In accordance with the program mission of the institution, which is to monitor and present artists who live and create in the local region, this year we are presenting a selection of works by the Slovenian coastal painter ALEŠ SEDMAK (1952, Postojna). The Piran Civic Gallery will feature a selection of paintings, graphics, drawings and natural science illustrations in various techniques from all periods of Sedmak’s nearly fifty-year-old oeuvre. The opening of RETROSPECTIVE EXHIBITION will take place on Friday, November 10, 2023 at 6:00 p. m.. The selection of natural sciences illustrations will also be on display at the Meduza Gallery in Koper. We will present the exhibition and the author at a press conference, which will be held on Friday, November 10, 2023, at 11:00 a.m. at the Civic Gallery Piran. We are also preparing a monographic publication. During the exhibition we will organize guided tours, round tables and workshops, including for those who are blind and partially sighted.
Since studying at the Department of Painting at the Ljubljana Academy of Fine Arts, where he graduated in 1980, Aleš Sedmak has been continuously creating as a painter, graphic artist, draftsman, illustrator, designer, pedagogue, mentor and organizer of educational workshops and events. Already during his studies, he was one of the founders of the SOG workshop at the Forum student association. From 1983 to 1987, he was the president of the Fine Artists Society of the Slovene Littoral (DLUSO). He was also one of the organizers of the establishment of the Society’s Insula Gallery in Izola (1987) and a quarter of a century ago a program consultant for the establishment of an Art School within Koper High School. From 2011 to 2021, he was a president of the Slovenian Association of Fine Arts Societies (ZDSLU). For sixteen years he was the head of the Kaverljag project as the only manifestation of its kind with the international participation of professors and students; his studio in this Istrian hamlet in the middle of lush nature above the valley of the river Dragonja has been a venue for unique educational camps, with an emphasis on current topics, especially ecology, the usefulness of products and the connection and synergy of fine arts and various scientific sciences. We are preparing a retrospective exhibition of Aleš Sedmak with the participation of the The Slovenian Association of Fine Art Societes (ZDSLU). At the Association’s ZDSLU Gallery, the opening of the exhibition Aleš Sedmak, Semi-scientific illustration and a “Black Box" will take place on Thursday, November 23, 2023, at 6 p.m.. More information at the link…
MLADEN STROPNIK received the Cesare dell’Acqua Award at the International Painting Ex-tempore Piran 2022. The award is named after the 19th century artist born in Piran, who established himself in the wider European area as a painter of portraits, historical and genre motifs. Last year’s international jury recognized Stropnik as an extremely interesting creator whose work deserved to be presented in the PCG’s 2023 exhibition program. His exhibition entitled “WIENER SCHNITZEL FRENCH FRIES“, which is being prepared by the curator dr. Majda Božeglav Japelj, will be opened on Friday, 17 November 2023, at 6:00 p.m. in the Loža Gallery in Koper. Stropnik ranks among the well-established representatives of the middle generation, who materialise their creativity in the field of contemporary visual art through a combination of different media, techniques and procedures. His recognizable personal style, which is rooted in Minimalist Aesthetics, is placed in the sphere of modern experimentation with innovative conceptual approaches. In his works on paper, graphics, drawings, photographs, as well as sculptures and videos, he touches on various topics, including those with sexual content, which are the subject of the Koper exhibition. He illustrates them with a great deal of humor and disarming sincerity, as an echo of his personal and almost intuitive experience of the world.
Some of the works in the exhibition will be in the form of NFTs- non-fungible tokens, digital art collectibles, a new-age phenomenon that allows the ownership of a certain value; for intangible objects, virtual drawings, or something in physical form. Viewing is possible by using a QR code. Some works, like the one on the cover of the invitation, “Crystals of Salt", can be viewed on a mobile phone with the help of the artiviva.com application. On the occasion of his first personal exhibition in Slovenian Istria, the author will also create an art object, a “mrč", or two.
In the style of his often used practice of interweaving and exchanging his creative energies with other authors, three more artists will participate in the exhibition: Saša Bezjak, Siniša Labrović and Nataša Skušek. The exhibition is created in collaboration with Gregor Podnar, Vienna. More information at the link…
At the end of November, the internationally renowned architectural conference, the 40th PIRAN DAYS OF ARCHITECTURE (PDA), will be held in the Municipality of Piran. With the title CONTEXT. CONCEPT. CONSENSUS., it summarizes the content of all previous meetings and all three topics are closely intertwined. Identifying the context, embedding the context in the concept, and verifying the concept by searching for consensus are all familiar working procedures that we use, but we mastered them in different approximations of complete integrity, which one only rarely attains. It is validated only in the context of the future and with the consent of history.
That is why returning to these timeless themes is always relevant, necessary and important. This is what the architect Janez Koželj wrote, among other things, about the content of the jubilee PDAs, the acclaimed traditional international architectural conference, which celebrates 40 years of activity this year. The conference will feature invited lecturers, internationally recognized experts: Wang Shu, Lu Wenyu (China), Iva Letilović, Igor Pedišić (Croatia), Pedro Domingos (Portugal), Tom Lechner (Austria), Aitor Fuentes (Spain), Janez Koželj, Sonja Ana Hoyer, Lenart Piano, (Slovenia). The conference will be held on Saturday, November 25, 2023, in the Portorož Auditorium, where at 7:00 p.m. the Piranesi 2023 award ceremony will be held with a welcome address by dr. Asta Vrečko, Minister of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia, and the honorary address of Anna Ramos, director of the Mies van der Rohe Foundation.
The award ceremony will be followed by the opening of the Piranesi 2023 international architectural exhibition in the Monfort Wooden Hall in Portorož at 8:00 p.m.. Andrej Korenika, Mayor of the Municipality of Piran, and architect Robert Potokar will address those present.
The history of the PDA will be summarized and evaluated by the documentary exhibition PDA 40: OPEN ARCHIVES (curators: Špela Kuhar, DESSA Gallery, Robert Potokar and Staša Baranja, Piranesi Foundation), which will be opened in the Herman Pečarič Gallery on Friday, 24 November 2023, at 6 p.m. More information at the link…
You are kindly invited!
