Foundation of a Traveling Imagination
Performance Art, Florence, 2021
A group of local artists, cultural operators and activists with a bond to the Balkans co-create a performative walk of Balkans throughout the city.
The co-designed artistic performative intervention “Morphing Realities – A performative walk of Balkans through Florence”, was hosted by Villa Romana in Florence. On the morning of July 24, 2021, in the heat of July, the community of the Some Call Us Balkans (SCUB) project and the locals, crossed the city center of Florence and constructed a collective memory.
“Morphing Realities – A performative Intervention” with Artist Smirna Kulenovic, curated by Enrico Tomassini, visual artist Milly Reid, Tailor Rosa Russo, music by Niccolò Vannucchi. video Shooting Fabricio Lamoncha, Francesca Pignanelli, edited by Francesca Pignanelli, Some Call Us Balkans, Florence, 2021, CC BY-SA 4.0
A large carpet conceived as a traveling territory in a ceremonial gesture, tuning up to sound vibrations where sounds of Balkan languages merge with the city soundscape.
The carpet is the foundation for an ongoing and developing participatory practice, a space of convivium and movement, an invitation to travel while being in a place with one’s own imagination, a welcoming place for everyday travelers.
Exploring different ways of belonging to the Balkans, the carpet welcomes plots, stories and connections, weaved together to form hybrid territories and realities, between here and now, there and tomorrow, beyond national borders, beyond the myths and misconceptions we carry toward one another.
The evening concluded with the presentation of SCUB’s art-based research “Balkan Myths and Misconceptions” in a public event in the garden of Villa Romana in Florence.
Myths and Misconceptions, presentation of art-based research projects, Some Call Us Balkans, Villa Romana, Italy, 2021, photographs by Stella Kerafili, CC BY-SA 4.0
– Hana Milenkovska, Klelija Zivkovic, Klementina Rist, Dragan Teodosiev (SocioPatch, Skopje): “Investigating the cultural production and aesthetics of the Truck Drivers Community in constant movement between North Macedonia and EU”
– Elias G. Skoulidas (Biennale of Western Balkans, Ioannina): “Investigating the translocal communities of Greek-Albanian in the area of the Epirus towards a new translocal identity of “Epirote”
– Bora Baboci and Stella Karafili (Tulla Culture Center, Tirana): “Investigating the value of land therefore how Land is described and inhabited in the mountainous areas of Northern Albania”
– Shpat Shkodra and Arpad Klemm (Termokiss, Prishtina): “Investigating the relationship in between pigeons and their keepers in the Urban Space of Prishtina”
– Djurdjica Bjelosevic and Vesna Majestorovic (Unsa Geto, Banja Luka): “Investigating ecology and right to public space in Bosnia Herzegovina”
Live set by sound artist Niccolò Vannucchi
