Ready to Change International Conference: NEW POLITICAL MYTHOLOGIES AND ART
Mark Twain’s quote “never let the truth get in the way of a good story” has its dark side. Cognitive science is increasingly establishing that facts don’t necessarily affect our perception of reality. Translating this into the language of mythology, one could say that myths are impervious to the negating and exposing power of fact, no matter how irrefutable.
The greatest myths of our time are those of the omnipotence of capital, the impossibility of true democracy, of irreconcilable differences between us and them, myths of the divinity of the nation-state, not least myths claiming change is impossible, that passivity and chaos are the order of the day.
The conference, focusing on the connection between contemporary political mythologies and art, isn’t interested as much in the deconstruction of current myths as in the exploration of the potential stories, narratives and mythologies of the future, and the role played by art in their emergence – an endeavour underscored with hope we’ll manage to transcend the stale, tired discourse of present day. The conference is designed as a set of diverse formats, all of which open up space for discussion and encourage attempts of thinking outside the box of today’s political mythologies. Spotlight will also belong to the artists; perhaps they are the ones who can wrest the construction of mythology from the claws of daily politics. Let’s join them in this!
Alma R. Selimović
Programme:
Catalogue (to view the downloaded brochures you will need Acrobat Reader)
![]() |
Friday, August 26th, 11.00–13.00 Union hall in Elektro Ljubljana Tony Chakar: ON POSSIBILITIES, UNLEARNING, UNDOING lecture |
![]() |
Friday, August 26th, 15.00–16.30 Foyer of the Old Power Station – Elektro Ljubljana Robertina Šebjanič in Miha Ciglar: SUBAQUATIC SOUND SCAPE (SI) |
![]() |
Friday, August 26th, 17.00–18.00 DUM Crvena: STATE OUT OF ORDER |
![]() |
Friday, August 26th, 20.00 PREMIERE Saturday, August 27th, 21.00 ŠD Tabor Beton Ltd.: ICH KANN NICHT ANDERS (SI) performance |
![]() |
Friday, August 26th, 21.00–21.30 The Old Power Station – Elektro Ljubljana Maria Lucia in Benjamin Verdonck: SECRET EXPERIMENTAL OBSERVATORY FOR GLOBAL MATTER (BE, PT) report on interventions |
![]() |
Friday, August 26th, 21.30 The Old Power Station – Elektro Ljubljana ScriptedReality: THE PIECE CONCERNING THE QUESTION OF PURPUSEFULNESS (DE) performance |
![]() |
Saturday, August 27th, 9.30–10.45 On different locations BREAKFASTS WITH THE ARTISTS |
![]() |
Saturday, August 27th, 11.00–14.00 Prešeren Square Mitja Velikonja & Sandi Abram: WHEN WALLS SPEAK: THE IDEOLOGY OF GRAFFITI AND STREET ART IN LJUBLJANA lecture, walk |
![]() |
Saturday, August 27th, 15.00–16.30 Animal Shelter Ljubljana (bus leaving at 14.45 from Stara mestna elektrarna – Elektro Ljubljana) Maja Smrekar: NEW DIMENSIONS OF THE “NATURAL” |
![]() |
Saturday, August 27th, 17.00–18.30 Ljubljana City Municipality, conference room Maria Lucia Cruz Correia: THE AGE OF POST-ANTHROPOCENE: EVOLUTIONARY PERSPECTIVE ON FUTURE LAW REGARDING CLIMATE CHANGE |
![]() |
Saturday, August 27th, 20.00 – 20.20 Foyer of the Old Power Station – Elektro Ljubljana Waldemar Tatarczuk: UP (PL) |
We reserve the right to possible programme alterations.
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
||
Ready to Change International Conference: NEW POLITICAL MYTHOLOGIES AND ART
The cognitive science is proving more and more that the facts do not directly correlate or influence our understanding of the world. The climate change debate testifies to this: even though the evidence corpus is compiling and the science community is backing the claims that the climate change is man-induced, the shift in acting upon facts not beliefs still has not happened (therefore the sentence: I do not believe in climate change). Our beliefs are shaped by dominant narratives or mythologies and internalized through the filter of our personal narrative – story of our role and position in relations. (more…)
Ready to Change International Conference: NEW POLITICAL MYTHOLOGIES AND ART
Mark Twain’s quote “never let the truth get in the way of a good story” has its dark side. Cognitive science is increasingly establishing that facts don’t necessarily affect our perception of reality. Translating this into the language of mythology, one could say that myths are impervious to the negating and exposing power of fact, no matter how irrefutable.
The greatest myths of our time are those of the omnipotence of capital, the impossibility of true democracy, of irreconcilable differences between us and them, myths of the divinity of the nation-state, not least myths claiming change is impossible, that passivity and chaos are the order of the day. (more…)
Ready to Change: Rethinking the Relationship between Artists and Communities, conference
The tight relationship between different communities and artistic production is as old as art itself. Artists have worked in them, with them and for them. Because of the everchanging meanings and relationship, we can look at this specific relation from different perspectives but in this edition of the conference, we have put a strong emphasis on participatory artistic approaches that involve communities directly. (more…)
International Forum STILL READY TO CHANGE?
Still Ready to Change? forum picks up where the Ready to Change? organized by Bunker and Sostenuto partners in 2010 left off – with the potential for change.
It seems like the multitude is still searching for a different reality than the one we’re living now, even if without a clear idea of how this different reality should look or how we can achieve it. (more…)
READY TO CHANGE- An experimental Forum on culture and social innovation in Europe and in the Med area
Proposal within the framework of the Sostenuto project “Thinking culture as a factor of economic and social innovation ”
Live video stream from venues:
Info details: Ready to change
CONTACTS
BUNKER – office
Slomškova 11
T: +386 1 231 44 92
E: bunker@siol.net
BUNKER FORUM TEAM
- Nevenka Koprivšek, director
- Samo Selimović, executive producer; T: +386 31 733 295
- Suzana Kajba, organization; T: +386 31 209 343
- Mateja Veble, organization; T:+386 40 558 929
VENUES
Stara mestna elektrarna – Elektro Ljubljana / Old Power Station – Elektro Ljubljana
Slomškova 18: public entrance
Kotnikova 9: staff only
Narodni muzej Slovenije/ National Museum of Slovenia
Maistrova 1 (entrance also from Metelkova street)
Slovenski etnografski muzej – SEM/ Slovene Ethnographic Museum – SEM
Metelkova 2
HOTELS IN THE VICINITY
Hotel Park
Tabor 9
City Hotel
Dalmatinova 15
TAXI SERVICE
T: +386 41 731 881 – Yellow taxi
T: +386 80 1117 – Taxi Laguna
MEDICAL SERVICE
if for any reason you need to see a doctor, contact:
BARSOS
Gregorčičeva 11
T: +386 1 242 07 00
EMERGENCY ROOM
Bohoričeva ulica 4
T: 112, +386 1 522 84 08
HOW TO GET AROUND
As you will find out, Ljubljana is not a very big city, so almost everything is within walking distance. In 20 minutes one is able to walk across the whole center.
Hotels are very close to all three mentioned venues and our office within 5 minute walk.
There are fairly good city bus connections. The bus is paid with Urbana card that you can acquire at any Kiosk stand or Urbanomat (24/7 automats across the city). The funicular to the castle is also accessible with Urbana.
From the airport Brnik to Ljubljana it takes about half an hour by a taxi.
From railway station (Kolodvorska 11) to the venues and hotels it takes 10 minutes walk.
Program: Ready to change
Numerous artistic and cultural actors in the Mediterranean area, in Europe or throughout the world have noticed the important changes of our societies and of the difficulties resulting from these changes. As experimenters and explorers, they are putting their efforts into proposing new ways of operating in the cultural sector and beyond.
In this moment of multiple and confusing crises, the European Union is also search-ing for new perspectives through its strategy EU 2020. Within this context, it seems important to highlight how cultural actors are coping with social transformations, with transformations of public policies or with transformations of cultural and artis-tic practices (new collaborative practices, integration of communication technolo-gies…).
In Ljubljana, we are risking the bet: is it possible, during three days, to combine our knowledge, our experiences and our desires in order to take up a collective posi-tion? Is it possible to demonstrate the determinant role that we are assuming in this moment of our history, illuminating the meanings, reconstructing models of solidar-ity, proposing new ways of thinking, new ways of organization and of relationships?
We are thinking it is possible, indeed! And we are inviting you to share this experi-ence with us in order to make a point about our abilities to:
- Initiate and accompany economic and social transformations,
- Think about new ways of more solidarity oriented social relationships,
- Create new ways of distribution of knowledge and of wealth in our societies.
During this Forum, we are proposing to achieve a common declaration, affirming our wishes for the redefinition of the artistic and cultural action in the social envi-ronment. We hope that this common declaration will bring our engagements and our analyses, but also our hopes into the European society, making the citizenship, the sharing and the solidarity one of the foundations of its construction.
This collectively compiled declaration will be supported by our exchange of knowl-edge and of experiences. Consequently, we are inviting you to participate during these three days at different types of sessions:
Video
READY TO CHANGE – Experimental Forum on Culture and Social Innovation in Europe and in the Med Area
Ljubljana, 2. – 4. december 2010
Proposal within the framework of the Sostenuto project “Thinking culture as a factor of economic and social innovation “.
Catalogue (pdf 2,4 MB- to view the downloaded brochures you will need Acrobat Reader.)
Manifest
Lectures and Presentations
Photos
Bunker invites to cooperation: ART AND CLIMATE CHANGE
Bunker will choose one or more projects applied and support it/them in terms of production, promotion and finance as well as by arranging their guest-staging or its/their introduction to the international sphere.
We kindly invite all interested parties to send a short outline of the project proposed (one page), a reference list and a budget estimate to info@bunker.si by 28th February 2011. Any further information may be obtained at info@bunker.si or 031 694 559. Applicants will be notified of their application results by 31st March 2011. (more…)