Essay in 6th Belgrade Encounters “Latin America Meets Serbia” Book Catalogue
Commissioned and published by AKADEMIJA School of Fine Arts, Centre for Graphic Art and Visual Researches. Belgrade, SERBIA
Essays by Ljiljana Tasić and Alicia Candiani, curators
Researches, 2012 (Beograd:Cicero)
64 str.:ilustr.;21 x 21 cm
ISBN 978-86-88591-04-1
Serbian / English / Spanish
“Akademija” Research Center Visual and Graphic Arts” (Centar za grafiku i vizuelna istrazivanja Akademija) has been organizing on biennial basis the Belgrade Encounters since 2001. The purpose of these meetings is to establish organizational and artistic links between different countries, helping to position Belgrade among the leading cities on the international map of new media and printmaking. In September 2011, the VI Belgrade Encounters included the residence of 6 Latin American artists, the production of a portfolio in collaboration with 7 Serbian artists, a guest artists exhibition and a symposium with lectures and demonstrations. A book was published registering all the work and activities as well as participant artists.
As a, simultaneously, curator of the Latin American delegation and resident artist I was invited to write one of two critical texts in the book published for the 6th Belgrade Encounters. The essay addresses the project-residence and its results in a structure of 4 chapters:
1. Prologue: About the aroma of the paprika
2. Circumstances: Latin America meets Serbia
3. Actions: About collaborative work
4. Colophon: About risky journeys and successful results
“Six months after our visit to Serbia, I wonder weather the memories of Belgrade, viewed with the backlight of a magnificent sunset enjoyed while sailing smoothly down the Danube River, are even though so perfect or a fake flashback produced by my vivid imagination. What I remember most of that late summer that might seem more real to me? Intensive heat, the bustle in Knez Mihailova (the pedestrian street full of coffee-shops with people talking aloud just as in Buenos Aires), my colleagues artists’ good mood and cheerfulness, and many, many fragrances: the waters of the Sava River, the trees in Kalemegdan Park, cigarette smoke and, above all, the aroma of the paprikas”
Alicia Candiani in the Esssay’s prologue
ALICIA CANDIANI 