Repair’s experimental digital campaign

The continual experimental digital campaign that encompasses the activities of the Repair project is yet another space for interdisciplinary encounters, as well as testing and implementing methodologies of creative research, reflection, and production.

We have adapted publishing formats and methods, taking into account the thematic focuses of the research within the project, as well as broader transformations in the reception of cultural content, while fostering a collaborative and participatory approach. The idea of experimental dissemination of the project is reflected not only in the diversity of digital and print content production, but also in the mediation of areas of interest through various formats, opening these focuses to interpretation by various authors: artists, writers, journalists and critics active in different parts of the cultural sphere.

In addition to being research and production-oriented, the Repair project is also an experimental media platform. With the aim of achieving accessibility for different audiences, we developed multimedia formats of illustrated and visual reports in which artists react to the content and themes of our Repair project. In addition to the visual reflections by young illustrators and visual artists, the digital segment of our experimental campaign also includes podcasts and a polyphonic review experiment. A selection of different content that was produced with the abovementioned efforts can be found below.

Experimental reflections

More details on each of the visual reflections, accompanied by the English translations of textual parts can be found on the Flow section of this web.

Here, we present through the various focuses tackled through the project:

• ~ power of pleasure and importance of joy;
• ~ organizing, resisting and hacking the systemic obstacles that surround culture;
• ~ art of failure;
• ~ more-than-human encounters and collaborations;
• ~ and speculative futures.

On the importance on pleasure and joy

In two of the illustrated reports that accompanied the Sex Education II lecture-performance cycle, two young artists from Croatia and Slovenia produced illustrated reflections of the performances.

Petra Divković responded to Sex Education II: Ability that took place at the stage of Academy of Dramatic Arts in 2024. Ability is based on stories of four women about their sexual coming-of-age, their relationship to their bodies, their sexuality and their relationships. What the four women have in common is that they live with a disability and are thus, as Elena Pečarič says in her essay So beautiful, yet disabled, faced with double discrimination, as persons with a disability and as women.

One of the lecture-performances of Sex Education II is dedicated to consent, asking what consent in sex actually means. with an illustrated reflection on consent, a topic in the frame of the lecture-performance cycle. In her response, Maja Poljanc used lipstick and nail polish for different versions of the illustration, producing a short video that enabled a closer look into the process.

Podcast: Repair’s researcher’s thoughts on the importance of emotions in research and creative procesess, prod. by Kurziv

Organizing, resisting and hacking vs. the systemic obstacles

Antonela Šurbek reported on Una Bauer’s lecture about the obstacles facing attempts to eradicate violent practices in educational institutions through a series of illustrations:

Instututional and systemic setbacks in cultural and artistic education and working conditions were also a topic of Space without a name – vulnerable position and systems, a lecture-performance by Ana Kuzmanić who shared a view on art system through the lens of dyslexia which was recognized in adulthood. A reflection by Klara Rusan Klarxy:

Systemic pressure of hyperproductivity in culture, but also in broader socio-economical environment was the main issue addressed by our collective research of the potentials of rest, slowing down and leisure within Repair Shack Molat, where project researchers were joined by illustrator Ena Jurov:

Molat Colony (on compulsory non-work)

Ena also reported from Exposium, the final event of our project, which entangled all of Repair’s focuses:

Art of Failure

In a polyphonic review, two young critics reflected on I passed the stage of disappointment long ago by the artist Fette Sans, member of team Rhizome. The performance, which was part of Exposium in Zagreb, deals with the multiple performance of female roles on and off-screen in the format of the open-stage rehearsal accompanied with work in progress film fragments focused on the main protagonist (Zora Bjelousov) roaming empty public spaces and abandoned hotel interiors. Nora Čulić Matošić and Mihael Željko Crnčec chatted about the work:

More-than-human encounters

An expedition called HIC SVNT DRACONES, but actually mld was conceived by the team Rhizome’s artist Maja Bojanić. The expedition is based on the records of researchers from the Institute for the Protection of Mold, an imaginary organization in which Bojanić has been “working” for the past two years. An expedition was joined by the illustrator Ivona Cvitković:

Podcast: audio reportage from the expedition, by Ivana Pejić

A visual reflection and excercises by Zakole team:

Speculative Futures

Through the formats of podcasts, project partners and associates followed the paths of our Yugofuturist experimental focus.

Podcast: audio guide through Hrvoslava Brkušić’s research process of yugofuturist histories of unalignment, by Sara Gurdulić

Podcast: researchers’ exchange on potentials of more-than-human encounters and collaborations, by Kurziv

From Engaged Thought, a podcast series by Belgrade’s Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory

Podcast: researchers’ exchange on Yugofuturism, by Hana Sirovica