Ljubljanski grad Public Institute

Contact

Javni zavod Ljubljanski grad

Grajska planota 1, SI-1000 Ljubljana

http://www.ljubljanskigrad.si

info@ljubljanskigrad.si

Phone386 (0) 1 306 4230

The Ljubljanski grad Public Institute was established in 2011 by the Municipality of Ljubljana. Its main task is to run and coordinate the cultural, educational and tourist programme at the Ljubljana Castle, which beforehand was under the wing of the Ljubljana Festival. The plethora of various exhibitions and events at the castle – often done in collaboration with various other institutions – numbers up to 400 annually and encompasses cinema screenings, theatre plays, photography and history exhibitions, music concerts, dance performances, children's workshops and so on.

The tourist infrastructure and services of the castle are also managed by the institute, which among other things takes care for the funicular railway to the castle hill and services the long tradition of weddings being held at the Ljubljana Castle. They offer their many venues for hire, organise various guided tours and even arrange birthday parties for children.

Ljubljana Castle - The number 1 attraction in Ljubljana, Slovenia by LjubljanskiGrad on YouTube

Permanent exhibitions

The better part of the permanent exhibitions at the castle is dealing with the history of the castle and the city bellow. One of them is the Virtual castle, a twelve-minute projection showing the history and architectural development of the castle up until present day. It is a complementary project to the Virtual Museum – Ljubljana Squares through the Ages, prepared by the City Museum of Ljubljana, which is now available to watch on-line. A similar topic is dealt with in the multimedia exposition iLjubljana, which deals with the urban development of Ljubljana.

An important exhibition is the Slovenian History, which uses original items, replicas, interactive content and multimedia presentations to outline the political, social, cultural and economic history of the Slovenian territories from prehistory onwards. Another important but a bit more specific display is called The Penitentiary and deals with the techniques and artefacts of confinement and torture, a topic on which an additional exhibition was made in 2015.

Finally, there is the Museum of Puppetry, an ambitious project initiated by the Ljubljana Puppet Theatre, which presents the history of puppetry in Slovenia since the early days of the 20th century and also sets up regular puppet shows.

Arts exhibitions

Graphic arts form a very important part of the institutes programme, which featured for example, photographies done by Steve McCurry and also some other collaborations with National Geographic photographers; a contemporary ceramics exhibition (co-produced with the International Ceramics Triennial Unicum; interdisciplinary spatial installations done by Urša Vidic as a part of City of Women International Festival; a display of contemporary Hungarian graphic artists (a project done together with Hungarian Academy of Arts); and a number of other exhibitions, from children's creations to urbanistic planning.

Of the recent international partners, one can also name the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague and the Venice Academy Gallery of Fine Art.

Educational events

The educational events span from geology lectures to workshops for children. The latter focus on topics like the cultural legacy of the castle, folk legends and tales and the medieval life at the castle.

Alongside these, there are also serious lectures and discussions on history and culture, many of them produced together with the researchers and experts from the Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, the National Museum of Contemporary History or the Museum and Galleries of Ljubljana.

Music, cinema and performative arts

There are two main music cycles at the castle, with the first one conceptualised as a series of concerts in which an invited artist musician curates his own four or five collaborations with other artists. Some of those who were given this mandate were Milko Lazar, Matjaž Drevenšek, Tajda Lekše, Mia Žnidarič and VAsko Atanasovski.

The second cycle presents classical music pieces, which were in 2015 coupled with the works of poets like William Shakespeare, Paul Eluard and Antonio Machado. Some of the invited musicians were Theresa Plut, Nadežda Tokarova, Denys Masliuk and Gavriel Lipkind. Occasional other musical events also take place, from pop music gigs to the Academic Choir Tone Tomšič concerts

During the summertime, the castle courtyard is occupied by Kinodvor Cinema's film screenings called Film under the Stars and a stand-up shows series titled Comedy under the Stars (done in tandem with Gustav Film). This genre is also represented by an international stand-up comedy festival called Panč Festival.

See also

• Ljubljana Castle
• Museum of Puppetry
• Festival Ljubljana

External links

• Ljubljanski grad website
• Ljubljana Castle on YouTube
• The Virtual Museum – Ljubljana Squares through the Ages video