Practicing the Impossible
100 years have passed since two artists were presiding over their self-proclaimed temporary states: Gabrielle D’Annunzio in his proto-fascist Italian Regency of Carnaro and Ernst Toller in his Bavarian Soviet Republic. These failing states represent two attempts at institutionalising poetic imagining with detrimental consequences, either on the population of the state (Rijeka) or the artists and their fellows (Munich). Both regimes are considered utopian attempts today, but the question is: what can we and our institutions learn from artists practising the impossible at a time when utopia seems to be more a matter of memory then of imagination?
is dramaturge, co-founder and member of BADco. performing arts collective. He was also a researcher and curator at the Centre for Drama Art (CDU) from 1995 till 2007, Associate Professor of Dramaturgy at the Academy of Dramatic Arts, University of Zagreb, and one of the initiators of the project Zagreb – Cultural Kapital of Europe 3000.
His projects and collaborations (BADco., Frakcija) have been presented at the Venice Biennale 2011 and 2016, Documenta 12, ARCO and numerous festivals and conferences. He also took on the role of mentor and teacher at DOCH (Stockholm), JLU (Gießen), Statens Scenekunstskole (Copenhagen), P.A.R.T.S. (Brussels) etc. First editor-in-chief (1996–2007) of Frakcija, magazine for the performing arts. His latest book is called Exploded Gaze (Multimedia Institute, Zagreb 2018).
In English
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