Internationalisation of the Art System in Slovenia (1945–1963) (original) (raw)

2016, Art and Politics in Europe in the Modern Period

In its first years of development, the Federal People’s Republic of Yugoslavia (FPRY) looked towards the Soviet Union as a political and cultural reference point. After the political split between the states, the so-called Tito–Stalin Split, Yugoslavia started gradually opening to the West and moving away from Soviet-influenced cultural politics. This led to modernisation, economic and cultural liberalisation and Yugoslavia slowly stepped onto a new path, the so-called third way. Later on, this shift also reflected in Yugoslavia’s leading role of the Non-Aligned movement. The period between 1948 and 1963, when a new constitution was adopted and the country officially changed its name to the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY), saw a gradual liberalisation in all areas of life. The number of foreign, mostly western, exhibitions of modern art increased greatly. Research shows that more than forty percent of exhibitions have been of foreign, non-Yugoslav art. Throughout the analysed period, the reactions of critics and the public changed markedly under the influence of the changing cultural politics and Yugoslavia’s efforts to present itself to the world as a country of the third way that had managed to carve out a space between East and West. There were many touring exhibition during that period. Some were organised in Belgrade, others were hosted by Ljubljana as a result of good cultural and political connections between the states, while organisation of some exhibitions stemmed from the ambition and vision of the key protagonist of the art scene. One of such very important people was Zoran Kržišnik, the then director of the Modern Galley. He was the driving force behind the first international exhibition of graphic arts in 1955, which included artists from more than twenty different countries ranging from East to West. This became the Biennial of Graphic Arts, quite a phenomenon in the art world in Slovenia, whose importance in the discussed period continued to grow. These international exhibitions played a significant role. They were used as a political tool for representation of the state’s third way. Furthermore, they had an educational role for both those artists and art historians who could afford to go abroad, and for the general audience who were introduced to modern art through these exhibitions. Finally, they also placed Slovenian and Yugoslav art in an international, Western art framework.