“What do you think will change or disappear in your everyday life when your country joins the EU”

Exhibition: May 13 – 18, 2010
Opening: 13 May 2010, 7pm
Center for Cultural Decontamination, Birčaninova 21, Belgrade
Museum Night: 15 May 2010, 6pm - 2am
Public Debate: 18 May 2010, 7pm

The Culture Lobby is a collective portrait of the territories of the Western Balkans that have yet to join the European Union, the product of a three-year photographic project by KIOSK in collaboration with the Sarajevo Centre for Contemporary Art (Sarajevo), G-MK | Galerija Miroslav Kraljević (Zagreb), Cultural Centre Lindart (Tirana), Laboratory for Visual Arts | LAB (Prishtina), ProStory (Podgorica), Center for Contemporary Public Art Elementi (Bitola) and Index on Censorship (London, UK).

The Culture Lobby is an initiative to create a participatory “active archive” of cultural memory in the Western Balkans during this moment of transition, by documenting visually and aurally what citizens think will change or disappear when their territory joins the EU. The Culture Lobby project is realized in collaboration with the European Fund for the Balkans.

It is our pleasure to invite you to the opening of The Culture Lobby exhibition on Thursday, 13 May 2010, at 7pm in the Center for Cultural Decontamination in Belgrade. Please see the invitation here.

Exhibition program

Exhibition: 13–18 May 2010
Location: Center for Cultural Decontamination, Birčaninova 21, Belgrade, Serbia
Opening reception: 13 May at 7:00pm
A curated selection of the archive will be exhibited in the form of a self-standing installation, created by artist Dorijan Kolundžija.
The whole archive is available for browsing on www.theculturelobby.com

Museums Night: 15 May 2010, 6:00pm–2:00am
Location: Center for Cultural Decontamination
All citizens are invited to attend the exhibition and contribute their answer to the question: “What do you think will change or disappear when your area joins the European Union?” The collected answers will be published on www.theculturelobby.com.

Public debate: 18 May 2010, 7:00pm
Location: Center for Cultural Decontamination, Birčaninova 21, Belgrade
On the occasion of the completion of the Culture Lobby project, KIOSK will host a public debate on the topic “How citizens of the region perceive the process of European Union accession – cultural models, identity and globalization”. Experts from various professions will gather to discuss the process of EU accession, based on the results of The Culture Lobby project. The debate is open to the public.

Participants include: Milica Delević (Director of the Office for European Integration), Vincent Degert (Ambassador, Head of the European Commission Delegation in Serbia), , Borka Pavićević (playwright, Director of the Center for Cultural Decontamination), Hedvig Morvai-Horvat (Director of the European Fund for the Balkans), Ivan Vejvoda (Director of the Balkan Fund for Democracy), Ambassador, Andrew lass (Director of the British Council, Serbia and Montenegro), Cindy Blažević (artist, author of the Culture Lobby project), Ana Adamović (artist), Marko Stamenković (art historian, curator). Moderator of the debate: Milica Pekić (art historian and curator of the Culture Lobby project)