24th International Biennial of Graphic Arts

10 June–16 September 2005

The 24th International Biennial of Graphic Arts was marked by certain changes, with emphasis placed on the substance of the graphic arts in the context of newly emerging global art and the new internal organizational structure.

The 24th International Biennial of Graphic Arts comprised four exhibition segments
 

Print World

The exhibition was set in the premises of the Museum of Modern Art and the Jakopič Gallery. The curator Breda Škrjanec based her selection on the questions of how the original nature of print, or the multiplication of image and message, is reflected in mass-circulation goods, and what the common points are between art and ruling ideologies.

Participating artists:
Greddy Assa, John Baldessari, Monica Bonvicini, Daniele Buetti, Marna Bunnell, Guan Ce, Peter Ciuha, Claude Closky, Maja S. Franković, Adib Fricke, Catherine Gfeller, Simon Grennan & Christopher Sperandio, Izabella Gustowska, Damien Hirst, Päivikki Kallio, Micha Klein, Jakob Kolding, Ines Krasić, Oldrich Kulhanek, Kurt & Plasto, Claudia-Maria Luenig, Tracey Moffat, Juan Moro, Blanca Munoz, Marjana Pahor, Elena Panayotova, Chen Qi, Juan Carlos Romero, Thomas Ruff, Morten Schelde, Jonathan Seliger, Liina Siib, Zora Stančič, Fatimah Tuggar, Katja Valanne & Jarno Jokinen, Adriana Varella, Sašo Vrabič, Kara Walker, Christopher Wool.

Fundamina

The exhibition represented the art-historical ambitions of the Biennial. It was installed on the premises of the International Centre of Graphic Arts and it presented the following artists: Zoran Mušič (the selection was made by Zoran Kržišnik and Boštjan Soklič in co-operation with the Regional Museum in Nova Gorica), Andy Warhol (the selection was made by the curator Mark Francis), and Mimmo Paladino (the selection was made by Enzo Di Martino).
 


The exhibition Fundamina at MGLC, installation view. Photo: Igor Lapajne.

Imaging Ulysses: Richard Hamilton’s Illustrations to James Joyce

The work of Richard Hamilton, the Grand Prix winner of the 23rd International Biennial of Graphic Arts, was presented in Cankarjev Dom Gallery. The exhibition was organized in co-operation with the British Council and curated by Stephen Coppel.

Information – Misinformation, Off-Biennial Section
Individual projects were presented in Delo newspaper, on TV Slovenija, Radio Študent, and on 100 Proreklam-Europlakat billboards around Slovenia. In co-operation with the museum in progress, the works also appeared on 50 large digital info-screens at underground railway stations in Vienna and in Der Standard newspaper.
Curated by Gregor Podnar and Hans-Ulrich Obrist.
Participating artists:
Minerva Cuevas, Harun Farocki, Leif Elggren & Thomas Feuerstein, Natascha Sadr Haghighian & Rashad Becker, Apolonija Šušteršič & Jože Barši.

The Catalogue of the 24th Biennial of Graphic Arts

The 24th International Biennial of Graphic Arts was accompanied by a catalogue, which has completely sold out.

Producer: International Centre of Graphic Arts

Primary sponsor: Mobitel
Other sponsors: Autocommerce, Droga, Gorenje, Petrol
The Print World Exhibition sponsor: Lek
The Andy Warhol – Fundamina Exhibition received support from Philip Morris Ljubljana
Media sponsors: Delo, Der Standard, Proreklam-Europlakat, Radio Študent, TV Slovenija

 

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ARCHIVE

From the Biennial Prize Winners Collection: Shifts in the Canon

Robert Jančovič, Rez I Nazenie-Pasca/, 1996, colour woodcut

 

Exhibition:

From the Biennial Prize Winners Collection: Shifts in the Canon

7 November 2019–23 February 2020

Every review of the history of the Ljubljana Biennial of Graphic Arts is also informed by the stories inscribed by the prize winners of this exhibition. The selection made by the jury members – esteemed and influential art critics, curators, art dealers and other experts from all over the world – was, for many years, the only intervention into the seemingly multitudinous mass of exhibited artworks. The eagerly awaited and often critically-acclaimed decisions imparted the event with a touch of creative competition and were the driving force of the discourse that was generated by the exhibition in the professional and general public as well as the media. After every Biennial, when the hundreds of exhibited prints disappeared from the halls and what remained was only their trace in the form of an exhibition catalogue, a handful of selected works and artists – the winners chosen by the most prominent international jury – were inscribed into the history of the biennial in capital letters, and hence into the annals of worldwide printmaking.

In a sense, the exhibition of works by the prize winners from the collection of the MGLC – International Centre of Graphic Arts aims to get us thinking about the message of the awards of the Ljubljana Biennial of Graphic Arts in the context of the canon of post-war art. Most often, the jury did not validate the Biennial’s basic guidelines regarding the quality of the artworks, nevertheless, their decisions spoke volumes in various other ways. The wavering between the need to consolidate already established directions and discover new, unknown ones can be noticed throughout.

On the other hand, the exhibition offers an insight into the collecting policy of MGLC, an institution based precisely on the heritage of the Biennial. Particularly those works that have been acquired by the museum through purchase and donation in the recent period and works that have not been especially exposed will be on display. They have been arranged chronologically into three main sections from the first exhibition of prints in 1955 to the present.

The shifts in the exhibited works from the first two periods, from 1955 to 1977, and from 1979 to 2001, can primarily be seen in the form and content of the graphic print. The prints demonstrate the emergence and consolidation of new artistic directions in the 1960s and 1970s, especially the distinct aesthetics of art informel, geometric abstraction and pop art. From the pool, not lacking in art celebrities of the older generation, the juries often awarded the most coveted prizes to young artists, the rising stars with highly innovative artistic insights.

The shifts in the printmaking of the late 1970s can also be seen in the award-winning works. With the era of popularity of the more contemporary printmaking techniques having subsided, classical ones, especially intaglio printing, came to the fore again, along with the greater popularity of smaller formats and more intimate subject matter. The award-winning works from the 1980s and 1990s do not bring about any essential artistic innovation, but rather exhibit an interlacement and diversification of established aesthetics and approaches.

With the new millennium, the Biennial experienced some radical shifts and breaks. The display of works in national pavilions was replaced by an original, curatorial approach, which has recently undergone attempts at inquiry and experimentation. At the same time, the range of artwork formats has gradually expanded. A leap from classical printmaking to the art of printing in a diversity of techniques occurred, whereas later the Biennial has also adopted performative as well as other contemporary practices. The two processes have, of course, also impacted the meaning of the prizes and the physical dimensions of the awarded works.

Authors of the exhibition: Nevenka Šivavec, Breda Škrjanec and Gregor Dražil