The exhibition Brioni – a necromantic attempt: Behzad Khosravi Noori and Magnus Bärtås with Paul Kupelwieser and Josip Broz Tito is a continuation of the long-term collaboration between curators Ana Kovačić and Lea Vene and artists Behzad Khosravi Noori and Magnus Bärtås, whose work has often explored and engaged with the (post-)Yugoslav context. This exhibition, co-produced by this curator-artist team and What, How & for Whom / WHW, presents a newly created installation inspired by the tumultuous history of the Brijuni islands of the Croatian coast.

In the film that is the focal point of this work and the spatial installation, Khosravi Noori and Bärtås juxtapose two historical figures who shared an obsession with Brijuni: the nineteenth-century Austrian industrialist Paul Kupelwieser and former president of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia Josip Broz Tito. Both spent much of their lives on Brijuni, radically transforming the island’s landscape and fauna. Kupelwieser bought the malaria-ridden archipelago in 1893 with the idea of building an exclusive tourist resort and spa. He managed to eradicate malaria with the help of the bacteriologist Dr. Robert Koch, and then he carried out a complete transformation of the landscape. Tito would come to Brijuni half a century later, treating the archipelago as a geopolitical realization of the Non-Aligned Movement. Brijuni thus assumed an important role in forming international cultural and political connections and became the stage for numerous social and political events, some of which are the subjects of the collages that make up part of the broader exhibition project.
 
According to a list compiled in July 1977, more than a thousand exotic animals once lived on Brijuni, including tigers, orangutans, ostriches, giraffes, zebras, elephants, camels, ibex, antelopes, gazelles, llamas, seals, flamingos, grizzlies, Tibetan blue bears, and chinchillas. Starting in the early twentieth century, the space of Brijuni was first carefully cultivated and colonized as an exotic oasis and elite tourist destination, and then as a utopian political project that aimed to bring to life the Non-Aligned Movement. For the Brioni exhibition, the artists have decided to try their hand at necromancy: they attempt to summon the ghosts of Kupelwieser and Tito in order to confront them about their two respective visions for the Brijuni islands. For both men, Brijuni was their life’s work, fraught with vanity and grandiose ideas.
 
In the black-and-white film work, Kupelwieser’s and Tito’s narration and reminiscences are complemented with archival material that demonstrates the history of Brijuni as well as with recent recordings made of the natural environment of Brijuni, which is still home to many exotic animals—though not as many as there used to be in the “golden age” of Brijuni. The voices and apparitions of the deceased protagonists merge organically with the other visual materials, underlining the two men’s unbreakable bond with the island. In parallel with Kupelwieser and Tito, we witness the silent coexistence of the animals that still inhabit Brijuni and those that have been placed in large glass cases, forever preserved for the gaze of the many tourists who visit the Brijuni Museum. Khosravi Noori and Bärtås put particular focus on the relationship between the two protagonists and the island’s flora and fauna. Tamed animals that share their habitat (which certainly would not happen in the outside world) and the controlled and modified landscape are seen as expressions of colonial power. Menageries, cages, hotels, and golf courses are just some examples of the commodification and management of the islands. However, both men at the same time intimately and almost tenderly identify with the archipelago, reflecting their obsessions with nature and the living beings that inhabit it. These two vulnerable monologues of people who have been given the opportunity to look “backward” comprise the backbone of the film’s narrative, ultimately driving the whole project.
 
Against the backdrop of the film, the gallery space becomes an interlude leading to the culmination of the work, unobtrusively providing detailed historical materials, memorabilia, colors, and textures that evoke the former splendour of the archipelago across different periods. While Khosravi Noori and Bärtås’s film is based on the narrative strategies of essayist cinema, the rest of the Brioni exhibition focuses on the well-known stories about Brijuni as well as more intimate ones, such as those contained in postcards sent from the island. These postcards offered an opportunity for the people who stayed on Brijuni to present themselves to society as members of the high bourgeoisie, and thereby to strengthen their contacts and connections. Later, these social connections gradually became political, which is illustrated by a large stylized wall map that puts the single historical phenomenon of Brijuni in a broader context—in this case, in the framework of the Non-Aligned Movement and its political players from around the world.
 
Behzad Khosravi Noori and Magnus Bärtås invite you to reconsider the complex and conflicted history of Brijuni, the unexpectedly intertwined lives of Kupelwieser and Tito, and the human need for dominance over nature, which, as Brijuni shows, can result in the remarkable transformation of an ecosystem.
 
* The talk is part of WHW’s discursive and film programme Caring for one another, radical politics of caring.

Cover: detail of the Brijuni’s vegetation on a postcard from the beginning of the 20th century
 
This exhibition is supported by:
City of Zagreb
Croatian Audiovisual Centre (HAVC)
Ministry of Culture and Media, Republic of Croatia
Kultura Nova Foundation