TAMARA ROGOVIC
May 2024
Tamara Rogovic ZEMLJAKINJA
Zemljakinja: Compatriot Terrestrial
“Zemljakinja” references Nikola Tesla’s thinking about onward movement and increasing energy through: food , increasing mass and self – sustaining; peace , without slowing down onward movement with violence and work , as a means of accelerating onward movement.
“Zemljakinja” contemplates potential of Space exploration, its ethical governance and how we might perceive Space as the territory for rethinking connection and interdependence of human beings, but also the entire biodiversity of our planet, conditioned by the creation and destruction of bridges and roads of humanity.
Colin Sanderson
Director/Owner, The Artiscience Library, Summerhall, Edinburgh
Some Artiscient Observations on Zemljakinja
Dear Reader, I am delighted and honoured to write a brief introduction to Tamara Rogović’s current exhibition, Zemljakinja, which comprises at least two parts: paintings, and the performance conducted on the opening night, from which came the ideas, in words, applied to the paintings.
So, how to translate Zemljakinja? As a Scot, the notion of “the brotherhood of man” is familiar enough, being internationally associated with our national poet, Robert or “Rabbie” Burns. Yet, the feminine Zemljakinja? The “sisterhood of women”? In Tamara’s own words (I paraphrase), zemljakinja connotes something deeper than that: meaning compatriot or fellow countrywoman and distinctive to zemljanka (earthling), ‘you would use this word to regard someone coming from the same place (often in context of a village or nation), instantly presuming a sense of connection and trust in that person who would have been a stranger or “other” the moment prior.’ The exhibition title is a semantic inquiry: at its root is the word ‘zemlja’, in Serbian meaning Earth and simultaneously meaning ‘soil’ and ‘land’ - similar to the Latin ‘Terra’. Patriotism, according to James Boswell’s fellow traveller, Dr Samuel Johnson, was “the last refuge of a scoundrel”. However that may be, Zemljakinja connotes something more benign and wholesome than that, alluding to the common land of Earth that all Terrestrials share and belong to, in all our complex variety.
Bridges and Rivers
The imagery is largely of bridges: both bridges built and bridges broken. Bridges spanning gaps and crossing rivers, which may be taken both literally and metaphorically, reminding us of Ivo Andrić’s The Bridge on the Drina and at the same time the metaphorical bridging of gaps between the arts and sciences, something of a cliché now, but still useful. Bridges in Tamara’s paintings are far more than mere archetypal symbols. For example, in the enigmatic image Perseverance, the bridge, stark and dominating the landscape, broken or incomplete, with attention to the construction of the decking, the roadway and its supports, suggests the questions: where have we come from, and where are we going: Quo vadimus? What is the way? The palette is diverse but harmonious, even restful, displaying blues, steely blues, and grey concrete and tarmac, but with a suggestion of living vegetation and its root systems underneath; the legend, “Life Will Persevere,” promising that nature will in time reclaim our passing monuments and constructions.
Tamara draws on Tesla’s threefold list* “Food, Peace and Work”, recalling our own Patrick Geddes’s “Folk, Work, Place”. She also refers to “onward movement”, so well exemplified in a river, which (pace Heraclitus), paradoxically ever changes yet remains the same. She also describes her main method of working as “thinking through painting”, which resonates with Geddes’s use of the notion of a “thinking machine.”
8 Paintings, 9 Artworks
Artwork no. 9 is the performance entitled “Momentum”, imagined as a key for unifying the 8 paintings on display. Tamara analyses, and then creates a performance based upon, Tesla’s interpretation of man “as a mass urged on by a force“ She physically guides and involves participants in a “collective thought experiment on togetherness“. The individuality of each painting is enhanced by the legends, which are spoken responses by participants and inscribed by Tamara in white chalk, and provide a participatory aspect echoing the fact that we must and we do all quest together.
The major piece in Tamara’s exhibition is Cosmic Lecture 1, which calls forth her own artiscient research group in Scotland, Asteria Creative. Here, I see not just Mars, as mentioned in the text, –“On Mars We Will Learn about Peace, in Peace,”– but other worlds receding into the background; these not in the silent vacuum of space, but in a highly dynamic, energetic environment. Have our ventures into outer space; has the image of “Space Ship Earth”,** taught us to recognise our common humanity? Or, are we simply and tragically transporting our human failings to the Moon, to Mars and beyond?
The Arts and Science of Peace
In agreeing to write this introduction to the work of Tamara Rogović, I wished, personally, not only to recall mutual historical relations between Scotland and Serbia, but also to find some personal connections, and as we talked in recent days, they flooded in: the Scottish Women’s Hospitals and Elsie Inglis, a mission in which two of my great aunts participated, although in France rather than in Serbia; another great aunt’s visiting Istanbul, Greece and Yugoslavia in 1936; the
almost legendary work in Central Europe, from the Baltics to the Balkans, of Richard Demarco, with whom I have collaborated since the 1990s, and in ongoing events at our precious venue, Summerhall, in Edinburgh.*** In 1999, Demarco and I mounted a conference on “The Arts and Science of Peace and the Prevention of Conflict”.
Twenty years later, Tamara and I first met in 2019, but her having recently graduated from Edinburgh College of Art, we have engaged much more strongly in recent weeks for which I am profoundly happy. I hope that in future we might take up once again, some of the topics and purposes which I have mentioned here.
In conclusion, with what questions does Tamara’s exhibition Zemljakinja confront us? They are important questions, deep and most pressing questions in today’s unsteady world. What connects us, one person to another, one people to another? What can lead us to trust one another, without which peace is unachieved?
Enjoy the exhibition. It is, indeed, a “thinking machine.”
*Nikola Tesla, The Problem of Increasing Human Energy: With Special Reference to the Harnessing of the Sun’s Energy, The Century Magazine, 1900
**The phrase “Space Ship Earth” is traced to Henry George’s Progress and Poverty 1879. It has influenced many great individuals: inter alia, George Orwell, Buckminster Fuller, and U Thant, former Director-General of the United Nations; and, of course, that great NASA photograph Earthrise ]
*** Wider still, I wish to acknowledge the works of two very significant British writers: Misha Glenny, an expert on the Western Balkans, and since 2022, Rektor of the Institut für die Wissenschaften von Menschen, Vienna; and, secondly, Deyan Sudjić, of Serbo-Croat and Montenegrin heritage, former Director of the Design Museum, London, who studied in Edinburgh, and in 1999 directed Glasgow’s UK City of Architecture and Design programme.
Perseverance, 2024, mixed media on canvas, 105 x 140 cm
Nucleus, 2024, mixed media on canvas, 140 x 105 cm
Mass, 2024, mixed media on canvas, 105 x 140 cm
Terrapax, 2024, mixed media on canvas, 55 x 44 / 60 x 80 / 45 x 50 cm (60 x 174 cm)
Instructions 1, 2024, mixed media on canvas, 140 x 30 cm (30 x 140 cm)
Instructions 2, 2024, mixed media on canvas, 140 x 30 cm (30 x 140 cm)
Instructions 3, 2024, mixed media on canvas, 140 x 30 cm (30 x 140 cm)
Cosmic lecture 1, 2024, mixed media on canvas, 140 x 206 cm
Performans MOMENTUM
Aleksic Gallery, Kragujevac
May 12, 2024 at 5.30 PM
“Artwork no. 9 is the performance entitled “Momentum”, imagined as a key for unifying the 8 paintings on display. Tamara analyses, and then creates a performance based upon, Tesla’s interpretation of man “as a mass urged on by a force“ She physically guides and involves participants in a “collective thought experiment on togetherness“. The individuality of each painting is enhanced by the legends, which are spoken responses by participants and inscribed by Tamara in white chalk, and provide a participatory aspect echoing the fact that we must and we do all quest together.”
Colin Sanderson
BIOGRAPHY
Tamara Rogovic (born 1999, Serbia) is an artist based in Edinburgh, UK.
She is a former child prodigy in art with record –breaking academic achievements. With recognized exceptional abilities since her early years, she was the pioneer of accelerated education in Serbia commencing University studies of fine art aged 14, later continuing studies in France. At the age of 18, Tamara was accepted on MFA Contemporary Art Practice program at the Edinburgh College of Art, The University of Edinburgh (United Kingdom), two years later becoming the youngest Master of Fine Art graduate in the world.
Tamara has an extensive international exhibiting record of numerous group and solo exhibitions in Serbia, France and United Kingdom. Tamara is a recipient of number of awards and recognitions, including ‘Visual Artist and Craft Maker Award’ by Creative Scotland and ‘Youth Hero’, an award for the young leader in arts and culture by EXIT and NIS Foundations in Serbia. She is also the recipient of UK Visa for Exceptional Talents.
Tamara is the co-founding member of Asteria Creative, a group of scientists and artists at the University of Edinburgh bringing together different sciences, philosophy and art in order to explore the Universe - the technology, sustainability and ethics of discovering and inhabiting celestial bodies and simultaneously benefiting life on Earth. Furthermore, she is the Vice-President of the Scottish Artists Union and a member of several executive committees and boards, as well as the chairwoman of the Intersectional anti-oppression Subcommittee. As an educator, Tamara is lecturing on numerous courses in the fields of creative industries, contemporary art theories and fine art for organizations, local authorities and colleges across the UK and she developed a project of pop-up art school ‘TASHA’, delivering free art classes available to all and delivered across Serbia.
Art Practice
Tamara’s work is directed towards the development of theory and practice of symbiotic relationships between science and art (artiscience), with interest in the ways humans relate to the land, each other, and the universe through rituals, myths and labour.
Her practice considers contemporary discourses within the fields of space exploration and cosmology, through site-specific, conceptual and interdisciplinary work across mediums of painting, performance and installation, often incorporating text and digital elements. Tamara is interested in creating environments where outer space is socially produced, experienced, perceived and imagined in order to contemplate its significance for terrestrial life, questions of peacebuilding, ethical governance and domains of humanities in the future of AI.
Often employing discursive methods through collaborating with artists, scientists and communities, Tamara combines movement, language and audience participation in her performance practice to create ‘collective thought experiments’ of togetherness and has ongoing collaborative practice with the performance artist Tosia Bargielowska Johnsen, MFA. Tamara’s interest in the relationship between fantasy and social movements has informed her activist engagements.
SELECTED EXHIBITIONS AND PROJECTS
2024 “SEEDS”, live performance with Tosia Bargielowska Johnsen, Crownpoint Studios, Glasgow, UK
2023 “Fair Work, Fair Pay, Fair to the Planet”, creative industries in UK, key-note speaker, Dumfries, UK
2023 “Art as Truth” showcasing artistic dimension of truth-seeking, collective exhibit and panel moderator, Thomson’s Land, The University of Edinburgh, UK
2022 “Just Governance of Outer Space, a collective Thought Experiment”, audio-visual exhibition and facilitated programme of events, Whitespace gallery, Edinburgh, UK
2022 “More space for the people”, SaltSpace gallery, Glasgow, UK
2022 “Blackbox”, duo exhibition with David Reid, Whitespace gallery, UK
2021 “Universal Matter” large-scale data visualisation and multi-sensor installation, InSpace gallery, Edinburgh, UK
2021 “STILL Art Moving”, Artist in Residence at Edinburgh Palette, UK
2021 “RE:Connecting”, virtual exhibition, selected artist and artist in conversation with curator, Society of Scottish Artists, UK
2021 “In Limbo”, Rhubaba Gallery and Studios, Edinburgh, UK
2021 “Farthest Reach”, site specific live performance with Lily Shaw, Glentress Forrest, Scotland, UK
2021 “Farthest Reach”, site specific project featuring sculptures, Glentress Forrest and Yellowcraig beach, Scotland, UK
2020 “[SHIFT:ibpcpa] The Biennale of Performance, Collaborative and Participatory Arts”, The Wall Space Gallery, Glasgow, UK
2020 ‘BRIDGE - alteration two’, live performance with Tosia Bargielowska Johnsen, Generator projects, Dundee, UK
2020 “132nd Annual Online”, selected artist, Paisley Art Institute, UK
2020 “Planet Cramond”, self-guided tour with AR (augmented reality) elements on Cramond Island, Scotland, UK
2020 “BRIDGE -alteration one”, live performance, ‘Salon des Refuses’, Embassy gallery, Edinburgh, UK
2019 “BRIDGE”, live performance, ECA Degree Show, Edinburgh, UK
2019 “She found herself already castrated”, collaborative video installation with Lily Shaw, Whitespace gallery, Edinburgh, UK
2019 “STRATEGY NEEDS THERAPY” MFA Degree Show exhibition at Edinburgh College of Art, The University of Edinburgh, UK
2019 “Music for the Mind”, The University of Edinburgh Orchestra concert, live performing and painting, Pleasance theatre, Edinburgh, UK
2019 “COLLISION”, duo exhibition and masterclass with Beate Grauduma, Sculpture Court, Main building, Edinburgh College of art, Festival of Creative learning, UK
2019 Research Residency, Gallery Ecosse D’OC, South France
2018 “The pictures from my earliest childhood in Serbia”, solo exhibition and the first retrospective of the works created between age of 6 – 16, House of King Peter I Museum, Belgrade, Serbia
2018 “Confabulate State”, Embassy gallery, Edinburgh, UK
2016 – 2022 “Tasha Art School”, various locations, Serbia
2016 “The pictures from my earliest childhood in Serbia”, solo exhibition of the selection from the painting series, film festival ‘Days of Bata Stojkovic’, Solaris Resort Gallery, Serbia
2015 “Fragments of the soul”, duo exhibition, Serbian Cultural Centre in Paris, France
2011 “First Solo Exhibition” at the age of 12, KVART Cultural Multimedia Centre in Kraljevo, Serbia
Tamara Rogović
Editor : Galerija Aleksić
Karađorđeva 26, Kragujevac aleksic.gallery@gmail.com
Authorised: Dejan Aleksić
Art Council of the Gallery: Goran Rakić, Nikola Šuica, Milica Zorić
Curator: Dejan Aleksić
Text author: Colin Sanderson
Photography: Slavoljub Radojević
Design : Borko Petrović
Printed by: Grafostil Kragujevac
Circulation: 300 Year: 2024
