Dva Vremena
/1
- Two Times
- Dva Vremena
- 1978
- artist book, colored pencil on paper, stapled
- 21,3 × 29,8 cm
In a handmade booklet, only one sentence written in pencil is repeated: “Does this have a future?” It refers to the often repeated phrase in political, ideological and public speeches in the then Yugoslavia, used for legitimizing a specific idea, a specific event etc. This question was often reiterated in the 1970s art reviews for evaluation of so-called “new artistic practice”: conceptual art, video art, performances etc. In reality the question implied a negative conclusion because, as it was often claimed at the time, conceptual art as well as capitalism for example had no future. Browsing through the booklet, the reader/observer is irritated by repetition in the same manner as s/he was harassed by nonsensical speeches which surrounded him/her every day. But, if we bear in mind that this work appeared in the context of conceptual art and a frequently used tautology and self-reflection of the media, we can detect that the artist proposes a positive answer. Reading this sentence we become aware of the presence of the moment of our reading, and since the sentence shall reappear on all subsequent pages, we are free to conclude that “this” has a future. Hence, what is at stake here are two times, as indicated in the title of the book. B.S.