At the moment – first international exhibition of conceptual art in Yugoslavia

1/11Street view - exhibition ads drawing attention from the passers-by. Photo by Enes Midžić. Courtesy of the Marinko Sudac Collection (www.avantgarde-museum.com)

1/11Setting up. Photo by Enes Midžić. Courtesy of the Marinko Sudac Collection (www.avantgarde-museum.com)

1/11Photo by Enes Midžić. Courtesy of the Marinko Sudac Collection (www.avantgarde-museum.com)

1/11Photo by Enes Midžić. Courtesy of the Marinko Sudac Collection (www.avantgarde-museum.com)

1/11Inside view of the doorway exhibition space. Photo by Enes Midžić. Courtesy of the Marinko Sudac Collection (www.avantgarde-museum.com)

1/11Photo by Enes Midžić. Courtesy of the Marinko Sudac Collection (www.avantgarde-museum.com)

1/11Photo by Enes Midžić. Courtesy of the Marinko Sudac Collection (www.avantgarde-museum.com)

1/11Sol LeWitt's work. Photo by Enes Midžić. Courtesy of the Marinko Sudac Collection (www.avantgarde-museum.com)

1/11Photo by Enes Midžić. Courtesy of the Marinko Sudac Collection (www.avantgarde-museum.com)

1/11Photo by Enes Midžić. Courtesy of the Marinko Sudac Collection (www.avantgarde-museum.com)

1/11Invitation/poster for the exhibition, including the invitation letter for the exhibition and the list of artists to whom it was sent.

In 1970, Braco Dimitrijević and Goran Trbuljak began organizing exhibitions at the “haustor,” the doorway entrance of a tenants’ building on Frankopanska Street 2A in the center of Zagreb. Five exhibitions were held there, four of which involved individual projects by Dimitrijević and Trbuljak. In April 1971, Braco and Nena Dimitrijević organized a three-hour-long group exhibition titled At the Moment the first international exhibition of conceptual art to take place in Yugoslavia, which included the participation of some of the best known figures of conceptual art. The exhibition was the result of Braco and Nena’s travels across Europe where they became acquainted with the burgeoning new art scene. The process of organization involved sending letters of invitation to the participants. Whatever was mailed back to the organizers by those who had responded to the invitation was then exhibited. The flyer/poster for the exhibition contained the organizers’ letter and a list of all individuals and groups who were invited. The fact that the exhibition was organized independent of any institutional ties and that it took place at such an informal space was interpreted by some critics—most notably Ješa Denegri—to embody the subversive noncommercial and anti-institutional character of conceptual art itself. The exhibition was documented by the photographs of Enes Midžić, a fifteen-minute, 16 mm film by Vladimir Petek, and an 8 mm film by Mladen Stilinović. Although it lasted for only three hours, it was widely advertised and well attended. It was later restaged at the Student Cultural Center in Belgrade under the name In Another Moment.

Document:  Excerpts on the making of “Haustor” and the “At the Moment” exhibition from a text by Nena Dimitrijević (1978)

Guide for the chronology (Ivana Bago: Something to think about: values and valeurs of visibility in Zagreb from 1961 to 1986)