Location

• Zagreb Avenija Dubrovnik 17, Croatia 10000
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Languages

• Croatian

Website

• http://www.culturenet.hr/default.aspx?id=23185

Name of collection

• Homage to Josip Broz Tito Collection at the Museum of Contemporary Art Zagreb

Provenance and cultural activities

• Four photographs showing the four performances by Croatian conceptual artist Tomislav Gotovac, gathered under the title Homage to Josip Broz Tito, are located at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Zagreb. With these four performances - Reading the Newspapers, Listening to the Radio, Watching Television and Telephoning, staged in public places – New Gallery (Zagreb), Vjesnik's bookstore (Zagreb) and SC Gallery (Belgrade) in 1980 and 1981 - Tomislav Gotovac subversively underscored the general social psychosis and the media anticipation of the news of the death of Yugoslavian President Josip Broz Tito.

  The Museum of Contemporary Art purchased the photographs in 1991 and Tomislav Gotovac himself decided to frame them in four different colours: the three colours of the flag (red, white, blue), and the fourth in black - the colour of mourning (mourning for Tito). He then consolidated them under the common title Homage to Josip Broz Tito. Gotovac saw the world from the cinematic perspective and experienced everything as a film, and according to art historian Darko Šimičić and Gotovac's widow Zora Cazi-Gotovac, the artist assigned people the role of actors, screenwriters or directors. Therefore, Gotovac did not choose the word homage accidentally, he indeed honoured Tito - a statesman he considered one of the best "directors" in history, a person whose "direction" greatly influenced the history of the latter half of the 20^th century. 1991 is considered the year of establishment of an ad hoc Homage to Josip Broz Tito Collection. The collection was presented to the public with an independent retrospective exhibition called ˝Speaking of Pictures˝ in the Museum in 2003 and was singled out by curator Tomislav Milovac as an example of the culture of dissent.

  In his performances, Tomislav Gotovac used the mass media - newspapers, radio, television and telephones - and at the same time placed himself in the passive role of their user, leaving the public and socialist authorities in a state of confusion because they did not know what his performances were about. In his work Homage to Josip Broz Tito, the artist urged the public to think and reflect on the reality in which they live, but he did not criticise the authorities. That is why he used a subversive method, in which the artist remained unspecified, to highlight the general social psychosis that gripped Yugoslav society while following the physical health of Josip Broz Tito, and anticipating his death, which assumed primacy in the public mass media (newspapers/the press, radio/audio, television/images) and communication media (telephones), as well as media activity in Yugoslavia that was otherwise used as an ideological apparatus. According to Tihomir Milovac, at first the public and the authorities did not know what the performances were about, but after a while the true nature of performances was understood. Although, in the Milovac's opinion, Gotovac was one of Croatia’s most radical artists, he did not dare criticize the Yugoslav authorities and therefore he employed a subversive strategy. It is important to note that Gotovac was by nature an anarchist, which is also emphasized by Mrs. Cazi-Gotovac, who, during his whole life, pointed out social deformations and called for thought, and always opposed the generally-accepted opinion at any given moment. This was confirmed in 1991 when he used this work to commemorate Josip Broz Tito, to honour a communist after the fall of the communist regime.

  Although Gotovac admired Tito as one of the best "directors" in history, he did not remain blind to the negative aspects of Yugoslav society, and through his work Homage to Tito he pointed out the propagandistic character and the psychosis of Yugoslav media space, thus expressing his dissent against imposed social determinants. This is why his performance has been selected as a case study of cultural opposition in the COURAGE registry.

  The Yugoslav authorities did not react to the performances, neither at the time of their staging nor after they learned about their nature. At the time of the first performances, they did not even know what they were about, and later they probably did not consider them influential enough to ban or punish.

Description of content

• The ad hoc Homage to Josip Broz Tito Collection at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Zagreb contains four photographs depicting four performances by conceptual artist Tomislav Gotovac. The photographs measure approximately 83 x 90 cm and are mounted in red, white, blue and black frames. The photographs were taken by Milisav Mio Vesović and Ognjen Beban. 

Content

• photos: 0-9

Operator(s)

• Museum of Contemporary Art in Zagreb

Owner(s)

• Gotovac, Tomislav
• The City of Zagreb

Stakeholder(s) of the collection

• Milovac, Tihomir

Geographical scope of recent operation

• international

Topics

• alternative lifestyles and resistance of the everydays
• theatre and performing arts
• visual arts

Founder(s)

• Museum of Contemporary Art in Zagreb

Date of founding

• 1991

Place of founding

• Zagreb Katarinin trg, Croatia
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Creator(s) of content

• Gotovac, Tomislav

Collector(s)

• Museum of Contemporary Art in Zagreb

Supporters

• The City of Zagreb

Important events in the history of the collection

• Exhibition: Tomislav Gotovac: Speaking of pictures at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb, 2003
• Exhibition: Tomislav Gotovac: Crisis Anticipator – Don't Ask Where We're Going, Rijeka, 2017

Featured items

• Gotovac, Tomislav. Listening to the Radio, 1980. Performance
• Gotovac, Tomislav. Reading the Newspaper, 1980. Performance
• Gotovac, Tomislav. Telephoning, 1981. Performance
• Gotovac, Tomislav. Watching Television, 1980. Performance

Access type

• completely open to the public

Publications

• Gattin, Marija, Vinterhalter, Jadranka (ed.). 2003. Tomislav Gotovac: Speaking of pictures: djela iz fundusa MSU-a, Zagreb: Muzej suvremene umjetnosti

Author(s) of this page

• Bencetić, Lidija

References

1) Conversation with Zora Cazi-Gotovac and Darko Šimičić, January 9, 2018, Tomislav Gotovac Institute, Krajiška 29, Zagreb

2) Domljan, Žarko (ed). 1995. "Tomislav Gotovac." In Enciklopedija hrvatske umjetnosti, 307. Zagreb: Leksikografski zavod Miroslav Krleža

3) Gotovac, Tomislav. 2006. Antonio Gotovac Lauer: Čelična mreža = Steel net. Zagreb: Moderna galerija - Studio "Josip Račić"

4) Ilić, Aleksandar Battista, Nenadić Diana (ed). 2003. Tomislav Gotovac, monografija, Zagreb: Hrvatski filmski savez - Muzej suvremene umjetnosti

5) Lendvaj, Ana. "Čitanje novina." Večernji list (Zagreb), February 12, 1980, 22.

6) Lendvaj, Ana. "Gledanje televizije." Večernji list (Zagreb), June 7/8, 1980, 46.

7) Lendvaj, Ana. "Slušanje radija." Večernji list (Zagreb), March 1, 1980, 22.

8) Marjanić, Suzana. "Živa slika, skulptura: ležanje kao živa mrtvost ili mrtva živost - oksimoron slike i skulpture." Kazalište 17, no. 59/60 (2014), 40-55. 

9) Šijan, Slobodan. 2012. KINO TOM: Antonio G. Lauer ili Tomislav Gotovac između Zagreba i Beograda, Zagreb – Beograd: Hrvatski filmski savez - Muzej savremene umetnosti 

Milovac, Tihomir , interview by Bencetić, Lidija , March 09, 2017. COURAGE Registry Oral History Collection