CAUCASUS – BALKANS, interventions in public space (Armenia, Georgia, Romania, Slovenia)

August, 24th-30th

The Balkan-Caucasian collective of four artists grew out of artistic residencies and urban interventions under the auspices of the Caucasus Balkan Express project in Romanian Cluj-Napoca, Armenian Yerevan and Georgia’s Tbilisi. The artists will meet again at a residency in Ljubljana before the Mladi levi festival to devise an artistic intervention, depicting their reaction to the city by cutting into its very tissue.

The work of the visual artist Tanja Radež places mundane relics of our recent history into new horizons of possible being, blending our nostalgias with neuralgic issues of our contemporary, everyday lives. The theoretical conceptualist and performer Giorgi Khasaia melts together activism and theatre through a variety of performative actions. Multimedia artist Vilmos Koter chooses a unique art medium for every project anew in accordance with its needs. And, last but most certainly not least, Vahe Budumyan’s horizon of work lies at the intersection of art theory, architecture and design. Their diverse forms of artistic expression are interwoven with their mutual fascination over collective work, and they all regard cities as ideal arenas for creative action. According to them, themes from the outskirts of Europe are not stories of exclusion – instead they see them as a springboard for mutually exploring the unknown through common elements, defined by both the bright as well as the painful chapters from our recent history.

Caucasus – Balkans collective are: Vahe Budumyan, Giorgi Khasaia, Vilmos Kotor, Tanja Radež
Caucasus Balkan Express project was initiated by the Balkan Express Network and Alt Art Foundation, project partners are Bouillon Group and Public Art Platform, Tbilisi, and Institute for Contemporary Art Yerevan.