Loose Ends
Renata Fabbri is glad to announce Loose Ends, a project curated by Branka Benčić.
The exhibition Loose Ends takes form through unstable and temporary performative strategies of improvisation, replacement, repetition, or reconfiguration. As the title refers to the unsolved or unfinished, open-ended and vague, the exhibition unfolds as a set of provisional dialogues, echoing a suspended meaning. The exhibition brings together four artistic positions, each one dealing with protocols of reproduction and repair, testing and redoing, different conceptual and formal procedures in a process that encompasses contingency. It reflects uncertainties of the contemporary momentum – changing landscapes, economies of tension and collapse, spatial and temporal discontinuities.
The works converging in this project address the materiality of artistic processes as they unfold through production and display. In particular, they look at aspects of precariousness, fragility, (in)stability and ephemerality inscribed to such procedures, as well as to the production modes and methodologies behind them. The display is articulated through a series of formal elements, analogies, juxtapositions and reciprocities that characterize these works in their re-configuration of minimalist, post-minimalist, conceptual and abstract formal languages. Performativity is enacted in staging relations between objects and the viewer, in a choreography of the space.
We are often led to think that every action is projected towards a specific end or purpose. However, there is a distinction between actions that are “means to ends” and those that are not, that are “ends in themselves”. Loose Ends explores and enacts such element of suspension, a gap standing in between the reality of an object, an action, an image and its meaning. A space that remains vaguely defined by loosely connected or disconnected parts. Situations or actions become articulated as possibilities and attempts, either to reach, to avoid or to mark possible new ends or, again, to embody a space without ends. Awaiting for the meaning to be re-inscribed, Loose Ends stages a situation of both aesthetic, spatial and conceptual terms, to form a visual language of fragments, temporary, unstable and precarious forms. Structured as a fragmentary narrative, a set of potentialities is emerging on the horizon.
Renata Fabbri is glad to announce Loose Ends, a project curated by Branka Benčić.
The exhibition Loose Ends takes form through unstable and temporary performative strategies of improvisation, replacement, repetition, or reconfiguration. As the title refers to the unsolved or unfinished, open-ended and vague, the exhibition unfolds as a set of provisional dialogues, echoing a suspended meaning. The exhibition brings together four artistic positions, each one dealing with protocols of reproduction and repair, testing and redoing, different conceptual and formal procedures in a process that encompasses contingency. It reflects uncertainties of the contemporary momentum – changing landscapes, economies of tension and collapse, spatial and temporal discontinuities.
The works converging in this project address the materiality of artistic processes as they unfold through production and display. In particular, they look at aspects of precariousness, fragility, (in)stability and ephemerality inscribed to such procedures, as well as to the production modes and methodologies behind them. The display is articulated through a series of formal elements, analogies, juxtapositions and reciprocities that characterize these works in their re-configuration of minimalist, post-minimalist, conceptual and abstract formal languages. Performativity is enacted in staging relations between objects and the viewer, in a choreography of the space.
We are often led to think that every action is projected towards a specific end or purpose. However, there is a distinction between actions that are “means to ends” and those that are not, that are “ends in themselves”. Loose Ends explores and enacts such element of suspension, a gap standing in between the reality of an object, an action, an image and its meaning. A space that remains vaguely defined by loosely connected or disconnected parts. Situations or actions become articulated as possibilities and attempts, either to reach, to avoid or to mark possible new ends or, again, to embody a space without ends. Awaiting for the meaning to be re-inscribed, Loose Ends stages a situation of both aesthetic, spatial and conceptual terms, to form a visual language of fragments, temporary, unstable and precarious forms. Structured as a fragmentary narrative, a set of potentialities is emerging on the horizon.
Vlatka Horvat, Frame Painting (Felt Strip), 2018Wooden frame, felt, 37x39x5 cm
Vlatka Horvat, Frame Painting (Felt Hole), 2018Wooden frame, felt, corrugated cardboard, 55x55x3.5 cm
Vlatka Horvat, Equivalents (III), 2014From left:
Claybord panel, archival artist tape, acrylic, 13x13 cm
Wooden panel, cotton string 31x23 cm
Claybord panel, felt, foam , 24x31 cm
Ištvan Išt Huzjan, Unnamed image, 2013Bleached textile, 16x(10×5) cm
Dino Zrnec, Untitled, 2018Found cleats, sliced stretchers, cotton, acrylic glass, 100x50x5,5 cm
Dino Zrnec, Untitled, 2018Found cleats, sliced stretchers, cotton, acrylic glass, 44x8,5x5 cm
Ištvan Išt Huzjan, Unnamed figure, 2018Stretcher and armature metal net, 2x79x87 cm
Dino Zrnec, Untitled, 2018Acrylic glass, sliced stretchers, 50x25x4,7 cm
Dino Zrnec, Unnamed figure, 2018Oil on cotton, 116,5x86,5 cm
Dino Zrnec, Untitled, 2017Oil on cotton, 116,5x86,5 cm
Dino Zrnec, Untitled, 2017Oil on cotton, 116,5x86,5 cm
Sophie Ko, Geografia temporale, 2019Pure pigment, 140x80 cm
Sophie Ko, Geografia temporale, 2019Pure pigment, 140x80 cm
Vlatka Horvat (Čakovec, Croatia, 1974) works across a wide range of forms, from sculpture, installation, drawing, collage and photography to performance, video, writing and publishing. Her practice investigates the precarious relationship between bodies, objects, the built environment and nature by reimagining and redrawing the physical, social, psychological and environmental boundaries experienced in our everyday lives. She is particularly drawn to what she thinks of as ‘problematic’ or dysfunctional set of relations, whereby things like balance or stability become compromised, and where the habitual function of objects is playfully messed with.
In her work Horvat frequently enacts reversals and inversions of established spatial and social order. She is interested in how things occupy, negotiate and share space, and how gestures of organizing and reorganizing spatial relations also perform a certain reordering of social dynamics. Horvat’s works tend to have a speculative or propositional quality, and frequently deal with the possibility of transformation and change. Many of her projects are organized around a set of self-imposed restrictions, a rule-based framework of sorts within which her investigations take place. The artist stages a meeting between her own system of rules and the open-ended, playful, improvisatory activity that she pursues inside it.
Vlatka Horvat lives and works in London, where she moved after spending twenty years in the US. She has had solo exhibitions at PEER, London (2022); GAEP Gallery, Bucharest (2020); Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb (2018); Renata Fabbri, Milan (2017); Museums Sheffield (2017); Wilfried Lentz, Rotterdam (2016); CAPRI Raum, Düsseldorf (2016); Zak | Branicka Gallery, Berlin (2015 and 2011); MMC Multimedia Centre, Pula (2014); Galerija SC, Zagreb (2014); Disjecta Contemporary Art Center, Oregon (2013); annex14, Zurich (2013 and 2012); Boston University Art Gallery (2012); Rachel Uffner Gallery, New York (2012); Bergen Kunsthall (2011); The Kitchen, New York (2009); and Galerija Nova, Zagreb (2005). She has realized projects and installations for Kunsthalle Wien, Zurcher Theater Spektakel, the Pavilion of Croatia at the 16th Venice Architecture Biennale, VOLT (Bergen), Bard Center for Curatorial Studies (NY), Bunkier Sztuki (Krakow), Marta Herford Museum (Herford), Kunsthalle Osnabrück, the 53rd October Salon (Belgrade), Stroom (The Hague), MoMA PS1 (NYC), MGLC and Galerija Skuc (both Ljubljana), Aichi Triennale (Nagoya) and the 11th Istanbul Biennale. Her performances have been commissioned by venues across Europe, North America and beyond. Upcoming projects in 2023 include: Renata Fabbri, Milan (with Tim Etchells); Phoinix, Bratislava (solo); annex14, Zurich (with Simon Callery); Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb (solo); and PUBLICS, Helsinki (solo, alongside Maarit Mustonen). She teaches in the Fine Art department at Central Saint Martins / University of the Arts, London.
Vlatka Horvat (Čakovec, Croatia, 1974) works across a wide range of forms, from sculpture, installation, drawing, collage and photography to performance, video, writing and publishing. Her practice investigates the precarious relationship between bodies, objects, the built environment and nature by reimagining and redrawing the physical, social, psychological and environmental boundaries experienced in our everyday lives. She is particularly drawn to what she thinks of as ‘problematic’ or dysfunctional set of relations, whereby things like balance or stability become compromised, and where the habitual function of objects is playfully messed with.
In her work Horvat frequently enacts reversals and inversions of established spatial and social order. She is interested in how things occupy, negotiate and share space, and how gestures of organizing and reorganizing spatial relations also perform a certain reordering of social dynamics. Horvat’s works tend to have a speculative or propositional quality, and frequently deal with the possibility of transformation and change. Many of her projects are organized around a set of self-imposed restrictions, a rule-based framework of sorts within which her investigations take place. The artist stages a meeting between her own system of rules and the open-ended, playful, improvisatory activity that she pursues inside it.
Vlatka Horvat lives and works in London, where she moved after spending twenty years in the US. She has had solo exhibitions at PEER, London (2022); GAEP Gallery, Bucharest (2020); Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb (2018); Renata Fabbri, Milan (2017); Museums Sheffield (2017); Wilfried Lentz, Rotterdam (2016); CAPRI Raum, Düsseldorf (2016); Zak | Branicka Gallery, Berlin (2015 and 2011); MMC Multimedia Centre, Pula (2014); Galerija SC, Zagreb (2014); Disjecta Contemporary Art Center, Oregon (2013); annex14, Zurich (2013 and 2012); Boston University Art Gallery (2012); Rachel Uffner Gallery, New York (2012); Bergen Kunsthall (2011); The Kitchen, New York (2009); and Galerija Nova, Zagreb (2005). She has realized projects and installations for Kunsthalle Wien, Zurcher Theater Spektakel, the Pavilion of Croatia at the 16th Venice Architecture Biennale, VOLT (Bergen), Bard Center for Curatorial Studies (NY), Bunkier Sztuki (Krakow), Marta Herford Museum (Herford), Kunsthalle Osnabrück, the 53rd October Salon (Belgrade), Stroom (The Hague), MoMA PS1 (NYC), MGLC and Galerija Skuc (both Ljubljana), Aichi Triennale (Nagoya) and the 11th Istanbul Biennale. Her performances have been commissioned by venues across Europe, North America and beyond. Upcoming projects in 2023 include: Renata Fabbri, Milan (with Tim Etchells); Phoinix, Bratislava (solo); annex14, Zurich (with Simon Callery); Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb (solo); and PUBLICS, Helsinki (solo, alongside Maarit Mustonen). She teaches in the Fine Art department at Central Saint Martins / University of the Arts, London.
Sophie Ko (Tbilisi, 1981) lives and works in Milan. At the core of her artistic practice lies the concept of time, which is explored in its intense symbolic interaction with the materials she employs – mostly ashes of burnt images and pure pigments – and the images created. The change and instability of materials in relation to the flow of time are some of the constants of her artistic research. The Temporal Geographies, for example, provide an exemplification of a series of works eternally suspended between the act of creation and that of destruction, where the image is constantly subjected to a continuous process of modification through the slow and relentless collapse of the material of which it is made. Conceived through a conceptual and formal negotiation between sculpture and painting, these works stage “a bond made of weight, pressure, gravity, and the destruction of time on images, but also of formation, depth, return, and rebirth with respect to the passage of time.” Meaningful metaphors of the caducity and mutability of existence, her works recall the trajectory of life that we trace, parallel to a slow but persistent collapsing movement.
Recent solo shows include: Renata Fabbri, Milan (2015, 2018 and 2023); Contemporary Locus, Bergamo (2023); Postmasters Rome, with Marta Kucsora (2023); Museo Marino Marini, Florence (2022); EAST Galerie, Strasbourg (2022); Galleria de’ Foscherari, Bologna (2016 and 2021–22); BUILDINGBOX, Milan (2021); BUILDING Gallery, Milan (2020); Ca’Pesaro – International Gallery of Modern Art, Venice (2019); The OpenBox, Milan (2018). She has participated in group exhibitions at Palazzo Ducale di Gubbio (2022); Fondazione Malvina Menegaz, Castelbasso (2021); Albergo delle Povere, Palermo (promoted by RISO – Museum of Contemporary Art of Sicily, Palermo) (2021); Palazzo Barbò Torre Pallavicina, Bologna (2021); MAC – Contemporary Art Museum, Lissone (2021); and Renata Fabbri, Milan (2020), among others. In 2016, Sophie Ko won the Lissone Prize for Painting organized by MAC – Contemporary Art Museum, Lissone.
Sophie Ko (Tbilisi, 1981) lives and works in Milan. At the core of her artistic practice lies the concept of time, which is explored in its intense symbolic interaction with the materials she employs – mostly ashes of burnt images and pure pigments – and the images created. The change and instability of materials in relation to the flow of time are some of the constants of her artistic research. The Temporal Geographies, for example, provide an exemplification of a series of works eternally suspended between the act of creation and that of destruction, where the image is constantly subjected to a continuous process of modification through the slow and relentless collapse of the material of which it is made. Conceived through a conceptual and formal negotiation between sculpture and painting, these works stage “a bond made of weight, pressure, gravity, and the destruction of time on images, but also of formation, depth, return, and rebirth with respect to the passage of time.” Meaningful metaphors of the caducity and mutability of existence, her works recall the trajectory of life that we trace, parallel to a slow but persistent collapsing movement.
Recent solo shows include: Renata Fabbri, Milan (2015, 2018 and 2023); Contemporary Locus, Bergamo (2023); Postmasters Rome, with Marta Kucsora (2023); Museo Marino Marini, Florence (2022); EAST Galerie, Strasbourg (2022); Galleria de’ Foscherari, Bologna (2016 and 2021–22); BUILDINGBOX, Milan (2021); BUILDING Gallery, Milan (2020); Ca’Pesaro – International Gallery of Modern Art, Venice (2019); The OpenBox, Milan (2018). She has participated in group exhibitions at Palazzo Ducale di Gubbio (2022); Fondazione Malvina Menegaz, Castelbasso (2021); Albergo delle Povere, Palermo (promoted by RISO – Museum of Contemporary Art of Sicily, Palermo) (2021); Palazzo Barbò Torre Pallavicina, Bologna (2021); MAC – Contemporary Art Museum, Lissone (2021); and Renata Fabbri, Milan (2020), among others. In 2016, Sophie Ko won the Lissone Prize for Painting organized by MAC – Contemporary Art Museum, Lissone.
Ištvan Išt Huzjan (Ljubljana, Slovenia, 1981) graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice. He founded his own publishing house – 21st Century Books – in 2006, which specialises in artist’s books. In 2009, he completed a two-year residency programme at the Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten in Amsterdam. Between 2010 and 2020, he completed several other residency programmes, including the National Art Studio residency in Chang-dong, Seoul and the residency flat belonging to the Slovenian Ministry of Culture in New York. In 2014, he received the Belgian Fernand Baudin prijs award for the most beautiful artist’s book, as well as the Grand Prix of the 31st Biennial of Graphic Arts – Over you/you in Ljubljana a year later. Huzjan is a recent winner of the Grand Prize of the 31st Biennial of Graphic Arts awarded by the MGLC International Centre of Graphic Arts in Ljubljana, Slovenia. He was an artist in residence at the Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten, Amsterdam, Netherlands, and has exhibited internationally at The Modern Gallery and Museum of Contemporary Art Metelkova (MG+MSUM), Ljubljana, Slovenia; Museum of Contemporary Art, Skopje, Macedonia; The Center for the Humanities James gallery at CUNY Graduate Program, New York, USA; Villa Empain, Bogossian Foundation, Brussels, Belgium; SAVVY Contemporary, Berlin, Germany; the 51st Venice Biennial, Venice, Italy, among others. Some of his more significant recent independent exhibitions include: Proyectos Monclova, Mexico City, Mexico, the MERE retrospective at the City Gallery Ljubljana, and at the Vjenceslav Richtera and Nada Kareš Richter Collection/Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb.
His performances and sculptures create tension between opposing poles: avant-garde and neo-avant-garde, public and private, material and immaterial. The artist’s personal narrative facilitates his examination of different media, while also revealing Huzjan’s need to be on the move and explore the media’s boundaries. His performances use simple actions, such as walking, to consider the distances between people, spaces and even single steps as basic unit of locomotion. In these works as well as in his sculptures, he muses on society, historical facts, geography, and the relationships between individuals.
Residencies, awards, and stipends/scholarships: The Brumen Award for Excellence in Slovenian Design, The Brumen Foundation, National Gallery, Ljubljana; Work stipend from the Slovenian Ministry of Culture (2022); The Fondazione Morra Greco Residency, Naples, IT (2021); The Montoro 12 Residency, Rome, IT (2020); The Opening Prize Award for best booth, ARCO Madrid, ES (2019); The Stacion residency, Pristina, Kosovo (2015); The Fernand Baudin prijs Award, Brussels, BE (2014); The Kamov Residency, Rijeka, HR (2013); The Lokaal 01 Residency, Antwerp, BE (2012); The Komplot Residency, Brussels, BE; The Fonds BKVB Live Scholarship, NL (2010); The Stichting Kees Verwey Scholarship, NL; The Rotary Klub Slovenija Scholarship, SI (2008); The City of Ljubljana Scholarship, Ljubljana, SI (2001/2009).
Ištvan Išt Huzjan (Ljubljana, Slovenia, 1981) graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice. He founded his own publishing house – 21st Century Books – in 2006, which specialises in artist’s books. In 2009, he completed a two-year residency programme at the Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten in Amsterdam. Between 2010 and 2020, he completed several other residency programmes, including the National Art Studio residency in Chang-dong, Seoul and the residency flat belonging to the Slovenian Ministry of Culture in New York. In 2014, he received the Belgian Fernand Baudin prijs award for the most beautiful artist’s book, as well as the Grand Prix of the 31st Biennial of Graphic Arts – Over you/you in Ljubljana a year later. Huzjan is a recent winner of the Grand Prize of the 31st Biennial of Graphic Arts awarded by the MGLC International Centre of Graphic Arts in Ljubljana, Slovenia. He was an artist in residence at the Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten, Amsterdam, Netherlands, and has exhibited internationally at The Modern Gallery and Museum of Contemporary Art Metelkova (MG+MSUM), Ljubljana, Slovenia; Museum of Contemporary Art, Skopje, Macedonia; The Center for the Humanities James gallery at CUNY Graduate Program, New York, USA; Villa Empain, Bogossian Foundation, Brussels, Belgium; SAVVY Contemporary, Berlin, Germany; the 51st Venice Biennial, Venice, Italy, among others. Some of his more significant recent independent exhibitions include: Proyectos Monclova, Mexico City, Mexico, the MERE retrospective at the City Gallery Ljubljana, and at the Vjenceslav Richtera and Nada Kareš Richter Collection/Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb.
His performances and sculptures create tension between opposing poles: avant-garde and neo-avant-garde, public and private, material and immaterial. The artist’s personal narrative facilitates his examination of different media, while also revealing Huzjan’s need to be on the move and explore the media’s boundaries. His performances use simple actions, such as walking, to consider the distances between people, spaces and even single steps as basic unit of locomotion. In these works as well as in his sculptures, he muses on society, historical facts, geography, and the relationships between individuals.
Residencies, awards, and stipends/scholarships: The Brumen Award for Excellence in Slovenian Design, The Brumen Foundation, National Gallery, Ljubljana; Work stipend from the Slovenian Ministry of Culture (2022); The Fondazione Morra Greco Residency, Naples, IT (2021); The Montoro 12 Residency, Rome, IT (2020); The Opening Prize Award for best booth, ARCO Madrid, ES (2019); The Stacion residency, Pristina, Kosovo (2015); The Fernand Baudin prijs Award, Brussels, BE (2014); The Kamov Residency, Rijeka, HR (2013); The Lokaal 01 Residency, Antwerp, BE (2012); The Komplot Residency, Brussels, BE; The Fonds BKVB Live Scholarship, NL (2010); The Stichting Kees Verwey Scholarship, NL; The Rotary Klub Slovenija Scholarship, SI (2008); The City of Ljubljana Scholarship, Ljubljana, SI (2001/2009).
Dino Zrnec was born in 1983 in Zagreb, Croatia. He lives and works between Vienna and Zagreb. He studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb, Academy of Fine arts in Vienna as well as VSUP in Prague. In 2016 he participated in the Krinzinger residency program in Kuberton and finished other residencies between 2012 and 2015, amongst them ukk artist-in-Residence program for the Austrian Federal Ministry for Education, Arts and Culture in Vienna and Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris. In 2015 he was awarded the Radoslav Putar award in Zagreb. Recent solo exhibitions include: Vin Vin gallery in Vienna, Museum of Contemporary Arts Zagreb, Institute for Contemporary art Zagreb, Kunstlerhaus Graz project space. Recent group exhibitions include: Vier Meter hohes Display für Malerei, Ve.sch Kunstverein, Kaletenlutgeben; COCO, NEEMA, GAGA, House of Flora, Dubrovnik; temporary encounters, Apoteka at Galzenica gallery, Velika Gorica; Air, Krinzinger projekte, Vienna.
Dino Zrnec was born in 1983 in Zagreb, Croatia. He lives and works between Vienna and Zagreb. He studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb, Academy of Fine arts in Vienna as well as VSUP in Prague. In 2016 he participated in the Krinzinger residency program in Kuberton and finished other residencies between 2012 and 2015, amongst them ukk artist-in-Residence program for the Austrian Federal Ministry for Education, Arts and Culture in Vienna and Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris. In 2015 he was awarded the Radoslav Putar award in Zagreb. Recent solo exhibitions include: Vin Vin gallery in Vienna, Museum of Contemporary Arts Zagreb, Institute for Contemporary art Zagreb, Kunstlerhaus Graz project space. Recent group exhibitions include: Vier Meter hohes Display für Malerei, Ve.sch Kunstverein, Kaletenlutgeben; COCO, NEEMA, GAGA, House of Flora, Dubrovnik; temporary encounters, Apoteka at Galzenica gallery, Velika Gorica; Air, Krinzinger projekte, Vienna.
- Sophie Ko
- Vlatka Horvat,
- Tim Etchells
Renata Fabbri is delighted to announce that the artist has been chosen to create a project for the Croatian pavilion at the Sixtieth Venice Biennale, to take place April 20 to November 24, 2024.
- Sophie Ko
Contemporary Locus 15, Bergamo
Sept 16 – Nov 5 , 2023
Opening Sept 16, 5 pm
Curated by Paola Tognon
- Vlatka Horvat
Feb 4- Apr 2, 2022
PEER Gallery, London, UK
- Sophie Ko
Sept – Oct 24, 2022
Museo Marino Marini, Florence
Curated by Marcella Cangioli and Antonella Nicola
