A talk in the context of the exhibition Skin

The discussion will include exhibiting artists Špela Šivic (SI), Goran Bertok (SI), Karina-Sirkku Kurz (FI/DE) and Görkem Ergün (TR).

We will discuss with the artists their creative process, their projects, and the broader social significance of their practices. We will talk about art, society, the tangible and imaginary surface of skin, our identity in the age of online networks, posthumanism, hybrid identities and last but not least the privileged place the body occupies in a wide variety of art practices.

Špela Šivic (1998) is a young Slovenian photographer. While attending the Faculty of Applied Sciences – VIST in Ljubljana, she expanded her knowledge of photochemistry and various darkroom processes with photographer Peter Fettich who has been member of the Kela collective over the past year. She decided to spend her third academic year in Bari, at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Bari. She uses the analogue technique and occasionally complements her works with other means of artistic expression, thus exploring in terms of both content and form how to render the moment that occurs in front of the camera in its final form as genuinely as possible. Her first photography book, Brugnon, came out in February 2021. Last September Špela Šivic and Jaka Mojškerc held the exhibition MOMCI and some other or less related things.

Goran Bertok (1963) studied journalism and comparative literature and graduated in 1989 in journalism from the Faculty of Sociology, Political Science and Journalism – FSPN (now Faculty of Social Sciences – FDV). In 1990, the central motif of his first solo exhibition held at the ŠKUC Gallery was the human body bearing signs of physical violence. In subsequent series, Bertok explored the transitions between all stages of violence; from make-believe violence, intentional harm done to one's own body and/or the other’s body to the organised violence that society inflicts on the body of an individual, culminating in physical death and complete destruction of the body.

Karina-Sirkku Kurz (1979) is a Finnish-German photographer and visual artist currently based in Berlin. She studied in Bremen, Lahti and Helsinki where she graduated with a master’s degree from the Department of Photography at Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture. Kurz’s work UNGLEICHGEWICHT (Imbalance) has won and been nominated for several prizes. The book of the same name won the Nordic Dummy Award in 2015 and was then published by Kehrer Verlag. In 2017, UNGLEICHGEWICHT was honored with the Finnish Photobook Award, organized by the Association of Photographic Artists and The Finnish Museum of Photography. Photographer Alec Soth chose the winner. Kurz is a member of the Union of Artist Photographers in Finland and Deutsche Fotografische Akademie. She received several grants, among others, from Haus am Kleistpark in Berlin, the Finnish Cultural Foundation, The Arts Promotion Centre Finland, FRAME Contemporary Art Finland, Norwegian Arts Council and The Swedish Cultural Foundation in Finland. Kurz’s works can be found in the Finnish State Art Collection, the Collection of “The Finnish Museum of Photography” and in private collections.

Görkem Ergün (1981) is an artist and also works in a photography archive in Istanbul. In his lens-based works, Ergün focuses on the relations between culture, design and violence with a body-centered point of view. Scientific developments, new technologies, great destructions and rituals make it possible to create new meanings about the consequences of focused relationships and how these relationships can be transformed. His works have been exhibited in various galleries, museums and showcases.