L’Ollave, the Thread of Friendship
Over 30 years of artistic collaboration and exchange
Opening of the exhibition: Saturday, January 14, 2023, at 12:00 noon
Institute for Contemporary Art
Trg kralja Tomislava 20, Zagreb
Gallery hours: Tuesday – Saturday 13:00 – 19:00
The exhibition remains open until February 11, 2023.
Exhibition curators: Jean de Breyne and Martina Kramer
Artists: Boris Cvjetanović, Boris Greiner, Stanislav Habjan, Martina Kramer, Ivan Kožarić, Antun Maračić, Vlado Martek, Iva Patarčec, Mladen Stilinović, Mirjana Vodopija, Vlasta Žanić
and
Domaine croate / Poésie (published poets : Branko Čegec, Slavko Mihalić, Antun Šoljan, Sibila Petlevski, Antun Branko Šimić, Gordana Benić, Miroslav Mićanović, Dobriša Cesarić, Marija Čudina, Monika Herceg, Anka Žagar, Delimir Rešicki, Nikola Šop, Hrvoje Pejaković, Ana Brnardić, Zvonimir Mrkonjić, Andrijana Škunca, Vanda Mikšić, Jure Kaštelan, Vlado Kristl, Alen Brlek, Dražen Katunarić)
The exhibition L’Ollave, the Thread of Friendship brings together 11 Croatian artists and 23 authors of poetry who, over the past 30 years have participated in a series of programs in collaboration with the French gallery. The collaboration of the gallery from Lyon began in 1991 with a solo exhibition by Martina Kramer, and over the course of decades, it has expanded by organic and friendly development into a network of continuous artistic communication, exchanges, meetings and professional activities.
Since the first visit to Zagreb by gallery manager and poet Jean de Breyne in 1991, many artistic collaborations would begin with a friendly meeting, or would develop into friendship over the years. Therefore, today, when we want to look at the whole, the type and the guiding thread of these relationships that were born and lasted through years and decades, it is precisely this friendly environment that connects various accomplishments and emerges as the common denominator of the chronology of these relationships.
L’Ollave gallery-bookstore was founded in Lyon in 1974, and since 1978 it has been managed by a private, independent collective. To date, L’Ollave has organized more than three hundred exhibitions, readings, performances, artistic exchanges and other events, in France and abroad. English, Polish, Belgian and Italian artists participated in the exchanges, and in 1991 the exchange with Croatia began, and since then numerous exhibitions and exchanges have been organized in both countries. During the last 10 years, since 2012, there has been an active collaboration with writers, through which a series of translations of Croatian poetry into French, Domaine croate / Poésie (Croatian domain / Poetry), was created, in which 23 books have currently been produced.
The gallery published the art magazine L’Ollave, préoccupations (1993-2016). Since 1998, the gallery has been working without a permanent exhibition space as an exhibition organizer and book publisher, and in 1999 gallery moved from Lyon to Vaucluse, France. In 2005, L’Ollave conceived and directed the biennial poetry readings, Les Cris poétiques, with Vélo Théâtre in Apt (2005-2017); and the collection of artistic essays Préoccupations.
Today, L’Ollave is managed by Jean de Breyne, Euan Burnet-Smith, Martina Kramer and Jean-Louis Raynard, Vanda Mikšić and Brankica Radić.