Maja Smrekar: NEW DIMENSIONS OF THE “NATURAL”

Photo: Borut Peterlin

Saturday, August 27th, 15.00–16.30 
Animal Shelter Ljubljana (bus leaving at 14.45 from Stara mestna elektrarna – Elektro Ljubljana) 

Artist Maja Smrekar explores and connects two overarching themes: parallel evolution in the relationship wolf – human – dog, and Earth’s sixth great extinction period. She addresses the paradigm of so called biopower, which involves a re-examining of the concept of life, through the discourses of hybrid kinship (D. Haraway) and the animalization of humans (Deleuze – Guattari, Agamben) that treat biotechnology, global economies and the ideologies of humanitarianism as derivatives of processes by which humanity is reaching the new dimensions of the “natural”. Since we live in a time where total control over (human) life is becoming a reality, discussion will examine whether humanity can still be considered within the paradigm of the Enlightenment, which recognized humans precisely for their distinctiveness from animals.

Maja Smrekar graduated at the Sculpture Department of the Academy of Fine Arts in Ljubljana, Slovenia and is currently finishing her MA at the New Media Department. Her interests are grounded in the phenomenology of perception and the concept of life. She has been collaborating with, among other institutions, the Kapelica Gallery in Ljubljana for the past eight years, and with the Institute Aksioma for the past five. In their production she’s been executing projects tying together the intersections between humanistic and natural sciences into interdisciplinary works of art. Maja Smrekar lives and works between Ljubljana, Slovenia and Berlin, Germany.

 Discussion moderated by: Mojca Kumerdej