Exhibition: “Performing Democracy”

Center for Advanced Studies of Southeast Europe of the University of Rijeka, in cooperation with the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Rijeka and the City of Rijeka, invites you to the opening of the exhibition Performing Democracy by Ana Adamović and Milica Pekić (Kiosk), in collaboration with Kontrapunkt and DokuFest in ExportDrvo, Rijeka, 28. 10. 2022. at 5 pm.

In the contemporary context of the strengthening of totalitarian and oligarchic tendencies as the collapse of natural conditions for human survival spreads, democracy has become the topic of many conversations, from coffees with friends to international summits, from academic seminars to activist planning. The survival, value, ​​and very concept of democracy are discussed – whether it will survive in a world of insatiable social inequalities and ecological crisis, whether it is even desirable for it to survive since t it failed to defend us from the predatory capital hijacking of the political processes, and whether it can be upgraded to deliver on its complex promise of simultaneously developing freedom and the capacity for collective action. These are just some of the questions that have become uncomfortably commonplace.

The project Performing Democracy faces the tensions of democracy with the fearless belief that fostering a space for broad dialogue, a space for the search for the common ground without hiding from fundamental disagreements, is an indispensable condition of all future freedoms.

We invite you to join us at the opening of the exhibition Performing Democracy, and the conversation. Can we continue to boldly celebrate spaces for public debate on the possibilities of developing democratic culture? Are we allowed to close our eyes to the fact that we are on a planet that suffers the irreversible impact of our actions? Can we isolate ourselves in the local context, in Rijeka, can we change it through our actions?

Performing Democracy is a collective participatory artwork created in cooperation with the citizens of Serbia, Kosovo, and North Macedonia, as a series of conversations and social games with citizens, activists, members of initiatives, and workers’ collectives and political parties. The work is presented as a multimedia installation. The project was initiated by the organization Kiosk, carrying out the first phase in Serbia in 2020, while the second phase was carried out in Kosovo and North Macedonia, in cooperation with the organizations DokuFest from Prizren and Kontrapunkt from Skopje.