Visit the Exhibition in the Jakopič Pavilion

9 to 30 November 2023, Mala galerija Banke Slovenije, Slovenska 35, Ljubljana
University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Arts
 

Visit the Exhibition in the Jakopič Pavilion is an exhibition about exhibitions. It concerns the programme of exhibitions held in the Jakopič Pavilion between 1919 and 1945. The pavilion used to stand at the entrance to Tivoli Park, and from 1909 was the main space for displaying contemporary fine art and other visual output in Ljubljana. Until 1924 it was run by its founder and owner Rihard Jakopič. In that year it was purchased from the artist by the City of Ljubljana, who then handed the running of the pavilion over to the National Gallery Society. Without a clear exhibition programme, the society used the pavilion to host its own projects, but mainly let the space to a diverse range of exhibitors, including photographers, architects, amateur artists and various promoters of arts and crafts. The importance of the pavilion as the core Slovenian exhibition space for contemporary creatives declined in the late forties with the opening of the Museum of Modern Art, but it was revived as an exhibition space in the mid fifties. In 1962 the pavilion was demolished to make way for the rerouting of the railway.

The exhibition accompanies the release of the e-publication Exhibitions at the Jakopič Pavilion between 1919 and 1945, which was published by the Igor Zabel Association for Culture and Theory, and was co-financed by the University of Ljubljana’s Arts Council. The publication is the fruit of three years of student research at the Department of Art History at the Faculty of Arts. It examines the available archive sources and the newspaper reports of the day to interpret the exhibitions held in those times, and encompasses more than 700 pages of context texts, information about individual exhibitions, and valuable photographic and archive material.

The exhibition extends the narrative contained in the digital publication into real-life space. The presented elements attempt to simulate two exhibitions held at the pavilion. The interior of Banka Slovenije’s Mala Galerija has been wallpapered, inviting visitors to experience the exhibition space during the XXVIIIth Exhibition of Young Slovenian and Croatian Artists (1923). There is also a VR simulation of a walk around the pavilion as it looked at the time of the Exhibition by Artists of the Little Entente of Women (1938). The two exhibition settings invite visitors to reflect on the former exhibition space, and on the various exhibitors and their works that found their place there.
 
The exhibition and the e-publication are also accompanied by a discourse programme, with experts invited to examine the wealth of exhibition-related developments at the Jakopič Pavilion between 1919 and 1945. The programme can be accessed on the Mala Galerija’s Facebook page.

Authors of the project: Hana Čeferin, Jera Krečič, Neža Lukančič, Lara Mejač, Ana Obid
Editors of the project: Miha Valant, Beti Žerovc
Mala Galerija curator: Vladimir Vidmar
Graphic design: Žan Kobal
VR simulation design: Metod Kulčar
Production: Igor Zabel Association for Culture and Theory, Arts Council of the University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Arts of the University of Ljubljana, Mala galerija Banke Slovenije
Thanks: National Museum of Slovenia, National Gallery