Mom, where are we going? Left, right, left, right... Up, down, up, down...
Those words will greet the visitors of the exhibition "Refraiming.me" by the artist Maje Šofranac which was opened on Tuesday evening in the "Art" gallery in Podgorica, and which is available to visitors until the end of November. Instead of the classic white space of the gallery, Maja Šofranac brings a playground and various children's games into the quadratic premises of the cafe-gallery on Independence Square, while further entering the gallery the visitor enters the playground, guided by instructions on the floor and well-known and lesser-known games...
The pulsating setting can be seen and analyzed from several angles, and depending on the perception, the observer deciphers meanings, solves tasks, receives messages whose sender is, in a way, himself. The artist placed the playground as the center of the exhibition, presenting it both as a scenography and as a space, a place of action and an action in itself, but also as an object in relation to the observer, and then as a complex symbolism of man's eternal walking in circles, the need for play, the contradictions of the game played by an adult and a child, diametrically different meanings of seemingly common and irrelevant terms that we use every day. The meanings of those words, depending on the situation, the game and the game in the park or at the global level, change in several ways.
It is increasingly clear that, however innocent, naive, honest and clean that playground seems to us, it is not exactly like that, although everything depends on the eyes and the mind that processes it. Maja Šofranac's playground works, connects with global events, but leaves room for everyone to find their own interpretation.
So the question "... Where are we going?" Left right? Up and down?", can easily be literally transferred into the current socio-political context, whether of Montenegro, the region, Europe, the world... That text that awaits the visitor of the exhibition is at the same time the backbone, the center and the starting point of the exhibition. Those words will await the visitor at the entrance, they will echo through the gallery, so that, after visiting the installation, they will meet them again and, most certainly, read them differently... The curator also pointed out that Milica Bezmarević who worked with the author on this project.
"In the video work 'Where are we going', the voice of a girl can be heard repeating the same questions 'where are we going mom, up or down, left or right, forward or back...', while (in the video) spinning on the children's merry-go-round in the playground . Although in the same semiotic discourse of the entire setting, here, with a repeating child's voice, the polarization is emphasized in the relationship of assumed, experiential expectation of a pleasant scene (a girl on a merry-go-round) versus wondering before children's questions as disturbing voices of the future. This work is interpreted from an extremely personal starting point of the author, which is created under the impressions of the current Montenegrin social and political circumstances and events, where the increasingly obvious ideological polarization of society is defined precisely by such precise determinants that raise the question - Left or Right, in the sense of a timely metaphor that relates to our own doctrines and commitments", wrote Bezmarević in the catalog accompanying the exhibition.
In addition, at the entrance there are two plexiglass figures, a man and a woman, which could be said to be a continuation of Maja Šofranac's previous series of works "The Immune System". In an interview with "Vijesti", the artist revealed that the installation also has a soundtrack that corresponds well with the rest of the installation, but she decided to focus on a different tone.
Further touring the gallery and getting into the essence of the works, the visitor himself enters the playground, guided by well-known and lesser-known playgrounds... Seemingly joyful, unspoiled and innocent symbols of the playground and childhood take on different meanings and interpretations in the eyes and senses of adults placed in a time that brings different crises, turbulence, fears, while fun, play and joy are absent. A swing without baskets for swinging, but with a structure on which human figures made of Plexiglas are suspended, a seesaw that lies on the floor touching the words "War" formed in metal, an interactive maze that, like old familiar toys from childhood, asks the visitor for a solution, which leads to the word "Peace", a labyrinth on the floor, instructions "jump" before the famous "school", two squares with markings for standing two people playing a mirror game and much more, encourages the viewer to participate in the exhibition, make a move in the game , resolve the situation, contribute to something through action, including your own life and society...
Bezmarević also explains that "the harmlessness of swinging on a children's swing in this situation is disturbed by the disturbing sound it produces, as well as the echoes of its ends hitting the metal tiles on which the word war is written."
"Exactly that unexpected, unpleasant sound here becomes the key moment in which our experiential perception of a certain object is called into question; the moment of facing a new connotation of its meaning - reframing the situation. The expected impression remains disappointed, the selected context acquires a new dimension", she wrote.
The interactivity makes this exhibition even more interesting for the public and worthy of the attention of all visitors, whether they are authors, creators, art lovers or just getting acquainted with visual expressions. The communication between the work and the observer encouraged by Šofranac is rare to see in Montenegro, given that every visitor is automatically a part of the installation-object, but also an actor-subject. She achieves this with all the interactive segments of the installation, and perhaps most of all with the work she realized with By pine Chauffeur. This work implies the reflection of the visitor on the gallery wall by means of a computer program that was created especially for this occasion. Based on the principle of artificial intelligence, with the help of which the computer itself learns to recognize the human body that can be observed, it is reflected as on an X-ray, a projector, a game, along with all subsequent steps, moves and the like... This is how the computer recognizes and separates the human body body in relation to other objects in space.
Explaining this work, which turns the wall into a projector and detector of the bodies of those present, the artist Šofranac expressed her special gratitude to the young scientist Boro Šofranac with whom she worked together on that, one of the central papers.
"Boro programmed a program specially for this exhibition and it is based on the principle of artificial intelligence with the help of which the computer learns to recognize the human body that can be observed in space. Thus, the computer recognizes the body in relation to the other objects in the room and reflects it on the wall, along with the movements," said the artist, and Bezmarević added:
"The work in which transparent female and male figures made of Plexiglas hang on the structure of the swing, whose forms gently collide and turn around, is a simulation of their controlled movements and behavior. In parallel with that, the camera captures every realistic human figure that is found in front of the set composition, which is further, through an algorithm and artificial intelligence, memorized and translated into a visual silhouette on the wall, where the segmented form of a human being is conveyed artistically, in a geometric contour bodies. The figure is transformed from a physical form into a completely different, virtual form, visually described by coded points; like the code Borges, where 'Aleph is a point in space that contains all other points,'" Bezmarević pointed out.
The artist thus literally directly introduces the viewer into the context of the exhibition, while further asking him for movement, action, reaction, step, sign, solution, playing, showing that action is possible, that the solution is in the hands of the individual and that sometimes everyone is drawn into the game. .. Man is not a mere observer of events and circumstances. Maja Šofranac says that none of this is new in art on a global level, but she knows what she wants to present and get from the audience she is presenting to, constantly searching for the innovative and the unique, the personal and the universal.
"In the context of the new social reality to which we belong and in which we live, the very concept of play and, even further, playground as a specific, constructed space in which someone plays, acquires a different dimension in the visual and artistic interpretation of the artist Šofranac. In the interactive installation, where the gallery space is temporarily transformed into a children's playground with all its belongings, we actually have an extremely well-thought-out, clearly conceived simulation of the situation; circumstances and positions of man in today's system", noted Bezmarević, who pointed out at the opening that she has been following and appreciating the work of Maja Šofranac for a long time.
"It was my pleasure that I had the opportunity to be involved in this substantive conceptual process of the creation of the entire exhibition, which Maja had already started with the curator Masom Vlaović and has already largely achieved, and on whose curatorial initiative Maja came to the realization of this exhibition", said Bezmarević.
In her address to the audience, Maja Šofranac emphasized that she is especially grateful to all her colleagues from the gallery "Art" JU Museums and Galleries Podgorica, curators Milica Bezmarević and Maša Vlaović for their inspiring cooperation, her husband Srdjan Ilinčić who is always an unconditional supporter for all her projects, as well as for the young scientist Boro Šofranc.
This is the first independent presentation of this artist in Podgorica after almost five years, which this time also brings something different, new, fresh, unexpected and surpasses expectations, and it also seems to be an example of successful cooperation and communication between the curators (in this case the female curator ) and female artists.
Bonus video:
