IMPRESSUM

FUTURE REPAIRS TEAM

Nina Kurtela (artist)
Sara Simić (researcher)
Lana Grahek (designer)
Darija Jelinčić (photographer)

We would like to thank all the people who generously shared their time, knowledge, experiences and memories:
Leila Topić, Ana Zubić, Želimir Koščević, Leonida Kovač, Željko Serdarević, Ana Tajder, Ivor Ivezić, Lujo Parežanin, Tomislav Augustinčić, Nikolina Pahanić-Lugar (Grad Karlovac), Patricia Počanić, Jasenka Ferber-Bogdan (Arhiv za likovne umjetnosti HAZU). 

Future repairs research was supported by Kultura Nova Foundation.

WEB

EDITORS
Nina Kurtela and Ana Letunić

TEXT
Ana Letunić and Sara Simić

DESIGN
Lana Grahek and Leo Kirinčić

DEVELOPMENT
Nikola Greiner

Web supported by The Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Croatia

info@j-a-g-o-d-a.com

THE CONTEXT

Jagoda relies on Kaloper’s artistic legacy which stems from the context of the Yugoslav avant-garde and conceptual art scene whose interdisciplinary and internationally oriented artistic practices in the interstices between performing and visual arts were transgressive, radically political and deeply transformative phenomena. Nowadays, the post-Yugoslav independent contemporary arts scene is directly shaped by these practices and experiences as it strives to implement alternative models of organizing, producing and programming. Therefore, Jagoda also directs its own organizational culture towards the ecology of collective care and solidarity, thus attempting to resist the precarious and individualistic working conditions of the contemporary arts scene. By connecting artists from different disciplines, generations, affinities and aesthetics, as well as encouraging togetherness, discursive thinking and intermedia collaborations, we aim to create an inclusive and open space for exchanging ideas, critical thinking about one’s own and others’ work, consequently enticing transformative engagement towards related communities.

THE SPACE

Jagoda is founded by artist Nina Kurtela who in 2017 gained the right from the City of Zagreb (Croatia) to use the studio where conceptual artist and film actress Jagoda Kaloper* worked until her final days (2007-2016). Upon entering the studio, Kurtela inherits the physical space as well as various objects residing in it, and encounters valuable but forgotten Kaloper’s artistic legacy. Referring to the monograph “In the Mirror of the Cultural Screen: Jagoda Kaloper”* , which views the artist’s oeuvre through the prism of “patriarchal, misogynistic and sexist culture”, in which: […she gained recognition as a “fresh” female body but not as a creative person whose critical thought is articulated in her own work of art and public action]”, we critically reflect on the concept of stereotyping male gaze and exploitation of the female body and politics of forgetting conditioned by gender and institutional power regimes. Thus, although this studio is only 25 m2, Kaloper’s and now Kurtela’s “room of one’s own” persists as a safe space to engage in uninterrupted development of different artistic knowledge as well as everyday life as an artistic practice.

Jagoda is a non-profit art organization dedicated to research, discursive exchange and slow production betwixt (and between) contemporary performing and visual arts while examining gender, class and institutional power dynamics within the field.

We explore connections between the artistic, the theoretical and the academic that intertwine, complement and fluctuate through various media and formats.

We engage in non-hierarchical exchange on process-based artistic practices in relation to the concepts of collaboration, authorship and interpretation, invisible and maintenance work and critically examine different relationships of body, space, time and performance.

We also focus on empowering the community and context in which we operate and aim to connect local and global initiatives to provide a safe, caring and inviting space for artists, researchers and local communities.

FUTURE REPAIRS – ROOM OF LEISURE, CARE AND PERSISTENCE

Future repairs is one of the first projects initiated by art organisation Jagoda. This artistic research explores the practice of Yugoslavian artist and actress Jagoda Kaloper* (1947 – 2016) and its unexpected correlation with contemporary artist Nina Kurtela* through the working space they share in different times.

Upon entering the former Kaloper’s artist studio, Kurtela inhabits the space with her own artistic practice while carefully acknowledging Kaloper’s overlooked art legacy. Further on, Kurtela, together with the researcher Sara Simić*, critically engages with the very space, its histories, memories, traces and leftovers while looking at it both as a physical entity but also as an experiential, conceptual and intergenerational space. 

While looking at the “atelier” as a place of intermediate, hybrid and fluid exchange of strategies, they explore mechanisms of knowledge, experiences and actions transfers from one generation to another, from physical room to a Room of One’s Own.

Based on Kaloper’s self-reflexive, self-critical and politically-aware artistic practice, the goal of this research is not only to build an archive, raise visibility and give tribute to her artistic estate but also to (re)contextualize her position as a female artist in this specific historical and political context and its impact to today’s practices and working conditions of contemporary makers within the art field in local context. 

As one of the research outcomes, five maps have been arranged that manifest different aspects of Kaloper’s life and practice. In correlation with the current context they aspire to open up the space for new understandings, (re)interpretations, formation, realisations  and future collaborations: 

Map No. 1. Legacy_and_Archive.pdf
Map No. 2. Appearance_and_Presence.pdf
Map No. 3. Traces_and_Objects.pdf
Map No. 4. Theory_and_Premise.pdf
Map No. 5. Unfolding Futures 

REHEARSALS / VJEŽBE

Since it’s foundation, one of the backbone activity of art organization Jagoda is a discursive program “Vježbe” which hosts various actors of Zagreb independent art scene in order to activate a space for reflection, exchange of ideas and methodologies with the goal to contribute to the visibility, development and progress of artistic processes and practices within the local context.

”Vježbe” have been continuously held in various formats and manifested through gatherings and exchanges such as reading groups, film screenings, exercises, games, lectures, presentations, performances, dinners, artists talks, workshops, etc. developing methodologies around unconventional ways of transmitting knowledge and experience by imagining, creating, playing and rethinking the notion of artistic production and creation.

Organising various events in the Jagoda studio with experts from different fields within contemporary art, theory and science the aim is to reexamine important current topics such as – processuality of artistic creation, immaterial art practices, the ecology of collective care, togetherness, inclusiveness, gender equality, solidarity, (mental) health, sustainability, local production, climate change, eco-feminism, influence of digital technologies, etc.

The program is constructed from diverse disciplines and backgrounds from different contributors and it ranges from the artistic to the scientific, from somatic to visual, from movement based to object based. It offers non-competitive, informal and safe social space for creativity, healing, rest, play and collective wellbeing that hopefully complements more and more precarious and stressful environment and unsustainable production conditions within the art field. To participate in this collective exchange is to take time to slow down, to experience, to share, to listen, to observe, to smell, to touch, to taste, to rest, to move, to be together, to be present, to recuperate, to rethink, to reconnect, to engage with local community. 

VJEŽBA no. 01

MARIO MU
Spatial Examples (lecture)
Atelje Jagoda / 09.03.2024

The lecture draws upon two pieces by Croatian artist Jagoda Kaloper, “Unnamed Ambient” (1970) and “Woman in the Mirror” (2010), to explore the intersection of film history with contemporary digital tools, computer-generated imagery, and gaming. Concepts of image space and performativity in the digital realm are guiding us towards the reckognition of the transience in bodily movement, surveillance as a form of observation, mirroring, and the sequence of interactions within political and social contexts.

Mario Mu is an artist and filmmaker living in Berlin, Germany. He has has been working on a series of events as an author and collaborator with numerous institutions including Museum of Contemporary Art Zagreb, Singapore Art Museum, WHW Collective, V2 Institute for Unstable Media, MGLC Ljubljana, MAAT Lisbon, Research Center for Proxy Politics, and The School of Machines.