Photo: archive of Darko Fritz.
Discoursor - a series of talks and exhibitions dedicated to the conservation and restoration of digital artworks
Discoursor 002
Tuesday 30 May 2023 | 5 p.m. | Auditorium, Museum of Modern Art, Cankarjeva 15, Ljubljana
5 p.m. - exhibition opening and guided tour
6 p.m. - lecture with discussion
Exhibition and lecture with discussion: Darko Fritz
Lecture: Digital Art in Croatia 1968–1985
Exhibited works of art - from the project End of the Message (1995-2000), a series of works by Darko Fritz:
End of the Message (archives – live!), 1996, three-channel video installation
End of the Message (Edit Value), 1997, installation with 21 fax prints
End of the Message – Total Archives, 2000, video, 13'28''
End of the Message, 2005, interactive DVD
Moderator: Jaka Železnikar
Digital Art in Croatia 1968–1985
The project by the independent curator and researcher Darko Fritz has been realized with the support of the Nikola Tesla Technical Museum in Zagreb, running from 2020–2023. The project consists of a 224-page hardcover book in both Croatian and English editions, a multilingual website and the exhibition itself. The criterion according to which works were selected from all the pieces of early digital art featured in this project is that in at least one part of the working process, in pieces created up to 1984, digital technology was employed. Since no text or any other kind of document on the topic was available, the research had to start from scratch, collecting information and correlating the findings.
The author notes that this project is an attempt to map the application of digital technologies in art in Croatia from 1968 to 1984. The year 1968 is not only that in which the first works of digital art in Croatia were made and shown in public, but also a year that became the signifier of a turning point in the creation of a new discourse in politics, society and art that occurred all over the world in the preceding and following few years. Through this discourse, it is possible to establish coordinates that will define the extension of the concept of digital art, its creation and practice. That Zagreb was important in those early years is evidenced by the fact that just one day after the curator Jasia Reichardt opened the Cybernetic Serendipity exhibition in London (on 2 August, 1968), the Tendencies 4 exhibition opened in Zagreb, thematically determined by the subtitle Computers and Visual Research.
The second of the years mentioned in the title (1984) is not only the one to which the writer George Orwell gave special meaning, but also the year in which the Apple Macintosh personal computer was launched. Moreover, 1984 was the year when people in Yugoslavia, and so in Croatia, were allowed to import very modest and restricted amounts of computer equipment for personal use, although only after paying very high customs duties. Through the exhibitions of the international art movement New Tendencies, which was launched in Zagreb in 1961, all the features of digital art were affirmed in the best way, and with works form leading artistic figures, such as Vladimir Bonačić, Vilko Žiljak, Tomislav Mikulić, Miljenko Horvat, and Vlatko Čerić, as well as the architects Andrija Mutnjaković and Velimir Neidhardt, the scientist Nikola Šerman and the famous film director, screenwriter and cinematographer Nikola Tanhofer, who in one period of his versatile interests reached for the tools inherent in digital art. The main textual part of the book is then followed by individual portraits of these key figures in the history of Croatian digital art, some of whose artworks were also presented at the exhibition.
End of the Message
The “End of the Message” project (1995-2000) by Darko Fritz investigates the behaviours and movements of people when faced with old and new media in both culturally significant and public spaces. This work demonstrates a committed consideration of the practice of surveillance, and an artistic approach to the task of archiving media.
“Darko Fritz’s works are shaped from the difference between the slowness of the body and the technological acceleration of time. They are mimetic investigations of semiotic systems and communication structures which influence culture.” (Inka Schube).
“End of the Message (archives – live!)” (60 minutes) is a three-channel video installation, redesigned on DVD as an interactive multi-screen work. “End of the Message – Total Archives” (13’28” min) documents the project and is a hybrid of documentary film, video art and artist’s documentation.
Darko Fritz
Since the 1980s, the artist, curator and researcher Darko Fritz has been exploring the use and impact of technology in culture. His work bridges the gap between contemporary art, media art and network culture, taking up topics such as glitch, error, and surveillance. He is a critical observer of technology that changes society. A specialist in the pioneers of digital art, and particularly the New Tendencies movement, he has written numerous publications on the subject and curated exhibitions such as I Am Still Alive, presented at the HDLU in Zagreb in 2000 and Bit International. Computers and Visual Research, New Tendencies, Zagreb 1961-1973, presented at the Neue Galerie Graz am Landesmuseum Joanneum in Graz in 2007 and at the ZKM in Karlsruhe in 2008. His most recent book Digital Art in Croatia 1968 - 1984 was published by Technical Museum Nikola Tesla, Zagreb in 2020, and in English edition in 2022 alongside the related exhibition.
https://darkofritz.net
https://vimeo.com/darkofritz
https://digitalna-umjetnost-u-hrvatskoj.eu
Jaka Železnikar
Jaka Železnikar works for Moderna galerija as an expert advisor primarily in charge of museum digitization in its broadest extent and the broadest meaning of the term. In 2010, he obtained an MA diploma in new media in the UK. Since 1996, he has worked in new media as an artist, particularly in the sphere of net art and electronic literature. He exhibits his work internationally.
He is the initiator and head of the Discoursor series of exhibitions and related discursive events at the Museum of Modern Art.
https://jaka.org/
