geobalkans

DIVA Station is a physical and web archive of video and new-media art which has been developing since 2005, and is also a broader compendium of SCCA projects that seek to research, present, document and archive video/new-media art.
The collecting of materials for DIVA Station is based on a documentary, archival and research project on video art in Slovenia Videodokument: Video Art in Slovenia 1969-1998, which was developed at SCCA-Ljubljana between 1994 and 1999, and was followed by numerous curatorial selections of the gathered material, introduced under the common title of Videospotting. High-resolution video archive works and selected literature on video and (new)media art are available to the public in SCCA library / Diva mediatheque. Mediateque provides free access to over 1,500 video works by local artists for a in-depth viewing and studying. We offer also consulting and know-how services and provide a thematic literature. Works may not be borrowed for home viewing.

COURAGE (“Cultural Opposition – Understanding the CultuRal HeritAGE of Dissent in the Former Socialist Countries”) is a three-year international research project funded by Horizon 2020, the EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation. We are an international academic community interested in cultural dissent under Socialism in Eastern Europe.
The project posits culture in Eastern Europe before 1989 as more than socialist realism and dull propaganda art: at certain times and places alternative cultural scenes flourished despite the strict controls of socialist regimes. They do research that tackles this rich and colourful legacy of cultural opposition in the former socialist countries of Eastern Europe by exploring and comparing collections on cultural opposition; tell stories of non-conformist avant-garde art, anti-establishment religious movements, civic initiatives for unofficial education and publication, dissident movements, underground punk and rock bands, alternative ways of life, even novel spiritual practices, and many more.
The website also presents the first digital database of both online and offline private and public collections in Europe which testify to the survival of various forms of cultural opposition in the former socialist countries; as well as show how these collections work, what functions they serve in their respective societies, and how they represent their holdings and findings to the national and international public.

This website is a developing database of artists who have created or are currently creating performances (action art, live art, happenings and socially engaged art) in Eastern Europe. From 2013-2016 Amy Bryzgel traveled throughout Eastern Europe, conducting research for her monograph Performance Art in Eastern Europe since 1960 (Manchester University Press, 2017), and this website also serves as a documentation of her travels to the region, to meet and interview artists, curators, art historians and critics.