The exhibition “Dani koje nismo živjeli / Days we did not live,” is a collaborative exhibition of Jard van Everdink and Yanxian Zhao, the 2021 artists-in-residence at Živi Atelje DK, that opened on 25 June at our gallery. (Fb event) Both artists came together from the Netherlands staying for two months, participating in various programs and culminating in this exhibition.
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Exhibition text: None of us are isolated instances in time. We are all the result of a long line of ancestors, our beliefs the result of a long line of stories. What we believe to have value can be traced back to earlier generations. Fear and solace can be said to be spontaneous reactions, but they spawn from a base that has been forged in our minds by the storytelling, the fables, the myths from our parents (and their parents, and their parents…). What happened in the past yet affecting our present? What stories of our ancestors have influenced us to be the way we are?
Jard van Everdink and Yanxian Zhao look back on the days they did not live, in order to gain better insight of the stories that recur in their lives, a research as fictional as a fantasy, a life story as unreal as a myth. Their starting points are the stories that they discovered in their own families.
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Jard van Everdink is a visual artist and curator from the Netherlands. Mostly working with video and installation, she questions systems of control. She is inspired by the tension between pre-existing structures and the fluidity of morals, ideals and meaning. / website: www.jardvane.com
Yanxian Zhao is a visual artist born and raised in Southern China. Later, she spent 1/3 of her life in Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh. Her works mainly scrutinized and analyzed her own life experience, to have a greater understanding of love and violence, trauma and legacies. In her recent practice, she is seeking a methodology to bring the past into the present, the unconscious to the conscious, in such a way, she could relocate the generational trauma that lingered in her and her family in the past 100 years of China. / website: www.yanxianzhao.com / ins: @yanxian.Zhao
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Nitko od nas nije izolirani tren u vremenu. Svi smo nastavak duge linije predaka a naša vjerovanja nastavak su dugih priča. Vrijednosti kojima vjerujemo možemo slijediti unatrag prema drevnim generacijama. Kaže se da su strah i utjeha spontane reakcije ali njihovi zameci su izklijali iz tla u našem umu, zasađeni pričama, bajkama i mitovima naših roditelja ( njihovih roditelja, i roditelja njihvoih roditelja …). Šta se to dogodilo u prošlosti a uvjetuje našu sadašnjost? Koje su to priče naših predaka izmodelirale nas kakvi jesmo danas?
Jard van Everdink i Yanxian Zhao, umjetnice u rezidenciji Živog Ateljea DK, osvrću se na dane koje nisu živjele kako bi pokušale razumijeti priču vlastitog života. To je istraživanje zamišljenog i fantastičnog. To je životna priča nestvarana kao mit, a počinje pričama koje su otkrile u vlastitim obiteljima.
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Jard van Everdink je vizualna umjetnica i kustosica iz Nizozemske. Ponajviše se bavi videom i instalacijama u kojima preispituje sisteme kontrole. Inspiririaju je napetosti odnosa između postoječih, zadanih struktura i fluidnosti morala, ideala i značenja. / website: www.jardvane.com
Yanxian Zhao je vizualna umjetnica rođena i odrasla u južnoj Kini. Trećinu svog života provela je u Dhaki, glavnom gradu Bangladeša. Njezin rad preispituje i analizira najviše iskustvo vlastitog života, kako bi proširial razumijevanjeljubavi i nasilja, traume i nasljeđa. Kroz najnoviju praksu traži metodologiju iznošenja pročlosti u sadašnjost te nesvjesnog u svjesno, kako bi razmjestila generacijske traume koje su lebdjele u njezinoj obitelji tokom zadnjih 100 godina kineske povijesti. / website: www.yanxianzhao.com / ins: @yanxian.Zhao