Speculum Artium Festival
Background
The name Speculum Artium is related to the statement of Peter Weibel: "… there is a highly sophisticated relationship between art and politics which can be expressed as the speculum artium, or the mirror of art."
First held in City Art Gallery Ljubljana was in 2009 permanently moved to Delavski dom Trbovlje in Trbovlje. It was organised by Academy of Fine Arts and Design, ArtNetLab, Faculty of Computer and Information Science, University of Ljubljana, Trbovlje, The New Media Setting and Delavski dom Trbovlje Cultural Centre, the former being in charge of the organisation since 2010.
Programme
The festival is held in spring and includes the exhibition of students' artworks reflecting questions of contemporary society focused on audio and video installations and interactive projects. There are also invited guest artists. In 2009 they were chosen by Peter Weibel: Dorcas Müller, Herwig Steiner and Brigitta Zics.
The festival has also a rich accompanying programme with performances, happenings, workshops and concerts. In 2009 there was a musical spectacle by Laibach. The extended parallel program in 2010 included video festivals Digital Big Screen and Genius Seaculi.
Academy of Fine Arts and Design, Faculty of Computer and Information Science, University of Ljubljana, The Academy Of Fine Arts Prague, University of Applied Arts Vienna, Graduate School of Information Science and Technology, University of Tokyo and University of Art and Design in Linz have participated so far.
Speculum Artium 2011
The Speculum Artium 2011 was curated by professors of participating academies: Herwig Steiner (Vienna), Srečo Dragan (Ljubljana), and Michaela Ortner (Linz). The participating artists were: Dan Scott, Michael Fisher, Juan Suanca, Lisa Hall, Aram Zarikian, Paolo Zappala, Jessica Pinney, Philip Cornett, Marc Bonet Folgosa, Christoph Schwarz, Julian Palacz, Thomas Frierss, Nik Skušek, Jure Fingušt, Dorian Španzel, Reinhard Gupfinger, Travis Kirton, Maša Jazbec, Group V.A.T., and Tiago Martins. The opening was accompanied by performance of the group The Awkwardstra from London.