‘Time Machine No Network’ 1st Biennale in Konjic
Melancholia in Arkadia
Hüseyin Alptekin, Melancholia in Arkadia at Biennial in Bosnia and Herzegovina – May 2011, Courtesy of the Estate of Huseyin Bahri Alptekin and Rampa Istanbul
The first Biennial in Konjic, Bosnia and Herzegovina, 2011 featured works by 44 international artists and artistic groups which were be presented in the space of the nuclear bunker in Konjic, (Atomska ratna komanda – ARK). This was the first artistic project ever to be organized in this space and the first artistic prroject organized in any of the military facilities built in the time of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The exhibition was a unique opportunity for the invited artists to intervene in a space with such a historic and symbolic weight, and to create mostly new works in relation to the space, its story and its contemporary symbolical resonance.
Artists invited to participate in the project were primarily be those whose work is concerned with different aspects of “artistic research” and other “non-disciplinary” modes of production of inter-subjectivity in the field of experience which is increasingly getting emptied of forms of communication in a “common language”. The exhibition of contemporary art set at this location was represent also a significant step in re-connecting art scenes in a politically and economically ravaged part of Europe. Invited artists were mostly be from the immediate region but as well other international artists whose work can be of a significant contribution to the understanding of all the above issues as well as presenting their new and intriguing consequences.
Today the bunker in Konjic is gradually becoming a time machine that inspires us to travel as much into the past as into the future. This journey was initiated and mediated by innovative practices of contemporary art, in the form of some inquiries into implications and consequences this unique place, and its historical tale.
On display was Melancholia in Arkadia beside other works by Hüseyin Alptekin.
1st TIME MACHINE Biennial of Contemporary Art
D-0 ARK Underground, Konjic, Bosnia and Herzegovina,
Exhibition “NO NETWORK” May 27 – September 27 2011,
Curated by Branislav Dimitrijević and Petar Ćuković