Muzeum, zavod za umetniško produkcijo, posredovanje in založništvo
Breg 8, SI-1000 Ljubljana
Phone386 (0) 1 422 0290
Muzeum Institute
From Culture.si
Contact
.jpg)
Past events worldwide
6 Jun 2019
16 Jun 2019
Czech RepublicPragueIndustrial Palace and Prague Exhibition GroundsPrague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space (PQ)
Selected opus of 7 stage set and costume designers/art collectives (Angelina Atlagić, Uroš Belantič, Mateja Bučar & Vadim Fiškin, IRWIN, Leo Kulaš and NUMEN) presented within the installation Warped Space curated by Barbara Novakovič Kolenc (Muzeum Institute)
21 Nov 2017
22 Nov 2017
SerbiaNovi SadKulturni Centar Lab Novi Sad, Museum of Contemporary Art Vojvodina (MSUV)
Show me Heaven, a performance by Maja Kalafatić, Dimitrije Kokanov and Venelin Shurelov, produced by Muzeum Institute,
18 Jun 2015
28 Jun 2015
Czech RepublicPragueKafka's House and Bethlehem Chapel - Lapidarium
Meta Grgurevič, JAŠA as set designers and Ana Savić Gecan, costume designer, selected by Barbara Novakovič Kolenc, and students of the Faculty of Architecture, University of Ljubljana and Academy of Theatre, Radio, Film and Television (AGRFT) presented at the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space (PG). Produced by Slovenian Theatre Institute and Muzeum Institute, in cooperation with Slovene National Theatre Drama Ljubljana and Slovene National Theatre Opera and Ballet Ljubljana, supported by the Embassy of the Republic of Slovenia in Prague
Muzeum Institute's legacy
The Institute's contribution to the "introduction of visual arts and contemporary dance into Slovenian performing arts in the 1990s" was acknowledged by the Slovenian Theatre Institute. In 2025, on the occasion of the NGO's 30th anniversary, it co-published a book entitled Theatre as a Museum, accompanied by the exhibition Arhiv furioso, covering Muzeum's production between 1994 and 2024.
.jpg)
In December 2014, a documentary exhibition Time Folding – Muzeum Theatre – 20 Years was set up at the Jakopič Gallery in Ljubljana.
The Architecture of Dreams installations (2020) and the dance performance "Time of Tenderness" (2021) marked the 25 years of Muzeum Theatre.
Theatre production
Between 1993 and 2000
Barbara Novakovič Kolenc conceived and directed five stage performances: Cricket in the Fist [Čriček v pesti], Lo Scrittore, Emilia [Emilija], The Girl and the Double Bass [Deklica in kontrabas], and Paracelsus & Frankenstein – each exploring an individual field of art: fine art, architecture, dance, music, and movement. The subsequent synthesis performance All Together Now [Vse najboljše] was staged at the Slovene National Theatre Opera and Ballet Ljubljana, featuring a cast of actors from an old people's home, and presented at the Manifesta 3 in Ljubljana (2000). That same year, Barbara Novakovič Kolenc directed Racine's Berenice in the framework of the Slovene National Theatre Drama Ljubljana repertory.
Between 2000 and 2010
Muzeum produced a series of performances under the title Project 1–5, investigating theatre language through the input of architects, dancers, theatre theoreticians, lighting designers, and art historians stepping into production roles for the first time (Matej Filipčič, Rok Oman, Primož Jesenko, Majda Gregorič Trost, Lela B. Njatin, Rok Vevar).
Barabara Novakovič Kolenc's 2006 productions Molière and the Rodin II received excellent reviews. Rodin II, an installation with performance created in collaboration with Sonček – Cerebral Palsy Association of Slovenia, went on to be presented over several years at festivals and venues across Slovenia and abroad.
In 2007–2009, the Winter's Uncle trilogy took shape: A Winter's Tale [Zimska pravljica], based on Shakespeare's play, was staged at Križanke, followed in 2008 by Uncle Vanya and the 12 bouquets [Striček Vanja in 12 šopkov], based on Chekhov.
The performance The Repository WUST (Winter's Uncle and Summer Tale) [FUNDUS ZS PP (Zimski striček in Poletna pravljica)], created by B. Novakovič Kolenc and Sanja Nešković Peršin in 2009, featured artefacts from the City Museum of Ljubljana alongside selected contemporary visual artworks as set design (Zora Stančič, Polona Maher, Damijan Kracina, Katarina Toman Kracina, Nataša Skušek, Mladen Stropnik, Sašo Vrabič, Matic Sonnenwald, and Živa Žitnik). On tour, the artefacts were site specific – in 2010 the performance was presented at KiBela Art Space in Maribor and the Museum of Contemporary Art of Vojvodina in Novi Sad.
In 2008, Barbara Novakovič Kolenc staged Daniil Harms's play Elisabeth Bam [Jelizaveta Bam] for the first time in Slovenia. The production was presented at Stara Elektrarna - Old Power Station, where in 2010 Sanja Nešković Peršin also staged a dance-theatre performance Julie, after A. Strindberg, with set design by son:DA; the production was also hosted by BITEF Theatre in Belgrade. Sanja Nešković Peršin's next performance, 33 Turns, was staged at Španski borci Culture Centre in 2011. Milan Tomašik's performance Off-Beat, co-produced by Muzeum, Phileas Productions, Brussels, and Dance Theatre Ljubljana, toured internationally.
Between 2010 and 2020
From 2010 Muzeum developed the ŠIFT TEATER I and the ŠIFT TEATER II platforms.
The second part of the Source Image Trilogy, The Museum of Letters, staged at Cankarjev dom, explored the relationship between abstraction in theatre and the visual arts through selected letters written by painters of the 18th and 19th centuries.
The third part of the trilogy, The Theatre of Letters, belonging to the ŠIFT TEATER II platform, was based on Pablo Picasso's text Desire Caught by the Tail and staged at the Jakopič Gallery in 2014.
.jpg)
ABC oder Krieg, quasi una fantasia, directed by Barbara Novakovič Kolenc, premiered in 2015. Co-produced by Prešeren Theatre Kranj, Cankarjev dom, and Opera & Theatre Madlenianum, Belgrade, it toured to Belgrade, Montenegro, and Vršac. The new drama text, written by Ivo Svetina, is set in Vienna in the 1830s, when Jernej Kopitar, France Prešeren, and Matija Čop were embroiled in the battle known as the Alphabet War, in the presence of Vuk Karadžić and his daughter Mina.
Ivo Svetina's The Birth of Venus premiered in November 2018 at the Kosovel Culture House Sežana, and in January 2019 at the Kino Šiška Centre for Urban Culture.
Between 2016 and 2019, Muzeum produced a further series of dance and drama works: the Spinoza Project, the Dynamics of Space Trilogy, and Venus I/II.
Between 2019 and 2021, the Sleep project took shape, encompassing the solo performance Forms, Landscapes, Creatures and The Slumberland (2020), a dance performance for children and adults inspired by Winsor McCay's comic strip Little Nemo in Slumberland.
Visual arts projects
Several Muzeum productions have been staged in gallery spaces – among them Rodin (2004, directed by Boris Mihalj) at the Museum of Modern Art, The Repository WUST (2010), and Desire Caught by the Tail (2014, directed by Barbara Novakovič Kolenc) at the Jakopič Gallery.
Muzeum also actively engages in visual arts projects. In 2002–2003 it presented the auteur fine art series Talking House - Theory Open I, II, III, conceived by Barbara Novakovič Kolenc: The Shirt of Saint Francis at the Museum of Modern Art, Saint Lazarus at the City Art Gallery Ljubljana, and Saint Teresa at Kapelica Gallery.
International visual and performing arts projects
Muzeum Theatre productions have been presented in Austria, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Mongolia, Croatia, Albania, Armenia, Serbia, Italy, Macedonia, Israel, and Montenegro. The Museum Institute is a member of the Informal European Theatre Meeting (IETM).
Muzeum has also produced various international visual arts projects, notably Map to Paradise from Ljubljana (2000), a site-specific installation at Ljubljana Castle by Peter Greenaway, and the accompanying Peter Greenaway film retrospective.
In June 2005, Muzeum hosted the Ljubljana events of the international project The Gesture in the Cultural Heritage of Europe. That autumn it participated in Continental Breakfast [Kontinentalni zajtrk], an international co-curatorial and multidisciplinary project. The Ljubljana component, entitled Memory (W)hole, comprised an international symposium, a site-specific exhibition, and art performances at Ljubljana Castle. New variants of the Memory (W)hole exhibition were subsequently presented at the Skopje Museum of Modern Art in Macedonia and at the Museum of Contemporary Arts in Banja Luka in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In 2007, an international exhibition entitled Paperwork was presented at the City Museum of Ljubljana.
In 2010–2011, Muzeum was one of co-organisers of Focus on Art and Science in the Performing Arts: European contemporary production, a project supported by the EU Culture programme. In April and November 2010, residencies and presentations of international authors were organised in Ljubljana, while Miha Erman, the selected Slovenian artist for the Focus project, took part in a residency in Italy and presented his work at Fabbrica Europa Festival in Florence, Italy. In May 2011, Muta Imago and Masque Teatro presented their recent work to Ljubljana audience within Muzeum's ŠIFT TEATER II platform.
Other international involvements
Beyond theatre and visual arts, Muzeum Institute has initiated and been involved in a number of international cultural policy projects, among them Mobile Theatre Network and MTN Loops, 1999–2001.
In 2015 and 2019, Barbara Novakovič Kolenc curated the Slovenian section of the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space chapter.
ECLAP
Muzeum was also a partner in ECLAP (European Collected Library of Artistic Performance), a three-year project that brought together 20 leading national performing arts institutions, universities, and research institutes from 13 European countries to create a previously missing online archive for the performing arts in Europe. Linked to Europeana, the European Digital Library, the project was co-funded by the European Union ICT Policy Support Programme.
Muzeum publishing
Since 2000, Muzeum has published the Muzeum Newsletter. Other publications include Mobile Theatre Network Calendar 1999, Mobile Theatre Network – Strategies for Establishing Distribution Networks for Independent Performing Arts in Central and Eastern Europe (proceedings of a 1999 symposium), Peter Greenaway's Book (a collection of theoretical texts by Slovenian authors on the work of Peter Greenaway), Peter Greenaway: Map to Paradise from Ljubljana (event documentation), and the exhibition catalogues Memory (W)hole - Continental Breakfast Ljubljana and Paperwork.
See also
External links
- Muzeum Institute website
- Time Folding - Muzeum Theatre - 20 Years exhibition 2015
- Architecture of Dreams - Muzeum - 25 years
- Continental Breakfast event context
- ECLAP gallery featuring Slovene authors on Europeana
- Barbara Novakovič Kolenc on Europeana
- On Barbara Novakovič Kolenc on Sigledal.org (in Slovenian)
Gallery
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.JPG)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
