asp?id=113
Perhaps no other city has managed to give voice to so many ideas which are present in contemporary art as has Gorizia. This city was rent by a wall, but precisely thanks to this duplicity has it been able to open out and develop its fascination, thus it exhibits its true nature as a link between two realities which must converse one with the other and produce a new language born from this encounter. In the case of Editing the driving force was the desire to find a place in which to publish, to edit, emerging realities for contemporary art from the East. The outcome has been the foundation of a aggregative moment involving organizations coming from: Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, The Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Hungary, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia. The panorama was inevitably variegated and the materials presented have offered an alternative version of the customary dialogues. Editing is born from the desire to include, the desire to weaken the foundations of those forms which demand difference and achieve it through exclusion. To obtain this Editing places itself at the heart of the disjunction, of the hybrid which is the very message of art. It is thus necessary to strive to become visible, to publish, that is to become plural and general, torn from the self-loving seclusion. Never again exclusions. In this workable interweaving a language is created which is infectious, a passage across frontiers, in opposition to any kind of censorship.
About KOLEKTIVA KOLEKTIVA is an art group from Slovenia which was established in 2008. The three members of the group Vesna Bukovec, Lada Cerar and Metka Zupanič have worked on occasional common projects since 2003. Their projects are focused on various aspects of communication, inter-personal relationships and everyday life. They often engage with the various public such as individuals, art public, passersby or specially target groups and invite them to take an active part in the creative process and become the source and co-authors of the work. They understand the process of art making as a means of immagination, negotiation, exchange and cooperation. www.kolektiva.org
Talk to the Other Side Unrealized project in public space by KOLEKTIVA (Vesna Bukovec, Lada Cerar, Metka Zupanič)
The idea for the project was developed during the Editing residency in Gorizia at the border between Italy and Slovenia.
The initial starting point of the project was the specific history of the region. Old Italian city of Gorizia was a regional center before the World War II. After the war the new border not only divided the two countries that were at war but it also divided the East and the West and cut neighboring Slovenian population from the supplies of the city. Yugoslavian government decided to build a new city on the verge of the border for local population. Nova Gorica was designed as the model for communist architecture and urban planning. The two cities were geographically attached to each other but strictly divided by the border. In the years following the border gradually became more open and people could pass to the other side easily. After the disintegration of Yugoslavia the new state of Slovenia inherited the border which was finally abolished in 2004 when Slovenia joined the Schengen Area.
With the project Talk to the Other Side KOLEKTIVA wanted to offer the citizens of both cities an opportunity to speak openly to the people in the other city. A special opaque phone booth was to be installed in each city’s main square in order to provide the speaker/participant with anonymity. It would offer a liberation and empowerment of expressing one's self in public. Expressing one's ideas or opinions vocally in a public space can be seen either as an intimate or as political act and it is not often possible in urban space. This project wanted to open up an opportunity for individuals of various perspectives, attitudes and opinions to express themselves to a potential audience in the other city.
The speaker in a phone booth would not know if somebody is listening on the other side. The square in the neighbor city could be empty and one could end up talking to buildings and birds. But a certain conversation between random speakers who don’t know or see each other could evolve.
The project was not realized because of a rejection from the Gorizia city council. The fear of encouraging hate speech and the lack of control of individual expression in public space prevented an interesting communication experiment.
About the Editing residency http://www.zerynthia.it/ram.asp?id=113
Perhaps no other city has managed to give voice to so many ideas which are present in contemporary art as has Gorizia. This city was rent by a wall, but precisely thanks to this duplicity has it been able to open out and develop its fascination, thus it exhibits its true nature as a link between two realities which must converse one with the other and produce a new language born from this encounter. In the case of Editing the driving force was the desire to find a place in which to publish, to edit, emerging realities for contemporary art from the East. The outcome has been the foundation of a aggregative moment involving organizations coming from: Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, The Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Hungary, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia. The panorama was inevitably variegated and the materials presented have offered an alternative version of the customary dialogues. Editing is born from the desire to include, the desire to weaken the foundations of those forms which demand difference and achieve it through exclusion. To obtain this Editing places itself at the heart of the disjunction, of the hybrid which is the very message of art. It is thus necessary to strive to become visible, to publish, that is to become plural and general, torn from the self-loving seclusion. Never again exclusions. In this workable interweaving a language is created which is infectious, a passage across frontiers, in opposition to any kind of censorship.
About KOLEKTIVA KOLEKTIVA is an art group from Slovenia which was established in 2008. The three members of the group Vesna Bukovec, Lada Cerar and Metka Zupanič have worked on occasional common projects since 2003. Their projects are focused on various aspects of communication, inter-personal relationships and everyday life. They often engage with the various public such as individuals, art public, passersby or specially target groups and invite them to take an active part in the creative process and become the source and co-authors of the work. They understand the process of art making as a means of immagination, negotiation, exchange and cooperation. www.kolektiva.org