SANJA ŽDRNJA
PRESENTATION OF WORKS
Workshop “2D Mutant Zombies”-(Low-Key Low-Tech Identity Mapping Workshop)
Workshop explores the issues of identity and its cultural instrumentalization.From the sixties to the recent new-media, cyber, gender and hybrid theories. The
identity, as the specific theme of the Western art, has become the universal paradigm for the contextualization of art and turned into a cultural fetish.
Workshop utilizes a low-key morphing method that is considered low-tech in the digital domain where it has been used for more than 15 years.Morphing is a
digital animation technique for transformations between two images.It is realized through algorithms for warping and blending of pixels according to the given
reference points or structural lines.The face is the key identity map and here is used for the purpose of pixel-level experimentation.
The process of work was: first photograph pairs of portraits on the location, morph them and select one intermediary frame, print and exhibit as a life-size
photograph.The result is a static bastard-image created within the animation process.Unlike the classical approach of Nancy Burson, the pioneer of morphing
whose elegant portraits conceal the technique, here is different, we practiced freestyle morphing with equal use of digital limitations and tricks in order to make
visually exciting and provocative works.
The artist is a primarily in the role of manipulator, paradoxically renders hybrid portraits with clear qualities of “personality” and “character”, open for
identification and any other relation which open the space for the game and thinking.
1. morf
2. morf
final morf
foto-instalation „On the edge „ , 2006
Photomontage “ On the edge”
I made this print for my final exhibition at the faculty of
fine arts ( in Belgrade ).I spent five years of my life
there.I worked there and listened the stories about
earlier generations and who become the famous art
star, etc.I know the building from different sides,
outdoor, indoor, simpliest, every angle of every room.It
was my so called secon home; that is the reason I
choose precisely that building.The arhitecture without
decoration was for me inspiration and I put the line (
with human body ), I called it “Mejbrige’s line”, on the
edge of the roof.First, for the tests I choose Mejbrige
photo when he shot the man who stand on the
hands.But his photos from book is not so clear and
good for manipulation and so, I find model to make
photos.Here I duplicate and got the line:of strong,
young men, stand upside down on the hands, larger
than average size, human size.This work have
references to the work of for example Leni Rifenshtal
or Rodschenko, it is look like it belong to the past time,
so it is the same with my situation, for me the
memories belong to the past.Also, the line look like on
young new generations, in the same time, they are
young, they could compete among themselves.Who is
the original and who is the copy ( in big print we do not
know but in postcard ) I discover. I use postcards only
for good memory and also for my own art marketing.
postcard “ on the edge “
Seria of photos „ Miror „ I made in 2005. I
made in space of contemporary museum in
Salzburg. I find silver, aluminium suface and I
used my reflection in it. I find oneself like funny
figure with new form of the body and also with
halo above my head. Changes of my
apperance and see oneself in different view.
It’s almost like game with funny mirror and my
experience in that position.
Overlaped photos ( two photos: one is autoportrait and the other is laying figure in the salt ); the title is „ Memento mori „ ( hand-made
black and white photograph; size: 2x1,7m) ; the thinking about material : salt; in the sense of christianity ( in Bible’s sentence : „ You
are the salt for the ground „ ) and recollection of our death and the sense of our existence in this life and the nature of our souls; in
the other hand, reference with the whole cause ( with the chemistry ) in black and white laboratory.
“Patterns for my white shirts”
Digital photos of autoportraits; first, I multiplied and made them in very small size, so, nobody can recognize the face and I used it to make print for ( the way I
called this work ) my white shirt. The pattern is the square. I photograph myself with the cosmetic mask on my face, like, everyday ritual in women’s life. And, the
other part of the concept is that I choose, for the object, shirt- for me that is,definitely, male symbol ( and shirts for female are the second version of the first
one).Put that white canvas ( with the print on it ) on my body, I do, again, one more ritual of cleaning, this time, cleaning from that symbolical meaning.
PHOTO-INSTALATION:”BAD/WHITE
“,SOLO-EXIBITION, GALLERY “ALKATRAZ”,
SALZBURG, SUMMER ACADEMY, 2005.
PHOTOGRAPHY CLASS
OF KATHARINA SIEVERDING
I created photo-instalation for the very small
room or gallery( in the old salt factory in
Salzburg ).At first I collect lot of trash photos
from my dark room where my friends and I
develop the black and white photos.Very often
people do something wrong with the light and
exposure and get bad results.Thus I found
that these pictures have some sence for me.
They are new works even they are bad photos
in a view of professional photographer.I
collect pieces black and white, black or almost
really white photos.Some of wet photos I put
on the sun light and I get gold or bronze
colour on photo-papier.I choose to use my
intuition and hang them on the wall and make
big photo-wallpapier.I put in my work all
experiences and events and hopes, etc from
the other people, my friends.That emocional
attitude was important for me and have
impact on me.I use chair instead of the ladder,
scissors, tape and on the end of the action I
decide to leave everything like it is, on the
flour.I add only light, slid-projector light and
put the projector under the chair.So, when you
want to come inside, first you are blinded with
the light and you don’t see anything.When you
are approach you see photo-wallpapier and
details, some pictures and the parts of the
photos.Whole new big photo on the wall look
like on enformel painthing with lot of layers.
The title speaks us how the light could be in a
position of creator.
Corridor final wall
The title of this work, video installation is
Corridor Final wall.First I created the space,
six meters corridor and present that video in
the space.I choose hidden space in building,
so you can go and in one moment you will find
or discover the space.The corridor can be see
only from the inner side.I put projection on the
final wall of that corridor.That is the man of
hidden identity cos it can be female and male
and also model whowalk and do not show the
front side of appearance.We only can see him
or her from
the back.Story about lonliness of
existence.This figure exists and live here ( in
that space ), like for example, very rare animal
sort-human fish, live on the space of Slovenia,
in Postoina cave.I show the video all the time
in gallery space, put in loop-the video is about
30 min.So, it is like 2D sculpture.She or he
walks and does it very sophisticated.She
walks, sits, makes some different positions
with the body, but very slowly.The sound of
breathing, first one when she/he stands and
when she/he walks, then we can hear sound
of few breathing.First we see one figure then
four.
GENTLE
SPINE,
2006.
GENTLE
SPINE
“ GENTLE
SPINE “
“ GENTLE SPINE „ , 2006.
( exhibit on the solo-exhibition :“Playing
instruments=objects in the empty room “ )
„ TAKE A BASS BREATH „ , 2007.
( exhibit on the solo-exhibition :“Playing
instruments=objects in the empty room “ )
„ PLAYING PIANO IN THE EMPTY ROOM „ , 2007.
( exhibit on the solo-exhibition :“Playing instruments=objects in the empty room “ )
„ GIFT I „ , 2007.
( exhibit on the solo-exhibition :“Playing instruments=objects in the empty
( exhibit on the solo-exhibition :“Playing instruments=objects in the empty room “ )
„ GIFT II „ , 2007.
“Tear objects”
Series of sculptures, that I called
them “Tear objects” consist of seven
shapes in polish aluminium.I got it
from my face-I got prints from my
face choose surfaces which fluid
form follow the form of my
face.These elipsas forms are polish
with the purpose to get reflection
quality and stand exibit in the
space.But, I back them on the place
of birth in the line of autoportraitsphotographs with the objects.On this
way, the sculpture becomes
anecessary, organic decoration to
the natural appearance.To
emphasize metal quality of everyday
object on these photographs, my
portrait get increase shining.Also,
the form of the hair correspond to
these aluminium shapes.Through
this work, I research connection
between presentation and
performance of my own identity and
its appearance
.
( exhibit on the solo-exhibition :“Playing instruments=objects in the empty room “ )
00: empty room, body, three male and two female instruments
01:In the book Body art- performing the subject Amelia Jones states that body art in particular confirms the premises of the phenomenology and psychoanalysis,
that the subjects relations to the others adds to its meaning, and that the locus of identity is always elsewhere.
The Empty room is an important step with which Sanja establishes the logic of building intimate atmosphere and the condition to articulate the embodied intersubjectivity, characteristic of the performance art (Hannah Wilke). This intervention of the authoress opened the possibility to represent personal, erotic fantasy
of another body, outside of the wider social context. Just like Wilke in the seventies and the eighties, Sanja treats her body as a sculptural form. However, even
though they are equally sensual, her works cannot be considered destructive. She tries to reexamine the questions of sexuality, femininity or feminism, only if
we agree that she offers quite a different focus. Her performance has no direct ambition to emancipate, but it suggests the state of intimate harmony.
Sanja’s body, entwined in an erotic act, does not figure just as its own image; it’s her entire being faced with an attempt of reproduction, desire or appropriation
of the other as an object or a subject of pleasure. Isolating herself in an empty room, the authoress is trying to take a position opposed to the lack in the Other, of
the Symbolic order, desire and jouissance of the Other, and uses fantasy as a relatively stable means of defense. A similar erotic relation which gives
figurativeness to the body can be seen in Marcel Duchamp, whose alter ego Rose C’est la vie has a function of denying the lack.
The Other is here embodied in the instruments of various sizes and it represents two principles: male and female. Sanja does not only offer her own body as an
object, she also points out the resonance created in the encounter with the male (Gentle Spine, Take a Bass Breath, Gift), and left out in the relation with the
female instruments (Playing Piano in the Empty Room, Tear Objects).
Fantasy could be explained with the mirror phase which, in an essay displayed for the first time at the Psychoanalysts’ Congress in Zurich in 1949, Lakan
explained as identification or transformation which constructs the ego, taking the images of others (imago) If we interpret the more recent works of Sanja Ždrnja
as an imaginary identification of the mirror phase, they enable us to see the Ego in its primordial form, in the time before its function as the subject in language.
As the male instruments, such as the one following the line of the authoresses spine (Gentle Spine), or a smaller instrument shaped after her fingers, in the
place of subjects in genesis, there are no visible signs of separation between them. The male instruments are the projection of the Ego inscribed into the
imaginary register, and in unison with Sanja’s body, they realize the harmony of imaginary identification. Their relation can also be interpreted like a pre-oedipal
stadium, as a natural state in which the need for closeness and compassion is realized. They have the function of balancing the authoresses libido and they
represent the identification point of the foundation of her subject, with the aim to make it coherent and closer to Ideal Ego.
While the male instruments are in unison with the authoresses body and they make the resonance possible, the female instruments are breath stopping. The
imprint of the authoresses body in Playing Piano in the Empty Room¸or the imprints of her face in Tear Objects, point out the insufficiency of female body and
the indispensable presence of the male subject whose effect it would be.
It would seem that Ždrnja knows that the subject, as seen by Lakan, does not exist apart from the constant flow of meaning, but only as a single event in an
unending flux, and that its particularities do not originate from the strengths, attitudes and dispositions the individual possesses in various situations, but from the
marking process whose part they make. Ždrnja uses photography, as a medium which enables her to freeze the relation of her body and the instruments, and to
defend herself from the flow of markers, which represent the lack. This way she hints that in the intimate atmosphere of an empty room her non-fragmented self
is still possible.
Maja Ćirić, curator
( solo-exhibition :“Playing instruments=objects in the empty room “ )