The Living monument is no longer about the spectacle of nostalgia for one time or place- instead, it represents a territory of multiplicity

GOOGLE TOURIST

Brief presentatio

the title is quite revealing of two things. first of all, a digital geographic tool was used to analyze metelkova and its context, along with other means of investigation. second, the opinions and analysis that resulted can be attributed to a person coming from the outside, a tourist or a guest, who tried to understand what this place was all about in a limited period of time (one month). this is an exterior view, marked by a desire to know, but also by superficiality, as the man with the camera passing by on the street might have taken the wrong picture at the wrong time from the wrong angle. but there is also a high chance that this random description might be revealing and even meaningful.

by using the iconic image of mount triglav (a different season), i tried to place metelkova in the wider context of slovene contemporary art, but also within a symbolic geography of the city of ljubljana. the remakes of irwin and the janes jansa group after the original work of OHO are some of the images that float around this iconic triglav. but there is also a recollection of the coat of arms of slovenia that comes to mind, or even the very view of the mountain from the castle, on a clear day.

juxtaposed on the rainbow pillars (euro), the triglav becomes somewhat of a polemic image, as placing money behind the three-headed mountain might make one think that the current system controlling the very lives of people in slovenia is no longer linked to the ideology of the communist party, but to economy itself. this symbolic image leaves behind its former mythology and the reference to contemporary art and it becomes a seemingly naive image with a twist.

last but not least, using images from google earth i tried to reveal some of the characteristics of metelkova. in 'north and south' two photographs underline the two different urban landscapes to which the two areas of metelkova - north and south - respectively belong. it is quite obvious that the northern part is connected to an industrial area of railways and that the south lives in a residential region of the city. i tried to erase these differences by using a mirror, in an effort to underline the common function of metelkova as a whole - a provider of cultural products for the city of ljubljana, whose development is currently supported by the state.

vse pravice pridržane © Destinacija Metelkova 2008

produkcija: ASTAR