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Diana Lelonek at Museum of Contemporary Art, Belgrade

OVERVIEW EFFECT

Museum of Contemporary Art, Belgrade, June 19th – September 20th 2021
Opening of the exhibition: Saturday, June 19th at 1 pm 

project portfolio

project and curatorial direction: Blanca de la Torre and Zoran Erić
assistant curator: Dušan Savić
production: Dragana Jovović
design: Katarina Popović, Andrej Dolinka (project logo)

Artists:

Ravi Agarwal / Maria Thereza Alves / Vasco Araújo / Amy Balkin / Anca Benera & Arnold Estefan / Luna Bengoechea Peña / Ursula Biemann / Tania Candiani /Juanli Carrión / Carolina Caycedo /Tomas Colbengtson /Dušan Čavić & Dušan Šaponja /Cian Dayrit /Ex-Artists’ Collective (Anikó Loránt – Tamás Kaszás) /Dirk Fleischmann /Nina Galić / Regina José Galindo /Asunción Molinos Gordo / Kitti Gosztola / Lungiswa Gqunta /Tue Greenfort / Michaela Grill / Igor Grubić / Christina Hemauer & Roman Keller /Markus Hiesleitner /IC-98 / Ingela Ihrman / The Institute of Queer Ecology / ISUMA / Anne Duk Hee Jordan /Kinga Kiełczyńska / Jacob Kirkegaard /Elena Lavellés / Diana Lelonek / Ernst Logar / Tea Mäkipää /Mary Mattingly /Nemanja Milenković /Anna Moreno /Amor Muñoz / Kevin Michael Murphy / Michael Najjar /Branislav Nikolić / mirko nikolić / Nils Norman / Fernando Palma /PSJM (Cynthia Viera & Pablo San José) /Marjetica Potrč / Minna Rainio & Mark Roberts / Beth Stephens & Annie Sprinkle /Vera Stevanović /Robertina Šebjanič & Gjino Šutić /Škart / Thomas Thwaites /Adrienn Újházi /Marie Velardi /Mariëlle Videler /Tanja Vujinović / Juan Zamora / Bo Zheng

The term overview effect was coined by Frank White in 1987 to describe the cognitive shift reported by a number of astronauts having looked back from Space to Earth. The question is it only from such a distant point of view of the planet we occupy, as the “crew of the Spaceship Earth” to use Buckminster Fuller’s metaphor, that we can first realize that this “spaceship” is slowly running out of “fuel” and that the crew is in need of “oxygen”?

This project seeks to explore the complexity of the ecological problematics and the inseparable links between them and issues like corporate imperialism, indigenous sovereignty, gender, different kinds of extractivisms and the importance of decolonising not just history but also our concept of nature in order to reshape an inclusive mindset akin to a post-anthropocentric world.

The goal is to rethink the issue of environmental justice and propose an approach to art one possible way to a better future and to building an awareness that opens a path for a new eco-aesthetics approach.

The curatorial strategy explores alternative exhibition-making formats and responds to the rhizomatic idea of ECO_LABS where six realms represent distinct sub-themes, all of them interconnected: 

1 – GENDER, RACE AND THE COLONIAL TRACE
2 – WATERTOPIAS
3 – THERE IS NO EDGE!
4 – LEARNING FROM INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE 
5 – BEYOND ANTHROPOCENTRISM
6 – BACK TO THE FUTURE

Each ECO_LAB will take on the role of a think-thank for art, action and knowledge production related to the sub-themes we derived from the overall concept, within the whole methodological approach to the development of the exhibition. The ECO_LABS will thus create a dynamic and revolving structure that builds on the transversality used as key way of thinking and also establish a trans-disciplinary approach from different disciplines such as arts, humanities and social sciences. 

SUSTAINABILITY GUIDELINES

We strongly believe that art must contribute to the public debate on the politics of sustainability, developing creative proposals that put forward alternative forms of working with the environment fairly and sustainably, with the goal of seeking alternatives that will help to bring about a paradigm shift and to collaborate towards a more habitable, fair and sustainable future.

Our goal is to develop an exhibition that speaks of ecology in content and form. To this end, and with the purpose of making sure that the project is consistent with this approach, the curatorial proposal has been deliberately driven by the ways of doing, with the goal of opening a door to a search for more ethical ways of consuming. A number of guidelines were established in order to take care of the carbon footprint of the whole show like avoiding pollutants, petrol-derived materials and shipping of the artworks by air, in favour of local production, biodegradable materials and repurposed and recycled materials. A waste plan and a general plan to reduce energy were also made in the museum. But, being aware of the impossibility to make a total sustainable exhibition and embracing all the contradictions that came along the way, we are planning to offset emissions at the end of the project.

Due to the outbreak of coronavirus, the project has taken shape in two stages. The first part and the launch of Overview Effect was held on October 2nd 2020. It comprised a group of outdoor installations in the sculpture park of the Museum, a mural, site-specific interventions in different urban and rural areas, performances, artist’s workshops, artistic projects on Instagram, and the production of a personalized stamp with artist’s motif, among others. This phase continued with panel discussions with local experts, activists and environmental organizations and initiatives, as well as a series of lectures that were held online.

The second part, is an exhibition throughout the 5 floors of the Museum, with 60 artists, artistic duos or collectives, that will be held at the main building of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Belgrade from June 19th to September 20th, 2021.

more about the exhibition on the Museum of Contemporary Art, Belgrade website