13th International Festival of Contemporary Arts

You are kindly invited to attend the opening of the exhibition on Wednesday, October 3rd at 8 pm.

The opening of the Humour Works exhibition shall also witness a presentation of the publication – Humour Works Reader, a thesis which reveals the fact that work not only exerts an essential influence on the politics of national and inter-European identity, but such influence is in particular evident in communication and ultimately self-understanding.

Further to this, the opening of Humour Works will also introduce Short Story, the first fire performance by Belgium artist Gwendoline Robin. This diligent pyromaniac will set off some unconventional fireworks; and as to exactly where these will be triggered – a clothes-hanger, maybe tube, or out of her fingers – let this remain a surprise!

Humour Works is an international curatorial and artistic project which elucidates the positive and negative consequences of precarious – uncertain, difficult, toilsome - working conditions, in particular in the context of the old »Eastern« – or to put it differently: »the new« Europe. The year-long project is comprised of four research and performative stations that follow one after another. After stops at Bratislava and Sarajevo, the project is presented in Ljubljana, prior to heading for its journey’s end in Berlin. The artistic programme is specifically formed within local contexts, and aimed in particular at reflection and reciprocal perception.

The main programme is the Humour Works exhibition, introducing Melanie Bonajo with Are All Cliches True?, a series of photographs on irrevocable enslavement with various tools; Anetta Mona Chisa and Lucia Tkacova with a parallel economies space installation entitled Private Collection II; Kanak Attak with HOW TO GETto Europe, a multimedia installation on migrant hardship; Valie Export whose response to why work can't provide a living is a series of photographs entitled Homometer II; kpD (kleines postfordistisches Drama) group which - exceptionally smartly - deals with the burn-out syndrome arising from a lack of proper free time; as well as Barbara Kapelj Osredkar who takes a look back into the history of women’s professions with an interactive animation entitled Yours. In addition to exhibition, Humour works will present video screenings and a lecture by Tatiana Bazzichelli on hacker ethics and networks entangled with the precarious and the sexual.

Melanie Bonajo (Holland), Anetta Mona Chisa and Lucia Tkacova (Slovakia/ Czech Republic), Kanak Attak (Germany), Valie Export (Austria), Barbara Kapelj Osredkar (Slovenia), dr.Keka (Slovenia), kpD - kleines postfordistisches Drama (Germany), Jana Prepeluh (Slovenia)

13th International Festival of Contemporary Arts
City of Women
Humour Works
Exhibition, lectures, video screenings, public actions and performances

Künstler: Melanie Bonajo, Anetta Mona Chisa & Lucia Tkacova, Kanak Attak , VALIE EXPORT, Barbara Kapelj Osredkar, dr.Keka , kleines postfordistisches Drama , Jana Prepeluh