Association for research, documentation and artist representation SKLOP is pleased to announce, that the jury for the ZVONO Award 2018 has selected four finalists on the jury meeting, held on June 1, 2018, at SKLOP. The four finalists for The ZVONO Award 2018 are:
Igor BOŠNJAK (*1981, Sarajevo)
Nikola KEKEROVIĆ (*1991, Banja Luka)
Vesna MAJSTOROVIĆ (*1994, Gradiška)
Saša TATIĆ (*1991, Banja Luka)
The ZVONO Award – YVVA The Young Visual Artists Award – is an award for young visual artists from Bosnia and Herzegovina up to the age of 40. The winner will be awarded with a two-months residency in New York at Residency Unlimited, supported by TMU Trust for Mutual Understanding, New York.
The winner will be announced at the finalists’ group exhibition, opening on October 12, 2018, at SKLOP, Sarajevo.
The ZVONO Award for the award winner consists of a two-months residency in New York at Residency Unlimited and a solo exhibition upon the return of the award winner from the US.
The finalists were selected by an international jury consisting of:
Jean-Claude FREYMOND-GUTH, independent curator and artist advisor (Basel/CH & Brussels/BE); Nina KOMEL, artist and the Zvono award winner 2016 (Brod/BA), Karina KOTTOVA, curator & director of the Jindřich Chalupecký Society (Prague/CZE); James Merle TMOMAS, Professor of Global Contemporary Art, Tyler School of Art, Temple University (Philadelphia/US), Christopher YGGDRE, director L’ Agence à Paris/FR & co-curator Pavilion of Bosnia-Herzegovina at the 57th Biennale di Venezia, 2017 (Paris/FR).
In the following (text with quotation marks) you can read extracts from the jury statement, conceived by the jury president Jean-Claude Freymond Guth:
“In order to confirm a final selection of the four finalists, the jury took many aspects and opinions into consideration. This included, first and foremost, the quality of both application and additional information available on the artists. The jury also considered additional factors, including applicant activity in previous years of the Zvono Award, frequency and caliber of finalist exhibitions, and questions of diversity and equality. Finally, the jury also emphasized its interest in cultivating a finalist group that represents a diversity of artistic subjects and content. (…)
The jury is extremely pleased with this selection and with the process of confirming the four finalists. The 2018 Zvono Award finalists represent four individual artistic positions of great achievement at different stages in their working experience, age, and formal approach. The jury believes in the Zvono Award’s potential to support artists at many moments of their career, and is convinced that each of the finalists could profit enormously from the prize—not only in terms of their work and lives, but also as a factor in how they may draw from the experience as they contribute to their respective artistic communities.
As a final note, the jury would like to express its gratitude to all who applied to the 2018 Zvono Award. The overall quality of work was impressive and outstanding, and communicated a sophisticated level of self-confidence and talent, while emphasizing specific cultural, political, and historical topics—qualities that have gained urgency in an art world that has become increasingly uniform and commercial. Through a process that includes all of its applicants—and regardless of one’s participation in the finalist’s exhibition—The 2018 Zvono Award demonstrates that art may provide form and inspiration to connect subjective experience, cultural difference, and formal diversity to something more inclusive and egalitarian than other fields of contemporary society.”
ABOUT THE ZVONO AWARD
The ZVONO Award – YVVA The Young Visual Artists Award in Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH) – was established in 2006 by SCCA Sarajevo Center for Contemporary Art. Since 2017 the Association for research, documentation and research SKLOP, Sarajevo, is the new official partner for the organization of the award in BiH.
The ZVONO Award is realized by SKLOP together with two partner institutions from New York: Residency Unlimited and The Trust for Mutual Understanding.
The contest is announced with an open call in public and social media and is open for visual artists from BiH up to the age of 40.
The ZVONO Award for the award winner consists of a two-months residency in New York at Residency Unlimited and a solo exhibition upon the return of the award winner from the US.
The aim of The ZVONO Award is to provide support to young creative artists and to facilitate the continuation of their activities by shifting them from the marginal to a central role in the society. This is established by creating a positive context for the young art, creativity, and innovativeness which society could and should identify.
The ZVONO Award is part of YVVA The Young Visual Artists Award network, consisting of 12 countries from south-eastern Europe (www.yvaawards.org). The award project has been conceived as a new and prestigious point of gathering the most creative forces of the art contemporary scene, locally, where the award is being awarded, but also internationally, in the countries where the award is acknowledged.
Project is supported by Swiss agency for developmend and cooperation (SDC)
SHORT ARTIST STATEMENTS AND BIOGRAPHIES
Igor BOŠNJAK (*1981, Sarajevo)
“Viewed from a marxist, utopian kind of perspective, all people are potentially artists. My approach to how I create my art, including video works, is utterly conceptual. I carefully select the best medium for an initial idea I wish to materialise, or better still visualise. After selecting the medium, I contextualise the idea, collect theoretical background, research, texts, Internet sources, and only then do I move on to the production. I am also very interested to relations between history facts and loading history, past and future, and how reality is connected to personal and collective memory.“ Igor Bošnjak, The Zvono Award 2018 Finalist.
EDUCATION: 2005 Department of Painting, Academy of Fine Arts Trebinje, BA. 2008 MA program Interdisciplinary Studies, Theory of Art and Media, University of Arts in Belgrade, SRB.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS: 2011 Image/Time, Museum of Contemporary Art of Republic of Srpska, Banja Luka, BA. 2014 It is not the literal past that rules us, it is image of the past, Duplex 100m2, Sarajevo, BA. 2015 Self-management, Podroom Gallery, Cultural Centre Belgrade, Belgrade, SRB; Accumulated history, Eastwards Prospectus Gallery, Bucharest, RO. 2017 EUtopia Project, MOCAV Museum of Contemporary Art Vojvodina, Novi Sad, SRB.
GROUP EXHIBITIONS: 2012 Inconclusive Analysis, National Center for Contemporary Art & Moscow Museum of Modern Art, Moscow, RU. 2014 New Cinema & Contemporary Art, Rencontres Internationales, Gaîté Lyrique & Palais de Tokyo, Paris, FR; Disappearing Things, 55th October Salon, Belgrade, SRB. 2015: The Future of Memory, Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna, AT. 2016 Artists Film International, Whitechapel Gallery, London, UK.
AWARDS: 2006 Swiss Pro Helvetia Grant for Cultural Programme, Pro Helvetia, Sarajevo, BA. 2007 First award for Experimental Video, 4th Video Salon, Velenje, SI. 2010 ZVONO Young Visual Artist Award Finalist, Sarajevo Center for Contemporary Art, Sarajevo, BA. 2011 Henkel Art Award, BH Finalist for Henkel Art Award, Zagreb, HR. 2016 49th Herceg Novi Winter Salon Award, Herceg Novi, MNE.
Nikola KEKEROVIĆ (*1991, Banja Luka)
“ My artistic activity takes place in the critical reflection of art and society as well as personal, individual, intimate, experiential situation relating to the wider social context. All artworks are not made in a vacuum; they are a reflection of the community. In my works, I’m ironically criticizing on the establishment as represents of authority and setting up questions towards the system of valorization of the artworks. Of my works, I’m expecting to awake the critical awareness towards the social hypocrisy, according to aesthetic and ideological mechanisms of cultural power and domination.” Nikola Kekerović, The Zvono Award 2018 Finalist.
EDUCATION: 2014 Department of Painting, Academy of Arts, Univeristy of Banja Luka, BA. 2014 Salzburg International Summer Academy, Class Figure.Ground.Perception, Salzburg, AT. 2017-, MA program Public Art and New Artistic Strategies, Bauhaus University, Weimar, DE.
GROUP EXHIBITIONS: 2015 EAMIF – Edinburgh Artists Moving Images Film festival, Edinburgh, UK. 2016 Contemporary Thesaurus, Museum of Contemporary Art of Republic of Srpska, Banja Luka, BA. 2017 The Laughing in face of… , 23. Biennial of Humour and Satire in Art, Grabovo, BG; Odlična izložba, Kamena zgrada, Banja Luka, BA; 3. Berliner Herbstsalon – DESINTEGRIERT EUCH!, Maxim Gorki Theatre, Palais am Festungsgraben, Kronprinzenpalais, Berlin, DE.
AWARDS: 2014 6th namaTre.ba project/biennial, in association with KulturKontakt Austria and Austrian Federal Agency, Award for best young video artist in Bosnia and Herzegovina; Award for the best works from multimedia researches at the annual final exhibition of Academy of Arts in Banja Luka, BA.
Vesna MAJSTOROVIĆ (*1994, Gradiška)
“I can describe my work as a constant search for the best way to interpret my ideas that I have about myself and the world I live in. The ideas that reflect me as an artist and my everyday struggle for creating, I express though various mediums. I strive to express every problem that concerns me as an artist and as a human, through art.”
Vesna Majstorović, The Zvono Award 2018 Finalist.
EDUCATION: 2013- Department of Painting, Academy of Arts, University of Banja Luka, BA. SOLO EXHIBITIONS: 2017 The perception of reality, National Assembly of the Republic of Srpska, Banja Luka, BA. 2018 Individual mythologies, Gallery Plus, Museum of Contemporary Art of Republic of Srpska, Banja Luka, BA.
GROUP EXHIBITIONS: 2012 Painting exhibition in Art space “Koraci” Ministry of Culture and Education of Republic of Srpska, Banja Luka, BA. 2013 Painting exhibition of Art society Gradiška, Gradiška, BA. 2016: Video art exibition ArtZ Fest, Atelier Ismet Mujezinović, Tuzla, BA; Eco colony Blidinje, Široki Brijeg, BA; Final exhibition of Academy of Arts Banja Luka, Banja Luka, BA. 2017 Happening “RENAULT 25” Art space Prostor, Banja Luka, BA; ContempLorary, Art space Prostor, Banja Luka, BA; Final exhibition of Academy of Arts Banja Luka, Banja Luka, BA.
AWARDS: 2017 Award for the best works in the field of Intermedia art at the annual final exhibition of the Academy of Arts in Banja Luka, Banja Luka, BA; Award of the Museum of Contemporary Art of Republic of Srpska for the best works at the annual final exhibition of the Academy of Arts, Banja Luka, BA.
Saša TATIĆ (*1991, Banja Luka/BA)
“Tendencies of a contemporary transitional society, which manifest through informally adopted social practices, has formed numerous mass spread individual behavioural patterns of the society to which I belong. (…) Placing them in the context of art, through my works I address common meaning created in common space and dealing with thematic connected to still traditionally oriented consciousness about material and immaterial values, affiliation, origin and inheritance, I add elements that offer possibilities for new interpretations of values with simultaneous evoking critical awareness.” Saša Tatić, The Zvono Award 2018 Finalist.
EDUCATION: 2014 Department of Graphics, Academy of Arts, University of Banja Luka, BA. 2017 MA program Public Art and New Artistic Strategies, Bauhaus University, Weimar, BA.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS: 2018 Homewards, SKC Gallery Kragujevac, SRB; Homewards, Gallery Reflektor, Užice, SRB.
GROUP EXHIBITIONS: 2018 Immer Ärger mit den Großeltern / The Trouble with Grandparents, Kunsthaus Dresden, DE. 2017 Heterotopia: The Spaces of Otherness, Serbian House, London, UK. 2016 Contemporary Thesaurus, Museum of Contemporary Art of Republic of Srpska, Banja Luka, BA. 2015 32nd Kassel Documentary Film and Video Festival, Kassel, DE. 2015 16th International Media Art Biennale WRO 2015 TEST EXPOSURE, Wroclaw, PL.
AWARDS: 2015 and 2018 Jury Award for the best short film, 60seconds Film Festival, Copenhagen, DK. 2015 The Jury Award and Special mention for the best work of visual experiment at CTL 59 seconds European audio-visual creation competition, Pamplona, ES; European Audience Award at Euro Videographies Festival, Liege, BE.
