The Commission of the Ministry sent three identical sentences to all whose projects were accepted, and two to those who were not. Local colonies, meetings and similar events stand out among the recipients of state money
The results of all the tenders for co-financing that the Ministry of Culture announced at the end of last year and at the beginning of this year have not yet been published.
Among those announced are the results of the Competition for co-financing projects in the field of fine, applied, visual arts, design and architecture.
The competition was announced on November 27, 2023, the deadline for submitting proposals was December 26, and according to the law, the results had to be published 60 days after that date. On February 21, the competition commission, which consisted of Jelena Medaković, Radoš Antonijević and Zoran Čalija, made a proposal for projects that should be supported or not. This means that the Ministry could announce the results within the legal deadline, until the end of February.
The results were announced on July 19, almost five months later.
Serbia and Kosovo
The competition received 294 proposals, of which 135 were accepted, the Ministry allocated 80,1 million dinars for their projects, and most of the competitors were rejected.
The highest amount, 2,500.000 dinars, will be awarded to the Cultural Center of Belgrade for the 60th October Salon. Next, the Gallery of Contemporary Art Art for All from Belgrade will receive 2.000.000 dinars for "Flow - Contemporary Art from the Open Balkans" in Washington, the Association Konstrukt will receive 1,500.000 for "Challenges of Modernism", the Jevrem Grujić House in Belgrade will receive 1,200.000 dinars for the program " Dragoš Kalajić - the return of the Hyperboreans".
10 projects will receive one million each, and the remainder is divided among the others, usually 400.000 dinars each. The lowest amount is 300.000 dinars.
Three sentences
Research on these results is yet to be done. At first glance, one gets the impression that it was important for the Commission to distribute the money throughout Serbia and Kosovo, because local art colonies, meetings and similar events are noticeable, which, according to them, were more important than, for example, the annual programs of renowned galleries.
In addition to the explanation of each accepted work, three identical sentences are written in the Explanation section: "The expressed conformity of the project with the general interest in culture and the goals and priorities of the competition." Expressed quality and substantive innovation of the project. A pronounced degree of impact of the project on the quality of the cultural life of the community."
Among the rejected, it is very easy to find those who agree more with these three sentences, than those who are accepted.
Also, among those accepted, there are several of them who, at least judging by the IPR, are not engaged in art. For example, VMS DOO Belgrade, which received 400.000 dinars for Milija Čpajek's exhibition in Florence, is a design, engineering and consulting company.
Of those rejected, only two reactions were publicly announced: Art space U10 and SULUJ Galleries.
Space U10
U10 proposed three programs, and all three were rejected. These are: the annual program of the Art Space U10, the exhibition of Master's students of the Faculty of Fine Arts in Belgrade - Masterpieces VI, and the project They told me that the planet has nerve endings.
Despite this, from August 10 to 1, the art program "Plestelin" prepared by the platform "Stereovizija" will be held every day in Gallery U31, with more than 25 works by more than 30 authors from Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Switzerland, Germany, Russia, Taiwan.
Gallery SULUJ
Then, for the eighth year in a row, the Ministry of Culture refused to co-finance the work of the SULUJ Gallery, the Association of Associations of Visual Artists of Yugoslavia. This means that artists, in order to show their work to the public and above all to influence the development of our art scene, will again have to pay all the costs of exhibiting in this gallery themselves.
In the Ministry's commission's explanation of why it believes that the state should not support the work of this Gallery, two sentences were mentioned that were sent to all rejected: "The compatibility of the project with the general interest in culture and the goals and priorities of the competition is questionable." The quality and substantive innovation of the project is questionable."
By the way, this year, the Gallery celebrates its 30th anniversary, which means that it is one of the few in Belgrade with such a long history and belongs to the civil sector.
In addition to their anniversary, this year will also mark the 125th anniversary of the "Anker" Home at Terazije 26, where they are located. Where they are now, in the twenties of the last century, the first art gallery was opened as part of the activities of the Art Department of the Ministry of Education - the forerunner of the Ministry of Culture.
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