The Culture Lobby is a collective portrait of the territories of the Western Balkans leading up to their membership in the European Union. This publication is the result of a three-year photographic project conceived by Canadian artists Cindy Blazevic and Pascal Paquette, and co-produced by Kiosk Platform for Contemporary Art (Serbia) in collaboration with the Sarajevo Centre for Contemporary Art (Sarajevo), G-MK | Galerija Miroslav Kraljevic´ (Zagreb), Cultural Centre Lindart (Tirana), Laboratory for Visual Arts | LAB (Prishtina), ProStory (Podgorica), Center for Contemporary Public Art Elementi (Bitola) and Index on Censorship (London, UK).
The Culture Lobby project is a participatory “active archive” of cultural memory in the Western Balkans, documenting visually and aurally what citizens think will change or disappear when their territory joins the EU. The book is an accompaniment to the permanent online archive: www.theculturelobby.com.
The project was realized within the British Council’s Creative Collaboration program and in partnership with Fund for Open Society, the European Cultural Foundation, Balkan Trust for Democracy, the European Fund for the Balkans, the City of Belgrade, Swiss Cultural Program and the Ontario Arts Council.
Artists: Ana Adamovic, Cindy Blazevic, Aleksandar Grozdanovski, Armand Habazaj, Astrit Ibrahimi, Amer Kapetanovic, Imrana Kapetanovic, Dusko Miljanic, Atdhe Mulla, Pascal Paquette, Lazar Pejovic, Leonard Qylafi, Nives Sertic, Nebojsa Slijepcevic, Lupco Temelkovski.
Curators: Milica Pekic (Belgrade), Ivana Bago (Zagreb), Julia Farrington (London), Asja Hafner (Sarajevo), Biljana Isijanin (Bitola), Alketa Kurrizo (Tirana), Dren Maliqi (Prishtina), Valbona Shujaku (Prishtina), Svetlana Sosic (Podgorica).
Additional texts by: Rebecca Heald (London), Katie Sonnenborn (NYC), Janko Ljumovic (Niksic), Agon Maliqi (Prishtina), Marko Stamenkovic (Belgrade), Odeta Barbullushi (Tirana), Nobojsa Vilic (Skopje), Antonija Majaca (Zagreb), Amer Tikvesa (Sarajevo).
Edition of 500