Miško Šuvaković / 2005

Rhetorical figures of the body by Zlatko Kopljar

Zlatko Kopljar’s works (performances, videos, photo-prints) were created in the 1990’s in a paradoxical confrontation between the current world’s micro- and macro-politics. Through the strategies and tactics of performance art, Kopljar problematized the relationship between the contemporary body and the contemporary world in the confrontation of the paradigmatic idealistic notions active-passive, aggressive-meditative, political-religious, materialistic-Christian, neoliberal-postsocialist, and local-global. His provocative mappings of the body/with the body comprise a wide span of presentations of bodily indexation ranging from behavioral expressiveness to rhetorical inexpressiveness. The symbolic knot of expressive lines of behavior and inexpressive positionings of the body presents a problem which he, as an artist responding to current events, places before the future and in relation to the past.

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Branko Franceschi / 2004

The construction no. 9 is founded on the action that Kopljar conceived inspired by the residency in New York he had obtained with the Franklin Furnace program in 2003. Just like most contemporary artists, he perceived the residency in New York – with the purpose of creative work and the possibility of its presentation – as the chance of the lifetime.

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Sanja Cvetnić / 2002

Every year in the first week of May and on the 19th of September the eyes of Neapolitans are fixed upon a small transparent vesse. In the dramatic scenery of the cathedral, in the midst of improbable crowd of believers and curious observers, the priests bring out the monstrance containing the blood of St. Januarius [San Gennaro), the patron of the city. They bring if to the reliqucary containing saint’s bones. If the coagulated martyr’s blood becomes liquid in the vicinity of his bones, grateful cries burst throughout fhe cathedral: Miracle! Miracle! The suspense of expectation subsides into contrite piety, few witnesses usually faint or get into hysteric ecstasy, but the rest of them disperse satisfied because St. Januarius answered their prayers again, thusassuring his miraculousc protection over the city.

Read More “What is the price of artists blood?”

Sanja Cvetnić / 1995

“The art of inner truth does not grow out of nature, but out of art. Rather than a mere inclination to imitation, a joy of creation which follows the models provided by nature, authentic art always serves deep psychic needs.” (Gustav Rene Hocke)1

When the disintegrated art scene of our fin-de-siecle, where “rien va plus”, yet “anything goes”,registers the appearance of a strong artistic personality, one wonders how to take him/her. One wonders whether it is possible to see through the veil of someone else’s closed and organized cosmos, to put together the puzzle pieces of the shattered mirror which used to show our common and recognizable reflection.

Read More “A flying lesson”

Sandra Križić Roban / 1993

Radovi Zlatka Kopljara izloženi u Gliptoted HAZU svjedoče o naπim sudbinama s izričitom izravnošću i dirljivošću

U današnje vrijeme, u kojem i jesmo i nismo, opravdano se pitamo da li u umjetnosti i dalje pronalazimo ritual koji zbivanje podiže na neke drukčije razine prepoznavanja, ili smo prepuπteni snalaženju u kojem misaonu, socijalnu i političku realnost iščitavamo kao dio svakodnevnog vrtloženja. Pri promatranju djela Zlatka Kopijara izloženih u Gliptoteci Hrvatske akademje znanosti i umjetnosti postajemo svjesni koliko su rituali rijetki i koliko tema žrtvovanja izaziva najčešće samo primarne konotacije vezane uz zbilju unutar koje nema prostora za umjetnost.

Zapravo se čini da umjetnost. polako nestaje, da prostori koje je istraživala od postojanja ljudskog roda nemaju više ništa ponuditi. Sve je dovedeno u pitanje pa i postojanje čovjeka. Njegova krhkost i ranjivost preuzele su mjesto klasičnog shvaćanja herojskog. No ritual skidanja maski, doslovnog guljenja kože da bi se spoznala unutrašnjost, preživljavaju samo rijetki.

Read More “Guljenje kože”