The “Yugoeslavia” Folder

Acta Academia Artium Vilnensis

Authors

  • Francisco Tomsich

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.37522/aaav.105.2022.114

Keywords:

Mail art, Yugoslav art history, Serbian art history, Uruguayan art history, Clemente Padín, artistic research, archive, method, dictatorship, institutions, failure

Abstract

In 2018, the Uruguayan-Slovene artist Francisco Tomsich launched the artistic research project Give my regards to those you connect, an exploration on connections and dialogues between artists from the former Yugoslavia and the River Plate region corresponding through the Mail Art network from the late 1960s onward. The research’s point of departure was a list of postal addresses from artists in Serbia prepared prior to the dissolution of Yugoslavia by the Uruguayan artist Clemente Padín and expanded in 2019 by Tomsich through the study of the “Yugoeslavia” folder at the General Archive of the University of the Republic of Uruguay. This paper traces the project’s development in Uruguay and Serbia in 2019 and summarises some of its achievements while describing the author’s approach to artistic research and the key issues of method, archive, comparative art histories, institutional context and failure.

Author Biography

Francisco Tomsich

(b. 1981, Uruguay) is an artist and author based in Slovenia. He has a Degree in Modern Philology (FHCE-UDELAR, Montevideo, Uruguay) and has published numerous articles, essays, translations and literary works in America and Europe. He has received many awards for his work in a wide range of languages and media, including the National Prize for Literature of Uruguay (2012). Since 2013, he has worked on the long-term artistic research project “Talgia”, which aims to study, establish and develop connections and exchanges between Eastern European and South American art histories and artists through exhibitions, texts and curatorial and pedagogical devices.

VAL (Alex Mlynárčík, Viera Mecková, Ľudovít Kupkovič), Heliopolis, 1968-1974, ink on paper and photocollage, 90 × 90 cm, Courtesy of the VAL Group, Žilina

Additional Files

Published

10/02/2022

How to Cite

Tomsich, F. . (2022). The “Yugoeslavia” Folder: Acta Academia Artium Vilnensis. Acta Academiae Artium Vilnensis, (105), 295–315. https://doi.org/10.37522/aaav.105.2022.114

Issue

No. 105 (2022): Give My Regards to Those You Connect! Cultural Interactions Between South America and Eastern Europe

Section

Reviews

Categories