By Una Zabunov
Belgrade, Sept. 28, 2009 (Serbia Today) - Serbian public rarely speaks about serious disorders such as autism. Autism is a problem with the way how the brain grows and develops. Citizens probably do not know that about 600 autistic children live in Belgrade and most of them do not have adequate accommodations.
There are only two housing centers designed for children with severe retardation with the elements of autism and children with pure form of autism. Their total capacity is very small. These institutions can accommodate only about 70 children. Since their capacities are full, there are waiting lists for the provision of accommodation.
On the waiting list are currently ten people. However, the real needs for housing are greater. Parents are aware that it’s almost impossible to get the accommodation, and they do not apply for the waiting list. They are forced to find alternative solutions for their children.
The story about autistic girl is filmed five years ago by our famous director Goran Paskaljević in the film "Midwinter Night's Dream". One of the main actresses of this film is autistic in real life. This film opened the door of autism and Goran shows in his film features of autism. Characteristic of children with autism is that they are not very good socially. They have adjustable mood and sometimes they do not like to look at others while talking to them, or do not want to share their thoughts with others. They have a problem with communicating. Sometimes they may not talk, or want to talk with others and they repeat themselves.
World estimates show that out of 10,000 newborn babies 60 of them are born with autism. Belgrade must have at least two new dormitories for children with autism. Although these children retreat from society, society should not run away from them.
Saturday, October 3, 2009
Elementary School Teachers’ strike on hold for now
By Li Novak
Belgrade, Sept. 24, 2009 (Serbia Today) - The Forum of Belgrade Primary Schools is the only representative primary school’s Union on the city level, which means that this Union has the biggest number of members. Under its organization, 16 schools have decided to hold a strike of warning on Friday September 18, 2009. The other schools from the same Union have decided to support the strike, but not to join. The reason for lack of bigger support is in fear from the pressures and the possible sanctions, the representatives from the Forum told Serbia Today.
President of The Forum of Belgrade Primary Schools Mrs. Radmila Dodic told Serbia Today that there were strong reasons for the strike: it is impossible to get from the Ministry of education any straight information about upcoming process called “rationalization”, about leaving payments and excess of working force. Also, there were no real consultations with unions, because the government keeps its measures in the dark.
Mrs. Dodic told us that The Forum of Belgrade Primary Schools made a decision to freeze the strike, for now. The decision about other form of struggle will be made in the ending of October. In the press release it was said: ”The Minister of education has spoken to us not personally, but by the media and declared that document about rationalization will be shown first to the Government and second to the education Unions. Because of that, we decided to give him the chance to fulfill the promise, and we froze the strike. After publishing of that document, the members of our union will meet again to analyze the government’s offer and to make decision about future moves.
The Forum of Belgrade Primary Schools got the support from The Forum of High Schools Experts. Radmila Dodic told us that the biggest number of media has totally ignored the strike. “Not important news or censorship?” – she asks.
The main goal of the planned strike was intention of the teachers to be better informed about upcoming school reform and about their own personal and professional near future. But the Minister of education Zarko Obradovic and the Government ignored this demand and didn’t organize any meeting with The Forum on the subject.
The Forum of Belgrade Primary Schools continues their campaign, by organizing the conversations and addressing the authorities.
Mrs. Dodic emphasized the fact that scandalized education public: on Friday, the strike has been frozen, and on Monday, in Belgrade schools, rationalization secretly began.
This union also sent the letter to the People’s office of the President of Republic Serbia, Boris Tadic. In it, they address to the president as the former teacher, and underline their astonishment by the Ministry of education’s actions, which disturbs the regular school year.
Belgrade, Sept. 24, 2009 (Serbia Today) - The Forum of Belgrade Primary Schools is the only representative primary school’s Union on the city level, which means that this Union has the biggest number of members. Under its organization, 16 schools have decided to hold a strike of warning on Friday September 18, 2009. The other schools from the same Union have decided to support the strike, but not to join. The reason for lack of bigger support is in fear from the pressures and the possible sanctions, the representatives from the Forum told Serbia Today.
President of The Forum of Belgrade Primary Schools Mrs. Radmila Dodic told Serbia Today that there were strong reasons for the strike: it is impossible to get from the Ministry of education any straight information about upcoming process called “rationalization”, about leaving payments and excess of working force. Also, there were no real consultations with unions, because the government keeps its measures in the dark.
Mrs. Dodic told us that The Forum of Belgrade Primary Schools made a decision to freeze the strike, for now. The decision about other form of struggle will be made in the ending of October. In the press release it was said: ”The Minister of education has spoken to us not personally, but by the media and declared that document about rationalization will be shown first to the Government and second to the education Unions. Because of that, we decided to give him the chance to fulfill the promise, and we froze the strike. After publishing of that document, the members of our union will meet again to analyze the government’s offer and to make decision about future moves.
The Forum of Belgrade Primary Schools got the support from The Forum of High Schools Experts. Radmila Dodic told us that the biggest number of media has totally ignored the strike. “Not important news or censorship?” – she asks.
The main goal of the planned strike was intention of the teachers to be better informed about upcoming school reform and about their own personal and professional near future. But the Minister of education Zarko Obradovic and the Government ignored this demand and didn’t organize any meeting with The Forum on the subject.
The Forum of Belgrade Primary Schools continues their campaign, by organizing the conversations and addressing the authorities.
Mrs. Dodic emphasized the fact that scandalized education public: on Friday, the strike has been frozen, and on Monday, in Belgrade schools, rationalization secretly began.
This union also sent the letter to the People’s office of the President of Republic Serbia, Boris Tadic. In it, they address to the president as the former teacher, and underline their astonishment by the Ministry of education’s actions, which disturbs the regular school year.
Serbian Rosaries "Brojanice"
By Una Zabunov
Belgrade, Sept. 28, 2009 (Serbia Today) - Praying while using rosaries is one of the oldest ways of prayer, which was particularly cherished by Orthodox monks. The rosaries have a symbolic character as well. With the political and social changes in Serbian society, wearing a rosaries became for many Serbs the expression of their ethnic sentiments and religious beliefs. However, for some young people Rosary became a fashion accessory.
Rosaries are usually black, and they remind the faithful to lead sober and serious life in constant repentance. Rosaries are knitted from pure sheep's wool. Small bracelet rosaries have 33 knots. There are bigger rosaries of 50, 100 or 300 knots.
Today one can find rosaries made of many different materials and in various colors. There are blue, red and even gold rosaries for fitting with the wardrobe. On the wrists of young people we can often see two or three rosaries, which no longer have their true meaning, but are no more than a fashion statement.
Belgrade, Sept. 28, 2009 (Serbia Today) - Praying while using rosaries is one of the oldest ways of prayer, which was particularly cherished by Orthodox monks. The rosaries have a symbolic character as well. With the political and social changes in Serbian society, wearing a rosaries became for many Serbs the expression of their ethnic sentiments and religious beliefs. However, for some young people Rosary became a fashion accessory.
Rosaries are usually black, and they remind the faithful to lead sober and serious life in constant repentance. Rosaries are knitted from pure sheep's wool. Small bracelet rosaries have 33 knots. There are bigger rosaries of 50, 100 or 300 knots.
Today one can find rosaries made of many different materials and in various colors. There are blue, red and even gold rosaries for fitting with the wardrobe. On the wrists of young people we can often see two or three rosaries, which no longer have their true meaning, but are no more than a fashion statement.
Living in Harmony with Nature and Yourself
By Ljilja Cvekic
BREZOVICA, August 11, 2009 (Serbia Today) – “What do you think the 21st century is bringing to us?” This is a question Bozidar Mandic, a founder of the only commune in Serbia that has survived to date, asks each of his visitors in the wonderful oasis of peaceful green fields and woods bordered by three creeks in the middle of loud, polluted and increasingly absurd civilization, just 100 kilometers away of Belgrade.
The only way we can struggle today against absurdness of consumer mentality, pessimism and negative energy, materialism and technology of modern impersonal world, he says, is to form such little islands that would bring back to us lost communication, emotions, creativity, time and sense. To gain ourselves back.
“A search for freedom has always been the essence of my life,” Mandic told Serbia Today.
He escaped the urban life in 1977, when he moved with his friends artists from their hometown Novi Sad to a hundred-year old country house and wildness, forming his Family of Clear Waters (Porodica Bistrih Potoka) as “a small suggestion to a human how to find a way out of a labyrinth he has been trapped in”.
“We’ve lived without any ideology or organizational imperatives. Freedom and creative life was all that we wanted. To be ourselves and to hold the sense in our own hands. We had everything except money. We made an oath that we’ll resist ever to be attracted by the power of money. To be modest, instead, and share with others.”
At that time many similar communes were appearing and disappearing around the world. It was a period when hippy movement and sexual revolution were still alive, when young people raised their voices against conventions and money as a measure of success, singing about peace, love and happiness, friendship and life freed of rules and orders. Times were changing, many hippies from the past have got their own children and became serious professors, politicians or bank managers in suits and ties, giving up the ideas of freedom and accepting all rules of their societies.
He remained fateful for 33 years to his initial idea of “a money-less economy”, resisting technology and living his “forest philosophy”. The Family of Clear Waters has turned from an intensive commune of people searching after the sense of life into a family commune, where he lived with his wife and three children and many friends. Children have eventually grown up and went their own ways, wives and friends were coming and leaving, replacing each other.
It was not always easy to live that kind of life. “It’s not easy to be free,” he says. Winters might be very cold and there is still no bathroom. His first wife got tired, moved to the city with children, then the second.
“I’m now in the third phase of parenthood, when children started looking after me and giving back that idyllic emotion I was poring on them without any punishment, authority and teaching,” said Mandic, 58, now grandfather of three. “It is important to find yourself within yourself and on your own.”
Many generations of young people have spent years there, living and working together, growing tomato, beans and potatoes in the garden, cooking on the wooden stove end eating at the big old dining table in the open, discussing and reading poetry sitting on an improvised wooden stage and benches in the yard, and sleeping on mattresses together at the main house.
The old house next to it had initially a sign at the entrance saying: “Even enemies are welcome here”. There is a small gallery and library now, and a barn, a stone building that once hosted two cows, has turned into a theatre, with simple wooden floor and a bench leaning against the wall. Steep wooden stairs lead to another stage under the roof.
“The commune has got its ephemeral form – a life in solitude. I have now much more time and peace for creation. Isolated, but not lonely, I live alone but with many people visiting and staying for a while; they are all accepted here with lot of love and joy, I believe in cheerful kindness as a new form of revolution, in saving the world with beauty,” he says.
The life is simple here. He rises with the Sun, wipes the floor in his little working room and writes for a while on his old typewriter, then works in the garden and around the house, reads, goes for long walks with his dog, fast as a lightening and white as a snow. “I think that time is not passing; it just has different densities. Time is here so thick that you can grab full hands of it. Life is slow, in harmony with nature.”
He says he cannot write, although he published 20 books of essays, poems and novels, and he cannot make art and theater, although he staged dozens of avant-garde theater plays and art exhibitions. “Stories are writing themselves, I’m just writing down thoughts and sentences from the nature, transforming them into pieces of art done only in natural material, wood and stone and dried horseshit, and then putting all that process of creation on the stage; we’re just playing ourselves on the stage, streets and fields.”
While he lives a natural and archaic life, he creates a modern art, based on three elements of authenticity – honesty, courage and simplicity. Each summer, the Family of Clear Waters hosts an avant-garde theater festival, when many actors and theater directors come to spend time together, enjoy art and nature, dialogue and laugh.
But Mandic says young people are playing and laughing much less than before. They are not ready to open up, they know neither how to express themselves nor to listen, didn’t learn to communicate, but just blubber instead. “One theme is inevitable in all talks we have here – relations between men and women. There’s a huge gap between two sexes, roles have been mixed and lost, making everybody unhappy.”
Although a great opponent of technology, computer, Internet and mobile phones, saying they are taking away a character and personality, living with no tab water and hitchhiking all his life when traveling, Mandic admits that he has got little tired and agreed finally to accept an old car from his son, an old TV set and his first phone for his children’s sake. “My daughters worry about me. I’m scared it would ruin my peace. But I’m also excited. Can you imagine when I get tomorrow the phone and for the first time somebody calls!”
BREZOVICA, August 11, 2009 (Serbia Today) – “What do you think the 21st century is bringing to us?” This is a question Bozidar Mandic, a founder of the only commune in Serbia that has survived to date, asks each of his visitors in the wonderful oasis of peaceful green fields and woods bordered by three creeks in the middle of loud, polluted and increasingly absurd civilization, just 100 kilometers away of Belgrade.
The only way we can struggle today against absurdness of consumer mentality, pessimism and negative energy, materialism and technology of modern impersonal world, he says, is to form such little islands that would bring back to us lost communication, emotions, creativity, time and sense. To gain ourselves back.
“A search for freedom has always been the essence of my life,” Mandic told Serbia Today.
He escaped the urban life in 1977, when he moved with his friends artists from their hometown Novi Sad to a hundred-year old country house and wildness, forming his Family of Clear Waters (Porodica Bistrih Potoka) as “a small suggestion to a human how to find a way out of a labyrinth he has been trapped in”.
“We’ve lived without any ideology or organizational imperatives. Freedom and creative life was all that we wanted. To be ourselves and to hold the sense in our own hands. We had everything except money. We made an oath that we’ll resist ever to be attracted by the power of money. To be modest, instead, and share with others.”
At that time many similar communes were appearing and disappearing around the world. It was a period when hippy movement and sexual revolution were still alive, when young people raised their voices against conventions and money as a measure of success, singing about peace, love and happiness, friendship and life freed of rules and orders. Times were changing, many hippies from the past have got their own children and became serious professors, politicians or bank managers in suits and ties, giving up the ideas of freedom and accepting all rules of their societies.
He remained fateful for 33 years to his initial idea of “a money-less economy”, resisting technology and living his “forest philosophy”. The Family of Clear Waters has turned from an intensive commune of people searching after the sense of life into a family commune, where he lived with his wife and three children and many friends. Children have eventually grown up and went their own ways, wives and friends were coming and leaving, replacing each other.
It was not always easy to live that kind of life. “It’s not easy to be free,” he says. Winters might be very cold and there is still no bathroom. His first wife got tired, moved to the city with children, then the second.
“I’m now in the third phase of parenthood, when children started looking after me and giving back that idyllic emotion I was poring on them without any punishment, authority and teaching,” said Mandic, 58, now grandfather of three. “It is important to find yourself within yourself and on your own.”
Many generations of young people have spent years there, living and working together, growing tomato, beans and potatoes in the garden, cooking on the wooden stove end eating at the big old dining table in the open, discussing and reading poetry sitting on an improvised wooden stage and benches in the yard, and sleeping on mattresses together at the main house.
The old house next to it had initially a sign at the entrance saying: “Even enemies are welcome here”. There is a small gallery and library now, and a barn, a stone building that once hosted two cows, has turned into a theatre, with simple wooden floor and a bench leaning against the wall. Steep wooden stairs lead to another stage under the roof.
“The commune has got its ephemeral form – a life in solitude. I have now much more time and peace for creation. Isolated, but not lonely, I live alone but with many people visiting and staying for a while; they are all accepted here with lot of love and joy, I believe in cheerful kindness as a new form of revolution, in saving the world with beauty,” he says.
The life is simple here. He rises with the Sun, wipes the floor in his little working room and writes for a while on his old typewriter, then works in the garden and around the house, reads, goes for long walks with his dog, fast as a lightening and white as a snow. “I think that time is not passing; it just has different densities. Time is here so thick that you can grab full hands of it. Life is slow, in harmony with nature.”
He says he cannot write, although he published 20 books of essays, poems and novels, and he cannot make art and theater, although he staged dozens of avant-garde theater plays and art exhibitions. “Stories are writing themselves, I’m just writing down thoughts and sentences from the nature, transforming them into pieces of art done only in natural material, wood and stone and dried horseshit, and then putting all that process of creation on the stage; we’re just playing ourselves on the stage, streets and fields.”
While he lives a natural and archaic life, he creates a modern art, based on three elements of authenticity – honesty, courage and simplicity. Each summer, the Family of Clear Waters hosts an avant-garde theater festival, when many actors and theater directors come to spend time together, enjoy art and nature, dialogue and laugh.
But Mandic says young people are playing and laughing much less than before. They are not ready to open up, they know neither how to express themselves nor to listen, didn’t learn to communicate, but just blubber instead. “One theme is inevitable in all talks we have here – relations between men and women. There’s a huge gap between two sexes, roles have been mixed and lost, making everybody unhappy.”
Although a great opponent of technology, computer, Internet and mobile phones, saying they are taking away a character and personality, living with no tab water and hitchhiking all his life when traveling, Mandic admits that he has got little tired and agreed finally to accept an old car from his son, an old TV set and his first phone for his children’s sake. “My daughters worry about me. I’m scared it would ruin my peace. But I’m also excited. Can you imagine when I get tomorrow the phone and for the first time somebody calls!”
Bakeries in Belgrade
By: Una Zabunov
Belgrade, Sept. 07 2009 ( Serbia Today) – In the retail business in Belgrade the most attractive locations are often taken by the luxury bakeries and pastry shops which are “popping up like mushrooms”. They are usually open 24/7 and offer fresh and delicious breads, baked goods and pastries. Modern life is characterized with long working days and irregular food intake. For very busy people, eating at home or eating homemade dishes is impossible during the working week. So, they turn to the convenient, and delicious bakery products.
Working hours from 9 to 5 are forcing people to eat fast food and because of that bakery owners have a lucrative business. Eating at night is not characteristic only of working people it’s also characteristic of students.
They study until late at night when they prepare their exams, so when they are hungry the fastest solution is bakery because a large number of them work all night. Today, when it's expensive to eat a cooked meal in a restaurant, breakfast is still the cheapest in the bakeries.
There is no other place in which man can get his meal for only twenty dinars. Another major issue is that the Serbian pastries are very diverse and tasty so it is hard to resist the burek, or hot chocolate croissants or a variety of pies, Danishes, rolls etc..
In Serbia, the number of obese children is growing, because smart entrepreneurs have opened their bakeries near schools. The consequence of eating too many pastries too often, is obesity. Obese people usually are not in top form and they are often passive.
Excessive obesity encourages laziness. According to the Institute for Public Health "Dr Milan Batut", each year at least 1.9 million people worldwide die from the consequences of physical inactivity. Unhealthy and irregular eating is a serious matter. Although we have a rich tradition of preparing domestic food specialties, a fast life style is putting us in danger of becoming a fat nation.
Belgrade, Sept. 07 2009 ( Serbia Today) – In the retail business in Belgrade the most attractive locations are often taken by the luxury bakeries and pastry shops which are “popping up like mushrooms”. They are usually open 24/7 and offer fresh and delicious breads, baked goods and pastries. Modern life is characterized with long working days and irregular food intake. For very busy people, eating at home or eating homemade dishes is impossible during the working week. So, they turn to the convenient, and delicious bakery products.
Working hours from 9 to 5 are forcing people to eat fast food and because of that bakery owners have a lucrative business. Eating at night is not characteristic only of working people it’s also characteristic of students.
They study until late at night when they prepare their exams, so when they are hungry the fastest solution is bakery because a large number of them work all night. Today, when it's expensive to eat a cooked meal in a restaurant, breakfast is still the cheapest in the bakeries.
There is no other place in which man can get his meal for only twenty dinars. Another major issue is that the Serbian pastries are very diverse and tasty so it is hard to resist the burek, or hot chocolate croissants or a variety of pies, Danishes, rolls etc..
In Serbia, the number of obese children is growing, because smart entrepreneurs have opened their bakeries near schools. The consequence of eating too many pastries too often, is obesity. Obese people usually are not in top form and they are often passive.
Excessive obesity encourages laziness. According to the Institute for Public Health "Dr Milan Batut", each year at least 1.9 million people worldwide die from the consequences of physical inactivity. Unhealthy and irregular eating is a serious matter. Although we have a rich tradition of preparing domestic food specialties, a fast life style is putting us in danger of becoming a fat nation.
Cosmic Eye
By Natasa Tepavcevic
Belgrade, Sept. 14, 2009 (Serbia Today) - Exhibition “Cosmic Eye” is open from September 6th until September 13th 2009 at Gallery of Cultural Center “Dom Omladine” in Belgrade. The author of the exhibition is Milica Živadinović. Exhibition is realized as part of the global celebrations of the International Year of Astronomy (IYA 2009), marking four hundred years since Galileo Galilei’s first observations by telescope.
Project is supported by the Ministry of Science and Technological Development-Republic of Serbia, in coordination with The Scientific Computing Laboratory (SCL) at the Institute of Physics in Belgrade.
The exhibition “Cosmic Eye” is a part of the project "Cosmic Harmony" which is inspired by the phenomenon of the universe and idea of existence of relationship between the human eye and planetary systems. Sight directed into space and whirl of solar cities, creative network of Milica Živadinović stretches to unexplored area of the human eye in which universe is ,reflected.
Some as our galactic neighborhood is known thanks to recordings of Hubble Space Telescope. Our eye hides range of divine combination of shades, and as the universe changes, grows and shrinks, changing shapes and colors, so the human eye gains life marks, the new spaces and brightness.
"Cosmic Harmony" is a big installation and it consists of different 3-dimensional forms. What are 3-dimensional forms in Milica’s case? She exhibited objects, installations, sculptures, assemblages or we can say that her “cosmic eyes” are something in between or mix of the conventional (in a sense of art history) forms of objects-installations-sculptures-assemblages.
Some of the pieces are hand-made, so we can recognize them as sophisticated sculptures and some of the objects are produced by factories (that’s what we called post-production in the domain of visual art). For example, the assemblage pieces like the one titled “Water” or pieces “Woman” or “Hell” are three-dimensional artistic compositions, made by putting together found objects, but objects titled “Earth” or “Air” are ordered and produced in factories. “Earth” is actually the leather ball but there is a prints of dollar-images on the leather’s surface. I wanted to emphasize these examples, in order to show the artistic sensibility of Milica Živadinović as conceptual artist. She is kind of artist whose ideas dictate the artistic process.
"Time of Tetraktys" is installation in which the connection between cosmic landscapes and philosophical concept concentrates in the thoughts of Greek philosophers, by whom "the mysteries of the universe can be inferred only with numbers and shapes, so the installation of planetary systems was organized by Pythagora’s symbolism of numbers based on specific figure – Tetraktys.
What is Tetraktys, and why Tetraktys?
Cosmic symbolism of numbers in Pythagoras learning is based on a specific figure named tetraktus (quadripartite number). Tetractys is consisting of ten points, arranged regularly to form structure of a decade in a form of equilateral triangle. Derived total of points in rows gives a decade 1+2+3+4=10. Every planet symbolized the element of Pythagoras pyramid: 1-Divine, 2-Man/Woman, 3-levels of life: Heaven, Earth, Hell and 4-four elements: Water, Earth, Air, Fire.
This symbols Milica used as titles of her objects/assemblages.
The secret of Universe could only be comprehended through numbers and forms. For Pythagoras and his followers Tetractys was a key of understanding the nature itself. By transmitting a numerical expressions of proportions and harmonies, from music and speech to the world as whole, Pythagoreans talked about so called cosmic harmony.
Ivana Misirilic Bigard wrote about Milica’s work in catalogue of exhibition “Cosmic Eye”. All who are interested to read more about Milica Živadinović’s work, can visit her web cite: www.milicazivadinovic.com. It is also possible to find the records of her exhibitions on you tube.
Milica Živadinović was born in 1975, in Belgrade. She lives and works in Paris since 1999. She graduated at the Academy of Fine Arts in Versailles in 2001 , as a scholar of the French Government. She got her master's degree in 2005 and is currently working on PhD at the University of Paris and UNESCO scholarship for 2007 year. She is author of numerous solo exhibitions in Paris and Belgrade, and participant in numerous collective exhibitions since 1999.
Belgrade, Sept. 14, 2009 (Serbia Today) - Exhibition “Cosmic Eye” is open from September 6th until September 13th 2009 at Gallery of Cultural Center “Dom Omladine” in Belgrade. The author of the exhibition is Milica Živadinović. Exhibition is realized as part of the global celebrations of the International Year of Astronomy (IYA 2009), marking four hundred years since Galileo Galilei’s first observations by telescope.
Project is supported by the Ministry of Science and Technological Development-Republic of Serbia, in coordination with The Scientific Computing Laboratory (SCL) at the Institute of Physics in Belgrade.
The exhibition “Cosmic Eye” is a part of the project "Cosmic Harmony" which is inspired by the phenomenon of the universe and idea of existence of relationship between the human eye and planetary systems. Sight directed into space and whirl of solar cities, creative network of Milica Živadinović stretches to unexplored area of the human eye in which universe is ,reflected.
Some as our galactic neighborhood is known thanks to recordings of Hubble Space Telescope. Our eye hides range of divine combination of shades, and as the universe changes, grows and shrinks, changing shapes and colors, so the human eye gains life marks, the new spaces and brightness.
"Cosmic Harmony" is a big installation and it consists of different 3-dimensional forms. What are 3-dimensional forms in Milica’s case? She exhibited objects, installations, sculptures, assemblages or we can say that her “cosmic eyes” are something in between or mix of the conventional (in a sense of art history) forms of objects-installations-sculptures-assemblages.
Some of the pieces are hand-made, so we can recognize them as sophisticated sculptures and some of the objects are produced by factories (that’s what we called post-production in the domain of visual art). For example, the assemblage pieces like the one titled “Water” or pieces “Woman” or “Hell” are three-dimensional artistic compositions, made by putting together found objects, but objects titled “Earth” or “Air” are ordered and produced in factories. “Earth” is actually the leather ball but there is a prints of dollar-images on the leather’s surface. I wanted to emphasize these examples, in order to show the artistic sensibility of Milica Živadinović as conceptual artist. She is kind of artist whose ideas dictate the artistic process.
"Time of Tetraktys" is installation in which the connection between cosmic landscapes and philosophical concept concentrates in the thoughts of Greek philosophers, by whom "the mysteries of the universe can be inferred only with numbers and shapes, so the installation of planetary systems was organized by Pythagora’s symbolism of numbers based on specific figure – Tetraktys.
What is Tetraktys, and why Tetraktys?
Cosmic symbolism of numbers in Pythagoras learning is based on a specific figure named tetraktus (quadripartite number). Tetractys is consisting of ten points, arranged regularly to form structure of a decade in a form of equilateral triangle. Derived total of points in rows gives a decade 1+2+3+4=10. Every planet symbolized the element of Pythagoras pyramid: 1-Divine, 2-Man/Woman, 3-levels of life: Heaven, Earth, Hell and 4-four elements: Water, Earth, Air, Fire.
This symbols Milica used as titles of her objects/assemblages.
The secret of Universe could only be comprehended through numbers and forms. For Pythagoras and his followers Tetractys was a key of understanding the nature itself. By transmitting a numerical expressions of proportions and harmonies, from music and speech to the world as whole, Pythagoreans talked about so called cosmic harmony.
Ivana Misirilic Bigard wrote about Milica’s work in catalogue of exhibition “Cosmic Eye”. All who are interested to read more about Milica Živadinović’s work, can visit her web cite: www.milicazivadinovic.com. It is also possible to find the records of her exhibitions on you tube.
Milica Živadinović was born in 1975, in Belgrade. She lives and works in Paris since 1999. She graduated at the Academy of Fine Arts in Versailles in 2001 , as a scholar of the French Government. She got her master's degree in 2005 and is currently working on PhD at the University of Paris and UNESCO scholarship for 2007 year. She is author of numerous solo exhibitions in Paris and Belgrade, and participant in numerous collective exhibitions since 1999.
Exhibition "Zubun"
By Jelica Tapuskovic
Belgrade, Sept. 28, 2009 (Serbia Today) - Exhibition „Zubun” has been opened in the Etnographic Museum in Belgrade, on September 21st. With this exhibition the museum celebrates 108 years of its foundation. Exhibition consists of about 600 objects from museum’s collection, which are folk costumes from Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia. The Author of exhibition, who is also the adviser of museum, Mirjana Menkovic, told Serbia Today that the aim of this exhibition is to present a collection which is extraordinary by number of surviving samples, as well as by formal, functional and style characteristics. She said it is the biggest and most preserved dress collection from XIX century made in South Slavic Balkan region. Its presentation can give to public new knowledge about cultural history and dressing culture of Serbians.
In the traditional culture Zubun was a top garment vest, usually sleeveless, made of cloth, mostly in white color. People wore it during the whole year, and it was really a necessary piece of clothes of cattle-breeders. Zubun was widely spread on Balkan Peninsula, and it was worn in combination with shirt, bodice and doublet. From region to region it has different length.
„On west Balkan – central Serbia and Croatia, west Macedonia and middle Albania, zubun was short. Long zubuns were characteristic in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Dalmatia, Montenegro, Kosovo and Metohia, east Serbia. In the middle of XVIII and in XIX, thanks to migration, it spread to Slovenia, Peloponnese in Greece, Eubia and Epir, south and south -west Bulgaria, and to north Albania”, said Mirjana Menkovic.
Both genders-male and female wore zubun, but it was more characteristic for female, what proofs number of zubuns shown on exhibition – there are only 13 male zubuns.
Zubun is one of the oldest clothes on South Slav Balkan region, and it also has esthetic effect – it is known as most representative piece of clothes of Serbian traditional costume.
In tradition, zubun was used to mark marriage, age and class status of a person who wore it. Unmarried women wore zubun different than married, with a collar and adornment. Their zubun was made in white color, and zubun of older women was dark or black.
„Dressing depends of marriage status – it was more colorful when you are a girl or bride, and almost baldness when you are older or widowed. In some regions reach girls wore red dresses, and in some parts of Balkan green. Also class status was distinguished by material quality, adornment, by name or cut of zubun”, said Mirjana Menkovic.
She underlined that selection of zubuns for exhibition was made by richness of zubun, by number of copies from one region and by their beauty, and preservation.
„In that way we got important number of copies, used for catalogue. They are made in XIX and on the beginning of XX century”, said Menkovic.
She also said that with this exhibition Etnographic museum wants to promote different ways of working, in the museum and with a public. By that she means a different usage of gallery space, and multimedia presentation which are supposed to attract different types of public. The visitors can see the method of making the zubuns using the touch screen monitors posed on the exhibition.
Visitors of this exhibition have a chance to see also the drawings and aquarelles of artist Olga Benson, who made them in 1945, inspired by zubuns.
Belgrade, Sept. 28, 2009 (Serbia Today) - Exhibition „Zubun” has been opened in the Etnographic Museum in Belgrade, on September 21st. With this exhibition the museum celebrates 108 years of its foundation. Exhibition consists of about 600 objects from museum’s collection, which are folk costumes from Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia. The Author of exhibition, who is also the adviser of museum, Mirjana Menkovic, told Serbia Today that the aim of this exhibition is to present a collection which is extraordinary by number of surviving samples, as well as by formal, functional and style characteristics. She said it is the biggest and most preserved dress collection from XIX century made in South Slavic Balkan region. Its presentation can give to public new knowledge about cultural history and dressing culture of Serbians.
In the traditional culture Zubun was a top garment vest, usually sleeveless, made of cloth, mostly in white color. People wore it during the whole year, and it was really a necessary piece of clothes of cattle-breeders. Zubun was widely spread on Balkan Peninsula, and it was worn in combination with shirt, bodice and doublet. From region to region it has different length.
„On west Balkan – central Serbia and Croatia, west Macedonia and middle Albania, zubun was short. Long zubuns were characteristic in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Dalmatia, Montenegro, Kosovo and Metohia, east Serbia. In the middle of XVIII and in XIX, thanks to migration, it spread to Slovenia, Peloponnese in Greece, Eubia and Epir, south and south -west Bulgaria, and to north Albania”, said Mirjana Menkovic.
Both genders-male and female wore zubun, but it was more characteristic for female, what proofs number of zubuns shown on exhibition – there are only 13 male zubuns.
Zubun is one of the oldest clothes on South Slav Balkan region, and it also has esthetic effect – it is known as most representative piece of clothes of Serbian traditional costume.
In tradition, zubun was used to mark marriage, age and class status of a person who wore it. Unmarried women wore zubun different than married, with a collar and adornment. Their zubun was made in white color, and zubun of older women was dark or black.
„Dressing depends of marriage status – it was more colorful when you are a girl or bride, and almost baldness when you are older or widowed. In some regions reach girls wore red dresses, and in some parts of Balkan green. Also class status was distinguished by material quality, adornment, by name or cut of zubun”, said Mirjana Menkovic.
She underlined that selection of zubuns for exhibition was made by richness of zubun, by number of copies from one region and by their beauty, and preservation.
„In that way we got important number of copies, used for catalogue. They are made in XIX and on the beginning of XX century”, said Menkovic.
She also said that with this exhibition Etnographic museum wants to promote different ways of working, in the museum and with a public. By that she means a different usage of gallery space, and multimedia presentation which are supposed to attract different types of public. The visitors can see the method of making the zubuns using the touch screen monitors posed on the exhibition.
Visitors of this exhibition have a chance to see also the drawings and aquarelles of artist Olga Benson, who made them in 1945, inspired by zubuns.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
