Ruins of Future Utopia

2018
video, color, sound, 30’ 25” loop,
three channel video installation, dimension variable

A huge part of the show Ruins of Future Utopia is an audio-visual piece for which the artist invited a local band, VVhile. 

The overarching theme regards the memory, seduction and persistence of nostalgia, reflecting on the local past (former Yugoslavia) and the global context, questioning contemporary nomadic way of life, values and utopias.

The audio work in question carries the same name as the exhibition itself – Ruins of Future Utopia – and thus it plays a key role in the exhibition. It is a 30 minute piece that utilizes a 1940s Yugoslavian concentration camp song as inspiration, distorting, manipulating and twisting the score so as to turn it into a long uncanny experience in the now. The song (called Bilecanka, after the camp’s location Bileca) remains a symbol of peaceful and dignified resistance, as it was made and sung by the imprisoned individuals who were mostly thinkers with progressive aspirations, intellectuals, early communists with high moral values and utopian beliefs. VVhile and Tkačenko’s incarnation, or perhaps sequel, of the song dissolves the original melody, responding to the memory, speaking to the thinkers of today.



Text: Natalija Paunić










Installation view