June 10 Text from Slovenian participant...saso
From: cfront-admin@cfront.org
[mailto:cfront-admin@cfront.org]On Behalf Of saso vrabic
Sent: Sunday, June 10, 2001 1:24 AM
To: cfront@cfront.org
Subject: [CFront] Text from Slovenian participant...saso
Hey I'm sending you a short unedited reading that I had
yesterday, so you can read it and maybe just have some coments or good time.
sorry that I was reading and that I'm sending you unedited text, but that's the
way I like it.. the Barbie-Q was just great... now we are going to party,
tomorrow morning we have workshop with children and latter we are going in
Rodopi to the monastery with Jane and Luka/// still not sure If I'll manage but
the rhythm of the festival is just going to the limits.....
01010101010101010010101010101010101010100001010111010101010101010101010
Have a nice time
Saso Vrabic
saso@mail.ljudmila.org
http://www.ljudmila.org/~saso/plovdiv/
(check what's going on in Plovdiv....)
Slovene micro reality after Manifesta 2000 in Ljubljana or
more personally... I'm a proffesional babysitter
(Essay on ethics, arts, information and life in Slovenia) - for C-front, Plovdiv
2001
It's usual to get different stories at the festivals like these and I got them, really. I always got a lot from discussions with different artists - creators and speakers. So, that's why I'm very thankful for invited me to be a part of c-front and to visit Plovdiv and Bulgaria again. When I was visiting first C-front in 1999, I presented the work of young slovenian artists and Ljudmila http://www.ljudmila.org (Ljubljana Digital Media Lab). I also presented my own video works on CD-rom that I made and after C-front I made ever better one just because idea.org or should I say Stewart Nolan and Jan Southern showed me some tricks in Lingo programing. That video CD was also a part of my MA disertation that I done recently. It's good that the people with creative thoughts are meeting each other in the same spot. So, I always expect something new or interesting. I'm enjoying staying with a people who are inspiration to me and that's m! y space I like to live in.
Cyberspace is just a tool to stay in touch with the creative
world. It's quite hard to get a chance in Slovenia to get in such circumstances
in other cities like Ljubljana, Maribor or Celje as being one of thee largest
cities in Slovenia. Slovenians are quite closed, but that doesn't mean that we
didn't have Manifesta in Ljubljana and great show 2000+ curated by Zdenka
Badovinac, presenting works of east European artists. This show moved also to
New York. So, after Manifesta nothing radicaly changed, but anyway things are
happening. People are networking with e-mails like the children magicians are
doing with howls in popular fiction book Harry Potterr. Big shows are planing
and we are opening internationaly with culture, art, politics, sports,
whatever... We had Giro d'Italia 2nd largest bycycle tournament recently touring
around Slovenia for two days, which brought an Italian police and sport
manifestation to Slovene streets. Europe here we come! President Bush ! and
Putin will meet in Slovenia this month on 16th of June. We are noman's land,
somewhere between. So are we south - eastern Europe or North Balkan? The student
scholarships will be taxed for now on. Bad or good, some people are getting
biger and other are getting smaller. That?s not a surprise at all. Social micro
reality in Slovenia is different than reality in the west. I think we can sell
ourselves well. We are not so recognisable for observers of E.U., but we are
like cameleons, we like those who are bigger and then act like them. And that?s
not good. Statistics says that we like supermarkets, giant mega movie theatres
and everything that's good and it's from west. Even without a commercial we
think big is good and shop till we drop. Europe - big country without borders?
And what is good, by the way? Macro reality is something that's very different
If you think global. In Slovenia there are no strikes agains kapitalism,
globalism or giant companies. We are still behind! that, we have our own
reality. Parlament consists of the natonal assembly and its deputies. The number
of all deputies is 90 and 12 of them are women. We had just one woman in
parlament few years ago...so, I hope the number wil be equal in the next 10
years.
We will have a referendum for a single women right to have a baby concieved in a
laboratory. We?ll have a referendum for or against artificial insemination. We
have about 10 women in Slovenia that wants to concieve a child without man. Who
should decite for you? It's realy silly that we will have a referendum and that
poeple will decite for a group of women who wants to have a baby concieved in
different way. People are talking:" Ok, woman can choose... what about
child - child can not? Even more problematic, more social question is about
woman rights in Yugoslavia in Serbia, where parlament is now thinking to give a
woman with a adopted child the same status as women who can have their own
babies. So, women in Yugoslavia with adopted child are not supported. When we
think of Dutch we can see a difference: euthanasia, prostitution, marijuana,
same-sex marrieges. So, on the other hand we are allowing Bush and Putin to have
a meeting in Slovenia just to show that we! are open. Maybe we will have more
american turist crossing Slovenia without fear. On the other hand it will be
good for George Bush to get know that Slovenia is not Slovakia or Slavonia and
that we speak different language than any others in the world. Well, no offence
to American school sistem, but that?s kind of true. Global world geography is
american blind spot. What about strikes? Being angry striker doesn?t mean that
you?ll achieve your rights. To strike with computer viruses with a reason makes
more sense than breaking cars and using rage? What strikes in many big cities
brought us? I?m interested in that? I?m interested what would alternative leader
do with power If the power of actual leader will be lost?
The science and ethics in the history have some problems. Albert Einstein didn't
have a clue that his theory will be a motive for atomic bomb. What is reality
now and what will be a sience fiction for us in the future? The main philosophic
background for great movie The Matrix is very well known work of Rene
Decartes...I think therefore I am ....so why oh why didn't I take the blue pill?
What's all our creative or destructive thoughts are leading us?
"Web cams are real cameras in real life that are
connected in cyber-space - the space that?s becoming more end more functional.
Life is becoming more end more complicated. Direct relations among people are
changing to indirect - electronic. Borders of our everyday communication are
getting new frontiers. It?s amazing how easy we act over computers. We organize
our work, plan our meetings, build our home pages, virtual galleries, our
writings, etc. We got a feeling that we got whole world in our hands (If servers
are working and If internet is not buisy) We can plan a project and got all
funds for it, not realy know all of the participants. Virtual reality is
becoming our everyday. The rhythm of life is pulling us not only from the people
we live with, but also nature. With a push of a button we can get a warm and
bright space. If there is something wrong we call the operater or someone who
knows something about electronics. As we turn on the light we almost ne! ver
think that we flooded valleys just that the force of the water can turn the
turbines, that nuclear reactions are going on in the reactors and that the
clouds of smoke are rolling out of big chimneys." #
#Alenka Gaberšèik - Virtual Reality
O.K. I'm an artist and it's hard to talk about science fiction
and the future, but what's real now. Reality is that I personaly have a MA in
arts - video and graphic, but I work as a baby-sitter. So what do I thinking? If
nice people would not invite me to Plovdiv I would be still baby-sitting 10
month old Max. For being only a painter or should I say artist, you have to be
very strong I guess. 2 million people are living in Slovenia and we have 200
private galeries, but only 5 are dealing with art, others are dealing with
art-craft or souveniers. So how to survive as a contemporary artist in micro -
Slovenia? The artist in Slovenia can achieve a status that bring them basic
social security and old age pension insurance. That's hard to get, but If you
get it that means that you start to work as a culture worker. That also means
that you are working for a Republic of Slovenia, but you actually don't see
money...it's virtual, it's for security. But that?s a mi! cro story?
*****************************
unedited text: read in plovdiv 9.6.2001 ..Presented also http://www.ljudmila
.org/scca/ publication VIDEO DOKUMENT (about 30 years of slovene video art -
check a catalouge and book of eseys and CD-Rom> check it on computer #1 in
Mexican Plovdiv), After Manifesta publication - SCCA Platform (same URL), and
24.Biennial of Graphic Arts Ljubljana .... http://www.mgb24.org
and sorry for the mistakes...
see Ya!