Art & Art History
Voices: Marjetica Potrc
Gallery 400 Lecture Room
1240 West Harrison Street
For the last decade artist Marjetica Potrc (born 1953) has been observing, researching, and re-creating human-built environments as examples of self-sufficiency and self-expression, what she refers to as “creative adaptation.” In a time when the social state is in decline and the inequitable distribution of the world’s wealth and resources prevails, billions of people survive each day in overcrowded shantytowns, unauthorized favelas, and improvised settlements without electricity, potable water, and sewage systems. These invisible cities are found in most of the world’s major cities and serve as both a source of inspiration and as site for many of Potrc’s projects around the world including Austria, Brazil, Germany, India, Italy, Luxembourg, Slovenia, and South Africa. She will discuss issues of security, privacy, and safety in informal cities and her most recent project in Caracas, Venezuela.
Potrc is a Ljubljana-based artist and architect. Her work has been featured throughout Europe and the United States, in the following exhibitions: the S o Paulo Biennial, Brazil (1996); Skulptur Projekte, M nster, Germany (1997); La casa, il Corpo, il Cuore: Konstruktion der Identitaeten, Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig, Vienna (1999); Urban Visions, Worcester Art Museum, Massachusetts (1999); and Manifesta 3, Ljubljana (2000). Potrc has received numerous awards, including a grant from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, the Parque de la Memoria Sculpture Prize, a Philip Morris Kunstfoerderung Grant, and the Hugo Boss Prize.