A competition that was supposed to show diversity of cultural creativity of Serbia during the Expo 2027 exhibition turned, according to "Vremen", into an open conflict between the Ministry of Culture and the company Expo 2027, which stalled the publication of the results.
Reason for dispute
The Minister of Culture, Nikola Selaković, threatened to cancel the competition if the candidates favored by the Ministry do not receive support, claims a "Vremena" source close to a member of the commission.
At the center of the dispute are the projects Predrag Đaković and Radmile Borojević, and due to the conflict, it is uncertain when the results of the competition will be announced.
About the competition
On May 29, the Ministry of Culture announced the competition on behalf of Expoe. Anyone involved in music, film and audio-visual creativity, theater, literature, art game, street art, visual art, digital creativity, architecture, performance, as well as the cultural heritage of Serbia could apply.
The goal of the competition is "presentation of programs and projects of subjects in culture at the Specialized Exhibition Expo 2027 Belgrade with the main theme "Game(s) for Humanity" which will be held in Belgrade from May 15 to August 15, 2027," the Ministry's competition conditions state.
Candidates were offered a premium of half to eight million dinars.
The total budget of the competition was not specified.
234 applications received, in which more than 300 entities participated as applicants or partners. Expo then announced that the administrative check will be followed by a professional evaluation and promised that each application will be considered "carefully, equally and in accordance with the prescribed procedure".
A three-member commission decides on the received projects: two members were proposed by the Expo, and one by the Ministry of Culture. The deadline for publishing the results passed on September 10.
The first reason for the dispute
However, what should have been an expert evaluation in recent days has, according to our source close to a member of the commission, become a political competition over whose candidates will receive the money.
Photo: GMSPredrag Djakovic, Milosrdje
Expo representatives in the commission expressly oppose the allocation of funds to the painter Predrag Đaković, close to the Minister of Culture Nikola Selaković, whose performance in Serbia this year at the Art Biennale in Venice caused extremely negative reactions from a section of the professional public.
In Venice, Đaković presented the project "Across Golgotha to Easter", which was submitted to the competition by the Archive of Vojvodina. The Ministry justified his choice with the assessment that the project contributes to the international dialogue "about memory, identity and conscience", while some art historians assessed the method of his selection as procedurally problematic, and the performance as unrepresentative of the contemporary Serbian art scene.
The second reason for the dispute
Another point of contention is the project of visual artist and educator Radmila Mila Borojević, wife of Saša Borojević, a television author known for promoting conspiracy theories.
In the part of the cultural community, both Đaković and Borojević are perceived as representatives of the so-called "children of culture" and people close to the political and value circle of Minister Selaković.
According to the sources of "Vremena", the minister told the representatives of Expo that he will cancel the competition if the candidates insisted on by the Ministry do not receive support. Due to this conflict, the date of publication of the results, which the cultural community is eagerly awaiting, is also uncertain.
The contest was closed on July 10, sixty days after the legal period for selecting representatives of Serbian culture at the Expo, but the participants still do not know when the results will be announced.
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