Summer openings

The Cukrarna Gallery cordially invites you to the opening of three exhibitions by the internationally acclaimed artists Šejla Kamerić, Adrian Paci and Tobias Putrih on June 19, 2024.

The aim of introducing the new programme activity in the form of simultaneous solo exhibitions is to activate the entire gallery, allowing the visitor to transition between three different artistic poetics by walking through all levels of the building – from the basement space, the lobby, and both floors. All three artists present new productions, while Šejla Kamerić and Adrian Paci feature other works in an overview exhibition format. Their art practices are influenced by the drastic socio-political changes of the 1990s, including war, migration, shifts in political systems and the reorganisation of social structures.

Šejla Kamerić: Perfect Tense
June 19–October 13, 2024

Perfect Tense is the most comprehensive exhibition of Šejla Kamerić’s work in Slovenia to date. A selection of outwardly political works from the artist’s versatile and prolific art career will be presented with curatorial advisement by Galit Eilat. The cohesive thread across the exhibition is Kamerić’s lifelong grappling with dyslexia and dysgraphia, informing the introspective nature of recent works such as RE PRESENT END, SICKHome and PRESENT each allocated distinct spaces within the exhibition. Created in 2024, these pieces serve as affirmative markers amidst the perceptible tensions between the artist and her creations, as well as the contexts of time and space in which they exist, thereby poignantly reflecting on the imperatives, accountability and challenges inherent to her work. The exhibition explores the pervasive political effects of perpetual war by creating multiple mirror images that reflect its structural and temporal embeddedness in everyday life.

Adrian Paci: Waves & Gazes
June 19–October 13, 2024

Waves & Gazes offers an insight into the art practice of Adrian Paci, marked by his spectacular video installations. The exhibition on the first floor is focused on the artist’s series of paintings, whose main characteristic is that they all stem from an indirect or third-party mediated gaze. A number of works from other painters are shown, who contrast the artist’s pictorial approach and confront this indirect gaze. The strong presence of anthropomorphic figures that inhabit the first-floor gallery also contrasts with Paci’s latest video production. The Bell Tolls Upon the Waves explores the archaeology of the artist’s gaze through various contexts that have shaped it, from his childhood in Shkoder, his years of study in Tirana and Milan, all the way to the present exhibition in Slovenia, curated by Pierre Bal-Blanc.

Tobias Putrih (with Ardalan SadeghiKivi): Order of Sweetness
June 19–September 15, 2024

The history of the Cukrarna Gallery building prompted the artist Tobias Putrih to reflect on the different stories harboured by every old house in its innermost chambers. In this pursuit, developed in a dialogue with the artist, architect and programmer Ardalan SadeghiKivi, Tobias Putrih brings together many fragmentary testimonies with stories and narratives from the past by thoughtfully transforming the space into a contemporary art gallery through a new architectural guise. Order of Sweetness, curated by Alenka Gregorič, will be the first exhibition in the lobby of the Cukrarna Gallery. Consequently, a key consideration in creating the spatial installation is how to establish a dialogue between the gallery’s rich history and its contemporary interior. The renewed combination of architectural theory, design and fine art has led the artist to the project’s final outcome in the form of a complete spatial installation.