On the occasion of DANUBE DIALOGUE, an international festival of visual arts from the Danube region, which promotes contemporary art, cultural identity and collaboration between artists, the artist Liliana (Mercioiu) Popa, university professor. dr. within the Faculty of Arts and Design, participates with the work for public space "What about you?" in dialogue with the artist Dragan Vojvodić, also a university teacher in Novi Sad.
The festival is organized in Novi Sad, where it takes place in different galleries and alternative places in the city, provoking open dialogue between different artists and cultures, establishing new connections and new collaborative contexts.
Thanks to these connections, the two artists, both participants for the third time in the festival, also interfered in another previous artistic experience - the "In vitro Veritas" exhibition, opened in 2019 in Timișoara, this time, in the alternative exhibition space of the North Station, exhibition organized by the T-act Association in collaboration with the Avantpost platform.
During the DANUBE DIALOGUE festival, opening a literal dialogue, Liliana Mercioiu Popa "investigates and (self) interrogates the role of art as a relational tool through "What about you?", a public artwork placed on the ground, in front of the public. The artist suggests an "ambiguous" interpretation - the viewer can perceive it as an existential question, a reminder of the process of self-examination, but also as an aesthetic hook for an awareness of the public role we each play in a certain context." (Diana Marincu)
Dragan Vojvodić's answer comes to emphasize the personal/individual character of responsibility, but also of involvement, which in his opinion coincides with a "political" attitude, which concerns us all.
The two interventions could be seen between September 9-21, in the old part of the city – Petrovaradin Citadel (Prote Mihaldžića square).
"The already stable partnership, the result of a fruitful collaboration between the Bel Art Gallery in Novi Sad, the main organizer of the festival, and the Interart TRIADE Foundation, places it in the privileged position of a permanent guest of the festival.
The collaboration between the two entities consists in choosing one curator each to ensure the dialogue between six artists - three Romanian artists and three Serbian artists, selected by the two curators -, identifying some points of tangent, convergence or contrast between artistic practices and environments different used by them.
This year, the orchestrators of these approaches are, for the Triade Foundation, curator Diana Marincu, and for Bel Art Gallery Novi Sad, Sanja Mladenov.
The two curators established the pairs of artists placed in a dialogical relationship, in accordance with the spaces chosen for the exhibition: Wednesday, September 8
18:30 – The Great Wall (entrance from the Museum): Oana Paula Vainer and Anica Vučetić
19:00 – The underground military galleries: Andreea Medar and Danica Bicanić
19:30 – Prote Mihaldžića Square: Liliana Mercioiu Popa and Dragan Vojvodić" (Sorina Jecza)
The cultural project was included in the priority cultural program TM2023 RESTART of the Timișoara Project Center, carried out with the support of the Timișoara City Hall and the Timișoara Local Council.
Univ. Assoc. Dr. Liliana Mercioiu Popa
