As part of the Art Cube Artists’ Studios new International Residency Program, Dejan Kaludjerović (Serbia/Austria) has created the project Shelters, from the series Coversations: Hula Hoops, Elastics, Marbles and Sand (2016)- an installation and Audio piece based on interviews he conducted with children from Israel in Hebrew and Arabic.
Previous project in the series were created in Russia, Serbia, Iran, Azerbaijan, and Austria. The interviews with children from respective local communities act as a litmus test for the way in which each society creates their cultural distinctions and value system, and identify the “other.”
Based on individual interviews with children from different socioeconomic and ethnic backgrounds, the artist has created an imagined conversation in which the children discuss among themselves issues such as social inclusion or exclusion, attitude to foreigners, language, war, money, friendship, or poverty.
The sculptures that make up the installation look like small models of local bomb shelters. They can be played with, moved around and used to sit upon. In each chapter of the series conversations, Kaludjerović creates an installation that references a children’s game, as a kind of personal interpretation of that particular society. In Israel, he was interested in the way in which the outer features of a shelter function as a place for playing, while its inside provides a safe space during times of war. The gap between the seemingly naive everyday routine, to the conflictual reality that can appear at any time, adds a layer of meaning to the children’s conversation.

Curated by Maayan Sheleff

Courtesy of the artist
Photocredit Itai Nadev and Yali Reicher