Presentation
of the 45th October Salon concept in the City Assembly
of Belgrade
The
concept presentation of 45th October Salon took place
in the Hall of the Belgrade City Assembly on Monday, 15th
December 2003. Mrs Radmila Hrustanovic, the Mayor of Belgrade,
was the host of this presentation. After her welcoming
speech, Mr. Bojan Bem, the President of the October Salon
Board, explained the concept changes of October Salon
to the guests: "Inflexibility, inertia, incapability of
adapting to a new spiritual ambience, which had brought
the "expanded media" with it and in a way started closing
the ideological gap between "sophisticated" and "applied"
visual art techniques, made us realize a long time ago
that pursuing old strategies in the domain of exhibiting
works of art was getting counter-productive.
Therefore,
the Salon stepped out of its usual venue - the Art Pavilion
"Cvijeta Zuzoric" and moved to some other settings around
the city: various galleries, the Memorial Centre "25th
May", legacy buildings and outdoor city locations. Selectors
replaced the jury of the Salon. Afterwards, the function
of art director was instituted.
The
Art Director of the Salon created a concept of the entire
event together with her/his assistants. Finally, the moment
came when the Salon should be transformed into an international
art event. Therefore, the October Salon Board appointed
Mrs Anda Rotenberg, a renowned art historian and critic
from Poland, to be the Art Director of 45th October Salon.
Mrs Anda Rotenberg
presented a project called "Continental
breakfast".
Mrs.
Danica Jovovic Prodanovic, the Director of the Belgrade
Cultural Centre, announced at the end of this presentation
that a conference
-symposium would take place on 11th and 12th September,
that is in the course of this exhibition. Renowned foreign
and domestic art historians and theoreticians, sociologists,
culturologists and artists were going to take part in
it.
Mrs
Jovovic Prodanovic also invited foreign ambassadors and
other representatives of foreign countries, as well as
business people from our country, to support 45th October
Salon, adding that it was going to be an international
exhibition for the first time since its inception and
that it was going to be held from 11th September till
31st October 2004 in Belgrade.
