Milica Lapčević
– born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia in the mid-1960s. She studied art history and English literature, graduated and completed her Master’s degree at the Academy of Fine Arts in Belgrade and Konsthogskolan Stockholm, Sweden. She has been active in the field of art since the mid-1980s, in various fields, such as fine arts, video, writing and curating. Co-founder of artterror video production (1989). Main fields of research include paradoxes of social life and media, criticism of capitalism, critical and engaged perspective at the history of art and the history of thoughts. Video works and experimental films have been presented at festivals and exhibitions in Serbia, Europe and the USA.
I consider my work in art to be wandering, restless, and exploratory.
Long before studying at the Faculty of Fine Arts, I recognized interdisciplinary forms as closest to my view of art. In this sense, I was particularly drawn to artistic performances that simultaneously incorporated text, sound, music, movement, objects, and various light elements. Later, I discovered these elements in the works of pioneers of American avant-garde theater, understanding the ideological and artistic motives behind such forms. During that earliest period, photography also seemed a very contemporary medium for me. In the early 1980s, I began my first photo sessions in the old Power Plant and other locations, followed by series of photographs, mostly nighttime ones, where I documented various ad hoc performative actions. I also created collages from magazine photos, forming complex visual structures.
My first works at the Academy were created by combining oil-on-canvas techniques with various “unverified technologies”: car tires, cardboard applications, sandpaper (whose texture particularly intrigued me), metal plates exposed to atmospheric conditions and covered with rust, ready-made objects that had long lost their shape, color, and function, transforming into impressive metal, glass, mirrored, or textile waste suitable for applications, and finally, specially prepared burlap, whose texture appealed to me much more than traditional canvas. How to resist conventional technologies by finding as many diverse surfaces as possible, resistant to drawing or graphic prints intended for application, how to liberate materials and avoid creating works of lasting value but instead produce new sensory experiences, and the effort to record change, movement, and test the temporality and performative potential of media have remained central themes in my work to this day. Subsequently, discarded 16mm film strips became artistic objects onto which I directly applied drawings, processed them by immersing them in various solutions, and then colored them. Several years later, I returned to animation, integrating dynamically fragmented scenes from art history through processes of copying, cutting, coloring, and filming, believing that this approach allows us to perceive them differently.
Regarding content, all the mentioned works were dedicated to specific aspects of human relationships that transcend socially mediated frameworks, lost time and unattainable harmonies, paradoxes of social life, critiques of capitalism, especially toxic optimism of production, “entrepreneurship,” and consumption, as well as attempts to view art history and the history of thought differently through either quoting or collaging recognizable motifs.
Parallel to this, I began working in the field of video, which unfolded in several stages. In the earliest phase, in the mid-1980s, short video works were proposals for self-portraits in spaces of free introspection with synchronized cameras. The relationship between TV technology, video art, and issues of image resolution contained a profoundly subversive potential, which was one of the significant challenges for my initial explorations in this area. From the mid-1990s, I reflected with ironic detachment on the political function of individuals in relation to the state and the broader context of political events. This resulted in the video Crocodile Tears, which was often screened in subsequent years. It combines numerous random media quotes in a collage format, highlighting relationships between capital, peculiar biological mutations, and the publicly disseminated “sentiment” of the criminal and political establishment. During the NATO bombing in 1999 and shortly afterward, my work underwent a significant shift as I, for the first time, focused on ideas not mediated by the media. At that time, one of the dominant visual motifs became the sky, reflecting climatic and geopolitical movements. The sky, spanning the entire world, transcends borders, conflicts, and destructive processes, serving as a mediator of visible and invisible communications, as well as increasing interconnectedness.
In the second decade of the 21st century, following reflections on the video medium and a retrospective overview of works created over more than three decades in collaboration with artist Vladimir Šojat, we organized an exhibition under the title of our long-term production artterror. Previously completed works were partially used in a new context within a series of video installations. During this period, I also created two works about spaces of alienation, which I consider significant in questioning the themes of social progress and its articulation within stereotypical architectural or transport environments (Away from Home, Muted Presentiments). In these, seemingly “insignificant” elements of everyday perception provoke considerations of “sublime, timeless” values.However, the technological constellations in which we live today are not as opaque from the perspective of science fiction, which has had a long-lasting influence on my ideas. Prioritizing reflections on the cosmos and relationships that we can only glimpse, over the history of exploitation, inequality, and class struggles in our earthly lives, holds the potential for observing different contexts and processes beyond the anthropocentric. Within them, ideas censored, eliminated, or commodified by our civilization’s “development” are reflected. Reviving some of these ideas and making them relevant again is something I consider extremely important (Spring Cleaning).
– rođena u Beogradu, u Jugoslaviji, sredinom 1960-ih godina. Studirala je istoriju umetnosti i englesku književnost, diplomirala i završila master studije na Akademiji likovnih umetnosti u Beogradu i Konsthögskolan u Stokholmu. Aktivna je na polju umetnosti od sredine 1980-ih, u različitim oblastima kao što su likovna umetnost, video, pisanje i kuriranje. Suosnivačica artterror video produkcije (1989). Glavne oblasti istraživanja uključuju paradokse društvenog života i medija, kritiku kapitalizma, kao i kritički i angažovani pogled na istoriju umetnosti i istoriju misli. Video radovi i eksperimentalni filmovi prikazivani su na festivalima i izložbama u Srbiji, Evropi i Sjedinjenim Američkim Državama.
Svoj rad u umetnosti smatram lutalačkim, nespokojnim i tragalačkim.
Mnogo pre studija na Fakultetu likovnih umetnosti, interdisciplinarne forme sam prepoznavala kao najbliže mom pogledu na umetnost. U tom smislu, posebno su me privlačila umetnička izvođenja koji bi istovremeno uključivala tekst, zvuk, muziku, pokret, objekte i različite svetlosne elemente, a što sam sve kasnije otkrila i u delima pionira američkog avangardnog teatra, shvativši ideološke i umetničke motive nastanka tih formi. U tom najranijem periodu i fotografija je bila za mene veoma savremen medij. Početkom osamdesetih izvodim prve foto-sesije u staroj Elektrani i na drugim lokacijama, zatim serije fotografija, uglavnom noćnih, na kojima beležim(o) različite ad hoc performativne akcije, a pravim i kolaže od fotografija iz magazina od kojih sam kreirala složene vizuelne strukture.
Moji prvi radovi na Akademiji nastaju kroz ukrštanje tehnike ulja na platnu i raznih „neproverenih tehnologija”: automobilskih guma, aplikacija od kartona, šmirgl-papira koji je za mene imao posebno zanimljivu teksturu, metalnih ploča dugo izloženih atmosferskim dejstvima te stoga prekrivenih rđom, ready-made objekata koji su davno izgubili oblik, boju i funkciju i prešli u impresivni metalni, stakleni, ogledalski ili tekstilni otpad, prijemčiv za aplikacije i konačno, posebno pripremljenu jutu, čija me je tekstura daleko više privlačila nego slikarsko platno. Kako pružiti otpor konvencionalnim tehnologijama kroz iznalaženje što raznovrsnijih podloga koje se opiru crtežu ili grafičkom otisku koji bi na njega trebalo naneti, kako osloboditi materijale i ne stvarati dela trajne vrednosti već nove čulnosti, kao i nastojanje da se zabeleži promena, kretanje, ispita temporalnost medijuma kao i njihov performativni potencijal, ostaće teme kojima se bavim do danas. Nakon toga, 16mm odbačena filmska traka poslužila je kao umetnički objekat na koji sam direktno nanosila crtež, obrađivala je potapanjem u različite rastvore i potom bojila,da bi se nekoliko godina kasnije vratila animaciji kada sam kroz postupak kopiranja, potom isecanja, bojenja i snimanja integrisala dinamički fragmentisane prizore iz istorije umetnosti smatrajući da ih tako možemo sagledavati i na drugačiji način.
Kada govorimo o sadržaju, svi pomenuti radovi bili su posvećeni pojedinim aspektima ljudskih odnosa koji prevazilaze društveno posredovane okvire, zatim izgubljenom vremenu i nedostižnim harmonijama, paradoksima društvenog života, kritici kapitalizma, naročito toksičnog optimizma produkcije, „preduzetništva” i potrošnje, kao i pokušajima drugačijeg sagledavanja istorije umetnosti i istorije misli bilo kroz preuzimanje citata ili kolažiranje prepoznatljivih motiva.
Paralelno sa ovim otpočinje moj rad u oblasti videa koji se odvija u nekoliko faza. U najranijoj, sredinom osamdesetih, kratki video radovi predstavljaju predloge za autoportrete u prostoru slobodne introspekcije sa sinkovanom kamerom. Odnos TV tehnologije, video umetnosti i pitanja rezolucije slike sadržali su i duboko subverzivan potencijal, koji je bio jedan od važnih izazova za prva istraživanja u ovoj oblasti. Od sredine devedesetih s ironijskom distancom promišljam političku funkciju pojedinca u odnosu spram države i šireg konteksta političkih zbivanja. Tako nastaje video Crocodile tears koji je kasnijih godina često prikazivan, a koji u kolažnoj formi objedinjuje veliki broj nasumičnih medijskih citata koji ističu relacije između kapitala, neobičnih bioloških mutacija, te javno plasiranog „sentimenta” kriminalnog i političkog establišmenta. Tokom NATO bombardovanja 1999. i neposredno posle njega, događa se novi preokret u mom radu, kada se prvi put vodim idejama u čijem fokusu nije medijski posredovan sadržaj. Tada, jedan od dominantnih vizuelnih motiva postaje nebo koje reflektuje klimatska i geopolitička kretanja. Nebo nad čitavim svetom, koje dominira nad granicama, ratnim sukobima i procesima uništenja i koje je posrednik vidljivih i nevidljivih komunikacija pa i narastajuće umreženosti.
U drugoj deceniji XXI veka, na tragu razmišljanja o mediju videa i retrospektivnog sagledavanja radova koji su tokom više od tri decenije nastajali u saradnji s umetnikom Vladimirom Šojatom, priredili smo izložbu pod naslovom naše dugogodišnje produkcije artterror, na kojima su prethodno realizovani radovi delimično korišćeni i u novom kontekstu niza video instalacija. U ovom periodu nastaju i dva rada o prostorima otuđenosti koje smatram bitnim u pogledu propitivanja teme društvenog progresa i njegove artikulacije u stereotipnim okruženjima arhitekture ili transporta (Away from home, Muted presentiments). U njima naizgled „nebitni” elementi svakodnevne percepcije iniciraju razmatranja o “uzvišenim, neprolaznim” vrednostima.
Ipak, konstelacije tehnologije u kojima danas živimo nisu tako neprozirne sa stanovišta naučne fantastike, koja je izvršila dugotrajan uticaj na moje ideje. U davanju prioriteta promišljanjima o kosmosu i relacijama koje možemo tek da naslutimo, naspram istorije eksploatacije, neravnopravnosti i klasnih borbi u našim zemaljskim životima, sadržana je mogućnost sagledavanja drugačijih konteksta i procesa, izvan antropocentričnog. U njima se reflektuju i one ideje koje je naš civilizacijski „razvoj” cenzurisao, eliminisao ili komodifikovao, a nastojanje na tome da se neke od njih učine ponovo aktuelnim smatram veoma važnim. (Spring cleaning)
