Igor Zabel Award for Culture and Theory

Founded in 2008 and dedicated to the memory of Slovene curator, art critic and cultural theorist Igor Zabel (1958–2005), the Igor Zabel Award annually recognises outstanding cultural activities related to the Central and South Eastern European region. It is the initiative of the Igor Zabel Association for Culture and Theory (Ljubljana) and the ERSTE Foundation (Vienna).

The laureate is selected biannually by a renowned international committee of experts. International curators, theorists, writers, and critics whose work spans the region and who either come from the region or live and/or work there are eligible for the award. In addition to the award of 40,000 EUR, three working grants of 12,000 EUR each are awarded - two by the jury, one by the laureate.

Background

Igor Zabel was a Slovene curator, writer and cultural theorist who, during his entire life, was actively involved in many fields of theory and culture – as a philosopher, author, essayist, modern and contemporary art curator, literary and art critic, translator, and model for new generations of curators and critics of contemporary art. As a curator and writer, he tirelessly called for the profound exploration of those political, social and cultural undercurrents that had the potential to give us a better understanding of the post-communist world of today.

From 1984 to 1986 he worked as free-lance writer and since 1986 as curator of Museum of Modern Art. In his work as curator he organised numerous exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art presenting artists from Slovenia and abroad. From 1998 to 2000 he was coordinator of Manifesta 3 in Ljubljana. In 2003 he curated the show Individual Systems as part of the 50th International Art Exhibition at the Venice Biennial.

Zabel also published two books of essays on contemporary art and a number of essays and articles in catalogues and magazines. He was editor of the magazine of the Museum of Modern Art M’ars and co-editor of the journal of contemporary curatorship MJ Manifesta Journal.

Award winners

In 2008 the international jury comprised of dramaturg, curator, and writer Eda Čufer (Slovenia/USA), artist Josef Dabernig (Austria) and Charles Esche, curator and director Van Abbemuseum (Netherlands) bestowed Croatian curatorial collective What, How & for Whom (WHW) (Ivet Ćurlin, Ana Dević, Nataša Ilić, and Sabina Sabolović) that became quickly known internationally due to the success of their first projects: What, How and for Whom, on the occasion of the 153rd anniversary of the Communist Manifesto; Broadcasting, a project, dedicated to Nikola Tesla, and START dedicated to young artists from the region. The prize was argumented: "their unique working practice as a curatorial collective has been dedicated to exploring relevant contemporary artistic issues in relation to social issues concerning the world after 1989". In 2009 the WHW curated also the 11th Istanbul Biennial.

Grants of Igor Zabel Award in 2008 were bewstowed to the Linguist Fouad Asfour, living and working in Vienna (Austria) and Johannesburg (South Africa) as a freelance writer, editor, programme coordinator, and linguistic advisor; further to the writer Erden Kosova, publishing and editing in two Istanbul-based contemporary art magazines art-ist and Resmi Gorus and a member of a post-anarchist collective which runs the magazine project Siyahi; and to the Prelom Kolektiv from Belgrade, established in 2001 as a project of the Belgrade Center for Contemporary Art, and from the very outset has become a space for critical query of the political constellations between art, film, and social theory in the contemporary post-Yugoslav context.

In 2010 the award will be bestowed to Piotr Piotrowski, art historian and director of the National Museum in Warsaw. One of the grants will go to Peace Institute - Institute for Contemporary Social and Political Studies for its "extremely important contribution to critical research of social, cultural and political transitional processes".

External links

Igor Zabel Award for Culture and Theory

Contents

Background

Award winners

See also

External links

Operated by

Financed by