here you can find complete report/overview of festival KARAVAN SARAJEVO that took place in slovenia capitol ljubljana.
the KARAVAN SARAJEVO festival is based upon an idea of cultural exchange. and, of course, the fact that post-war connection/communication among independent artists, living and working within the territory of ex-yugoslavia, is almost not there anymore, needless to say that they are hindered in many different ways on every step they take. thus the festival, the idea and its development represents our vision of reviving the civil society in the countries of former yugoslavia.
the post-war society imposed all sorts of (everyday) restrictions upon independent artists, so their ability to maintain contact to others, to communicate and present their work in the region where they live in is limited. another impediment in the development of independent art in the countries of ex-yugoslavia are the finances - since most of the artists who are into the independent art do not exactly draw attention and interest of the prominent institutions competent for financing culture. thus it is obvious that the situation of independent art scene is not a prosperous one. on the contrary, it is withering away. for these very reasons (isolation, impossibility of communicating and presenting, lack of finances) many independent art collectives/individuals stopped with their work.
activists from social and cultural centre METELKOVA MESTO - ljubljana and organization KOLEKTIV - sarajevo came up with the idea of a cultural exchange project - presentation of slovene artists in bosnia and herzegovina and vice versa. in september 1999 we already organized a festival LJUBLJANA - SARAJEVO 1999 in sarajevo, so bosnia and herzegovina was presented the current happening in slovene independent scene.
the next step - presentation of independent artists of bosnia and herzegovina in slovenia - is of great importance to the artists themselves and also to entire independent scene.in this way independent artists get the opportunity to present their creations - the independent art of bosnia and herzegovina gets to be presented outside its borders (which is even hard to imagine, being aware of its non-commercial/non-profit nature) - and thus create a counter balance to mainstream art, which is privileged by the state institutions.
as we said, result is KARAVAN SARAJEVO. 20 people, 2 vans, 2 days on the road, 2 days working in ljubljana.
KARAVAN SARAJEVO is supported by:
darko kujundzic at