Lala Rascic

Work 2004 - 2008

Bozidara Magovca 44, 10000 Zagreb, CroatiaTepebasina 13, 71000, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovinia+385 91 131 00 46+387 62 965 162lala.rascic@zg.htnet.hrlala@mi2.hrwww.arcprojects.org/artstream/rascic

New Workexhibition projectGallery Nova, 2004

Diary of descent or A Fantasy of a Lifestyle – excerpt from the Diary of Lala Rascic 04.06.2004

It goes like this: my last link to the world fell together with me into the sea last night while I was helping Miha to park the boat into themarina in Rovinj. I hope that the mobile phone will work again today when it dries completely, but it looks like the chances of reanimatingthat gadget are slim.The exhibition opens in exactly three months. I am thinking about the new work and it all reminds me of the state of the lost mobilephone. Let’s try to draw a parallel.This is not the first time I find myself in this situation of the severed communication channel. Not solong ago I lost my phone for the first time. This situation can maybe explain the state that I try to describe in my new works. This state isprobably connected to my recent intentional, although completely unfunded decision to stop working with video. The sudden loss of the mobile phone, as the loss of the fundamental work and communication tool, significantly changes the foundationupon which a “personal reality” is organized. The nature of social interaction changes.Suddenly all actions proceed in some other order, some chores pile up while others disappear. The loss of a mobile phone is a fullyacceptable alibi for slacking and evading unwanted contacts. The loss of a phone is a specific state, a state of emergency that reclaimssilence and restores a kind of “natural” rhythm. It’s needed to restructure the organizing of a workday; it is also needed to adopt changesin re-thinking free time. All of a sudden you are again and for real, one entity, closed, autonomous. Communication becomes selective and unmediated, thealarm doesn’t go off, the notices for parties and reminders of birthdays are gone. Especially in my Amsterdam flat without a land phoneline I become a world on its own.In that state I have discovered the long awaited gap, the possibility of stepping out into the world “beyond the looking glass”.Even though the world around me remains unchanged, the loss of the phone changes the micro reality of daily routine, opening somenew space of freedom. In that state I have realized that it is possible, after all to fabricate for oneself that alternative, desired, reality thatremains in sync with the surrounding (which remains unaltered).Information can be avoided; reality can be filtered just like junk mail. To hide for a while, to move without being monitored by the caring eye of our loved ones, disconnected, without responsibility, without thepressure of ambition, without the conditioning to action.The mobile unit is temporarily unreachable. The loss, which grants freedom.What seems to string thru all my new work is the attempt to transcend that casual moment of escaping reality, the attempt to fabricate aspace in between, detached form the world but at the same time in harmony with it....In the drawings I try to represent the worlds that open just beyond the tips of my outstretched legs. Capsules of separate space I find inconstructed, isolated spaces. I find them mostly when traveling, in between locations that I am connected to, to where I belong. Trains,the interiors of art installations, the decks of boats.Reality, it seems, fell apart and came back together again, maybe that is the reason I use such a precise technique, like an illustratedmanual for an alternative.The motive of the swing I use as a metaphor for play, the childish escape into an imaginary world. I have also discovered that the swingis a natural anti-depressive. The swing as a device of getting off the ground, simulation of flight, levitation, renouncing the responsibility ofparticipation... To find yourself in zero gravity where value systems are subjective and fall under some personal categorization. All in theaim of finding territory of retreat, the creation of the sovereign, autonomous province of “me”. Maybe it would be easier if I was invisible?I have dedicated myself to the exploration of how far is it possible to distance myself from the moral obligation to participate. Is it possibleto discover ones own identity in a context without context, thru the banal position of losing a mobile phone.Even though I do not believe in the world in which I live in, and maybe that is why I do not want to participate in it, by choosing to be anartist I realize the obligation and the importance of having an opinion. Paradoxically, I see my escapism as a sort of activism. I considerthat the renouncing any position of autonomy (a decision for which I am completely morally responsible), except the one that I am offer-ing, maybe has the potential of a political statement.

Text for Gallery Nova newsletter August-September 2004, on the ocassion of solo exhibition “Lala Rascic – New Work”, 09.09.2004 –12.10.2004, Zagreb, Croatia

List of exhibited works:

Swings,2004, installation; wood, cotton ropeThousand Tea Lites, 2004, K3 print on canvas, 100 x 130 cmThousand Paper Ribbons, 2004, K3 print on canvas, 100 x 130 cmOn Deck, 2004, K3 print on canvas, 100 x 130 cmOn Train, 2004, K3 print on canvas, 100 x 130 cmMemory Drawings, 2003, K3 print on photo paper, 4 drawings each 50 x 70 cmThe Abandoned Glove, 2004, audio, stereo, 15 minR U a Loser, 2004, audio, stereo, 10 minHypnoaudio, 2003, audio, mono, 20 minLocations,2003, series of videosseries of stickers

exhibition New Work, Swings, 2004, exhibition view

exhibition New Work, Swings, 2004, exhibition view

exhibtion New Work, Memory Drawings, 2004, exhibition view, ink jet print on photopaper

Thousand Hoola Hoops, 2005, ink jet print on canvas, 130 x 100

Thousand Paper Ribbons, 2004, ink jet print on canvas, 130 x 100

exhibition New Work, Locations, 2003, series of videos, installation view

exhibition New Work, sticker series, 2004

The Abandoned Glove, 2004, audio,10 min; R U a Loser, 2004, audio, 15 min; installation view

The Abandoned Glove Projectproject 2004 - 2005

EastArea, Amsterdam

series of computer drawings, gloves, dimensions variableaudio “The Abandoned glove”, 11min perfromance: “The Sound of One Glove Falling”

The project started in 2004 with a collection of gloves found on the streets of Amsterdam. Each glove was “portraited” and exhibited with a written story. Alongside the glove exhibits, the audio piece “The AbandonedGlove” tells the story of loss. With the perfomance “The Sound of one Glove Falling” the project was finalisedand exhibited. In the performance single gloves are dropped onto a sound-rigged surface.

The Abandobeg Glove, 2005, performance

The Abandoned Glove, 2005, installation view

The Flying Carpet2005sound - sculpture installation

moulded multiplex, stainless steel, speakers, sounddimensions od flying carpet 75 x150, height and dimensions of installation variable

installation verison I - continous streaming sound, computers, internet connection, network of stream providersin 6 different loactionsinstalltion version II - 5.1 surround system, 10 minute audio loop

The installation consists of a platform, which is suspended from the ceiling and speakers. The platform repre-sents a flying carpet, a sculptural form that people can sit on. It is made of wood and is colored by dark waxwith a pattern of an oriental carpet on it. It is possible and expected for visitors to sit on the carpet and thusexperience the installation.

The sound that is broadcast from the speakers are live audio streams form various locations. The sounds froma network of various locations that are simultaneously streamed, collect around the “flying carpet" creating aunique fantastic soundscape.

Travel here is enacted on a virtual level: the emission of sounds, arriving at the gallery from different locationsin the world with the help of web streaming, are components of the autor’s composition - a soundscape that isformed around the flying carpet on which the visitor can “fly away”. The sound isn’t a result of recordings ofurban environment but is directly broadcasted so that each moment of the 24 hour composition is unique. Asthe phantasmagoric destination of the magic veichle.(form the text of Jasna Jaksic)

courtesy of Filip Trade collection of Croatian Contemporary Art

The Flying Carpet, 2005, installation view, moulded multiplex, stainless steel, sound, variable dimensions

The Flying Carpet, 2005, installation view, moulded multiplex, stainless steel, 75 x 150 cm

The Flying Carpet, 2005, diagram of installation

The Invisibles

The Invisibles, a rehearsal for an audio drama200530 minutes, MiniDV, PAL/ DVD, stereo, color

drawing installation, all K3 ultrachropme print on canvas

Invisible Girl, 50 x70 cmInvisible General, 50 x 70 cmInvisible Man, 45 x 45 cmInvisible Flute Player, 40 x100 cmInvisible People, 155 x 60 cmInvisible Sexy, 65 x 90 cmInvisible Sleeping, 60 x 85 cmInvisible Boy, 40 x 25 cmInvisible Boys Playing Baseball, 45 x 45 cmInvisible Skydiver, 60 x 35 cmInvisible Woman, 60 x 35 cmInvisible Gardener, 40 x 100 cmInvisible Bosnian Artist Feeding Birds, 40 x100 cmInvisible Saz Player, 55 x 80 cm

The Invisibles project is best seen as a continued exploration of the topic of escapism in my work over the lasttwo years. I stumbled upon the concept of Invisibility while contemplating the ultimate state of/for freedom. Ofcourse, the metaphor of invisibility develops further and in this project I tried to touch upon many aspects andconnotations that are tied to the notion of 'in-visibility'. As in the H.G. Wells novel, the idea of physical invisibility in this project is used as a metaphor for the outsider,the socially outcast individual. On the other hand, the Invisible man is not only invisible because of his socialstatus or our choice not to see. The Invisible Man can also be the one with the 'Power'.The drawings touch upon the various aspects of invisibility: social and civil invisibility, the notion of escape,criminal activities, freedom, identity and the 'what-if' realitiy of a physically invisible person.

Along with the prints, the main part of the project is a video showing a performance of an audio drama of thesame name: “The Invisibles”. A story of an invisible family planning to go on a vacation is delivered through a conventional narrative struc-ture. The main protagonist is Mrs. Invisible, who attempts to regain her lost identity and obtain a passport. Thislight satire touches upon the absurdities of contemporary society: the bureaucratic mechanisms, collective para-noia and surveillance systems.In this work the idea of the “invisible” is tied in with the notion of the “other”.This work is neither an audio drama nor a video in the full sense; it lingers as the “other”, in between the twogenres.

The Invisibles, 2005, video still, 30 min, color, sound

Invisible General, 2005, computer drawing, print on paper/canvas, dimensions variable

Invisible Girl, 2005, computer drawing, print on paper/canvas, dimensions variable

Invisible Man, 2005, computer drawing, print on paper/canvas, dimensions variable

Invisible People, 2005, computer drawing, print on paper/canvas, 90 x 200 cm or 60 x 155 cm

Invisible Bosnian Artist Feeding Birds, 2005, computer drawing, print on paper/canvas, dimensions variable

The Invisibles, 2005, instalation view, computer drawing series, print on canvas, dimensions variable

Night of the Iguana:The Invisible General2006installtion

The Invisible General7 paintings70 x 100 cmwatercolor on paper

Night of the Iguanavideo/PAL/mono9 min. looptext: excerpts from the book “The Storm After the Storm”, Sinaja Bui Simunovic

Sinaja readsvideo/PAL/mono11 min. loop

various artefacts (newspaper clippings, photographs, books, magazines, supporter scarf, pin, calendar) assembled under a glass display case

Night of the Iguana:The Invisible general is the final phase of research started a year ago. The work is also areaction to the political climate in Croatia and the almost cult status the persona of general Ante Gotovina gen-erated. (wanted by the Hague tribunal for war crimes, then on the run, now in prison, at the time one and onlyobstacle for Croatias initiation into the negotaiations for joining the EU).

The phenomenon: Gotovina which took place not only in the public space but on the level of collective concius-ness gave way to an attempt of analisys of the politics of representation. Portrait photography which loses itsfunction as a protrait, in this case is kindnapped by the “slogan”. And while persistant in the effort of the embod-iment of the “message” thru numerous variations and repetitions of the face of Genaral Ante Gotovina, his fac-tual body is negated (being worn out, forgotten, overlooked). Coming out of the dark of politics or the haze ofdistance: either on the run or in jail, in any case invisible, his character (seperate form his physical reality)establishes itself as the phantom presence.

The image becomes a metaphor, and the aura of phantasm of the Invisible General makes his character sub-ject to fantasy, myhtization, erotization.

Even though based on the symptoms of the Gotovina phenomena, the work speaks about amore universaltheme: about the potency of the unseen, unknown, of the eerie, the other the distant in the construct of fantasy. The work consists of seven paintings based on the seven most commonly reproduced images of Ante Gotovina.The video is a register of a reading/interpretation of excerpts from the book “The Storm After the Storm”, thesecond erotic novel by the author Sinaja B. Simunovic (retired stewardess from coastal town of Split), whichshe dedicated to fictional sexual meetings with Gotovina.

Invisible General:Night of the Iguana, 2006, installation view, video, 7 watercolors

Invisible General:Night of the Iguana, 2006, installation view, video, 7 watercolors, display case

Invisible General:Night of the Iguana, 2006, installation view, video, 7 watercolors, display case

Invisible General:Night of the Iguana, The General, 2006, watercolor on paper, 70 x 100 cm

Invisible General:Night of the Iguana, The Beret, 2006, watercolor on paper, 70 x 100 cm

Invisible General:Night of the Iguana, The Birthday, 2006, watercolor on paper, 70 x 100 cm

Invisible General:Night of the Iguana, Salute, 2006, watercolor on paper, 70 x 100 cm

Invisible General:Night of the Iguana, Night of the Iguana, 2006, video still, 9 min, bw, sound

Sinaja Reads, 2006, video, Mini DV, DVD, color, sound, 11 min

Sorry Wrong Number2006video installation

installation version I:DVD/loop/mute/PAL,15 minsound, 3 record players, 3 records

installation version II:DVD/sound/PAL, 15 mincustomized telephone

Sorry,Wrong Number4 drawingschalk on paper, each approx. 61 x 76 cm

video:performed by: Lala Rascicvoices, sound editing and processing by: Lala Rascicvideographer: Ivan Slipceviccostume/make - up: Maja Kriskovichair: Snjezana Topalusic“Sorry Wrong Number” original script by: Lucille Fletcher

“Sorry Wrong Number” is an interpretation of a famous audio drama from the 40's. The work is conceived as amulti- channel audio/visual installation. The visitors are invited to play the threevinyl records by themselves; thethree vinyls are three separate audio tracks: sound effects, the voice of mainprotagonist Mrs.Stevenson and thevoices of all the other characters. The video is showing the artist acting out the entire radio play, muted.

The impossibility of synchronization of the 3 channels of audio with the video and with each other commentsonthe notion of the failure of technology in our own age, the impossibility of communication, it talks of isolation.

The same theme is present in the very narrative of the radio play. The main storyline is about an invalid wom-anwho spends all of her days in her room. Her only link to the outside world is her telephone. One night shegetsthe wrong connection and overhears a plan for a murder. While desperately trying to warn the police, shereal-izes that she has overheard the plan for her own murder.

The work also exists as a single channel video, the audio track and the image synchronizing only at briefmo-ments. The seeming technical mistake evokes the feel of old time television and film synchronization. Thevoiceis disembodied. The moments when image and sound are in sync seem uncanny as it becomes evidentthat thedistorted voices are in fact, belonging to the performer.

Sorry Wrong Number, 2006, video still, 15 min

Sorry Wrong Number, 2006, video still, 15 min

Sorry Wrong Number, 2006, video still,15 min

Sorry Wrong Number, 2006, installation view, video, record players, acetate dubplates

Sorry Wrong Number, 2006, installation view, video, telephone

Sorry Wrong Number, 2006, installation view, video, telephone

Sorry Wrong Number, 2006, installation view, video, telephone, costume, drawings (installation from 2007)

Sorry Wrong Number, 2006, chalk on paper, 61 x 76 cm

Everything is Connected20075 channel video installtion

5 channels of video and audio, 10 min loop, MiniDV, BW, mono

performed by: Lala Rascicscript: Lala Rascic, Arslan Rasciccamera and light: Ivan Slipcevicediting: Lala Rascicmake-up and styling: Maja Kriskovichair: Snjezana Topalucic

Everything is Connected is a five-channel video/audio installation. On five monitors five characters are having aconversation. They are bosses of criminal groups. The story is set in a situation where they - nameless crimi-nals meet in a nameless space to discuss the fate of an unnamed kidnapped child. The video is black andwhite, the overall atmosphere evokes the “image” of the 1930's. Apart form costume and the camera work, whatlinks us to this time-period is the media-motif of the audio drama; the characters are actually actors in an audioplay. In the isolated ambiance of the anechoic chamber of the recording studio, a plot without a denouementtakes place.

courtesy of Museum of Contremporary Art, Zagreb

Everything is Connected, 2007, 5 channel video installation, 10 min, video stills

Everything is Connected, 2007, 5 channel video installation, 10 min, video still

Everything is Connected, 2007, 5 channel video installation, 10 min, installation view

Everything is Connected, 2007, 5 channel video installation, 10 min, installation view

Everything is Connected, 2007, 5 channel video installation, 10 min, installation view

Everything is Connected, 2007, series of storyboard drawings, charcoal on paper43 x 61cm

“Untitled - Travel in a Box”20072 -23 channel video installationMiniDV, PAL/DVD BW, sound

Originally commissioned for Threshold Artspace's unique 22 screen video display system “The Wave”, thisinstallation “Untitled -Travel in a Box” adapts to given display posibilites.

The installation is inspired by my stay in the south of the USA where I accidentally came upon the children'sbook “Henry's Freedom Box” (S.Levine, ill. K. Nelson). The book tells a true story of a slave who shipped him-self in a box form Virginia to Philadelphia, which at the time, was a free state. That tale of a travel in a box hasan echo in a newspaper story form some years back - about a young man Charles Mc Kinley who shipped him-self home by cargo jet - packed inside a box. This is very strong mental image while both Henry's and Charles'sstories have the same utopian idea of arriving to a better place. The box, crate is now transformed into a magi-cal transport that serves as a means of reaching that utopia. Emerging from the box, one surfaces from a“nowherness”; from inter-space and time of the journey into a better - other reality.

The installation consists of projection of a scrolling text on top of which one can hear the author's voice readingthe stories of Charles Mc Kinley and Henry “Box” Brown respectively in English. The scrolling text is in the locallanguage.

The video on the monitors shows the author reading a text in the dark, cramped, with the help of the light fromher mobile phone - in a way simulating the claustrophobic space of a shipping crate.

A Horsecross commission for Threshold Artspace, Perth

Untitled- Travel in a Box, 2007, video installation, video still

Untitled- Travel in a Box, 2007, video installation, video still

Untitled- Travel in a Box, 2007, video installation, view of display at Threshold Artspace, Perth

Untitled- Travel in a Box, 2007, video installation, view of installtion test in studio

Individual Utopias2008performance, cca. 50 min

script by Lala Rascicsound: Andrijan Zovko, Nedim Cisic

(from press release)

While Rascic's work revolves around video performances showing the artist enacting multiple roles in heraudio drama inspired videos, in Istanbul the artist will stage a premiere of her newest script. This will be thefirst time that Lala Rascic delivers her scripted performance in front of a live audience, instead of the camera.

The performance bears the name “Individual Utopias”, as is the title of the script that the artist wrote earlythis year. The script is based on a true event of which the artist herself was a witness. The performance ispart of a larger exhibition project scheduled for early June 2008 that will consist of a book launch and aseries of videos, terracotta reliefs and drawings.

Invited to join a workshop in Mostar in autumn 2007, Rascic found herself in the midst of a number ofissues that are plaguing contemporary Bosnia And Herzegovina. While the workshop itself was a fiasco theartist recognized a strong dramatic potential in the events that occurred and in it found a basis for her newproject. “Individual Utopias” is a tragic - comic account of the frustrations and absurdities that can take place in ade-regulated and segregated environment such as post-war Mostar.

Sarajevo born artist Lala Rascic teams up with Mostar band Vuneny to perform her version of audio theaterfor Art On Stage. A hybrid form of a script rehearsal and theatrical performance Rascic will cast herself as anumber of characters, delivering her lines in interaction with the electronic and instrumental sonic supportby Vuneny.

individual Utopias, 2008, performance, live in Istanbul

Death and the Dervish2008video, 8 min, HDV, color, stereo

based on the book by Mesa Selimovicperformed by: Lala Rasciccamera and light: Ivan Slipcevicediting: Hrvoslava Brksicmake up and styling: Maja Kriskovichair: Snjezana Topalusic

produced b pro.ba, Sarajevo

This video is produced as a commission by the Sarajevo production company pro.ba for their documentaryTV series about Bosnian and Herzegovinian authors. The book “Death and the Dervish” by Mesa Selimovicis one of the all time masterpieces of Bosnian literature. The main protagonist, the Devsih Ahmet Nurudin istorn apart between what life has thrown him and the dogma of his order. Most of the book is in monologue,tracing the Dervish's internal turmoil.

My interest in working with the text was to select parts of the book that related most to my own inner worldand deliver them in a specific way. I also tried to reflect the essence of the book by the camera movementand atmosphere.

The reading of the text is staged as a rehearsal. The overhead light creates a dramatic effect as the cameracircles around me while I perform the text of this fascinating book. The video changes between me beingthe character, acting the character or just reading the character of the Dervish.

Death and the Dervish, 2008, video, 8 min, video still

Death and the Dervish, 2008, video 8 min, video still