IGOR GRUBIĆ

WE ARE THE REVOLUTION
2008
Interactive installation and action in public space

The famous photograph La rivoluzione siamo noi (1972) shows its author Joseph Beuys in movement, as if he were captured while leaving to start an action. I reprinted the photo in life siye, creating a self-standing figure of Beuys on a short stand. I cut out part of the photo, creating a hole where the face was, so that visitors to the exhibition and passers-by on the street can place their own face in the hole, posing for a photograph in which their faces will appear inside Beuys’ figure in movement. Series of photographs with different people transmit the same idea. Since every man is a potential artist, with hidden creative powers inside them, the work points to the idea of creative individuals joined in a movement which could lead to the initiation of significant social changes. More creative energy liberated in all aspects of life automatically means a happier society. (I.G.)

We Are the Revolution is part of the artist’s bigger project 366 liberation rituals, which evolves as a series of actions and gestures happening daily during 2008 and which is curated and produced by g-mk | galerija miroslav kraljević (Zagreb) in the framework of the collaborative project Land of Human Rights.

IGOR GRUBIĆ (1969, Zagreb, HR) enrolled in 1992 in a course of philosophy and later psychotherapeutic education based on Gestalt and Transactional analysis. As a visual artist, since 1996 he has mainly produced site-specific interventions in public spaces, with the aim of involving others in the creative process. Since 2000 he has worked as a producer and journalist at Fade In, a studio for activist video, on the production of documentaries, TV reports and socially committed TV advertising. He has exhibited his work widely. Recent solo exhibitions include: Before and After the Storm, MMC Luka (Pula, 2008) and Sooty-faced Angels, BELEF, (Belgrade, 2006). His most important projects and actions in public space include: Call for the withdrawal of the Zagreb Student Center management (2000, Zagreb), Black Peristyle (1999, Split/Zagreb), Book and Society - 22 % (1998, Zagreb), NO KI TEKA (1997/8, Zagreb). A selection of group exhibitions includes Be A Happy Worker: Work-To-Rule, Galerija Miroslav Kraljević (2008, Zagreb), Bad Joke, (2007, Tallin), October. Exit, Desire and Memory”, Artra Gallery, (2007, Milano), Revolution is not a garden party, Trafo Gallery (2006, Budapest), Side-effects, Museum of Contemporary Art (2006, Belgrade), Looking Awry, Apexart Gallery, (2003, New York), Imaginary Balkans, Site Gallery (2002, Sheffield), Manifesta 4, (2002, Frankfurt), What, how and for whom, Kunsthalle Exmergasse, (2001, Vienna), etc.