This document summarizes a photography exhibition by Barbara Jakše Jeršič and Stane Jeršič titled "Fragments of time and place in photography". The exhibition features black and white photos taken between 2003-2005 in Sarajevo, Ljubljana, Portorož, Venice, Vienna, Munich, and San Francisco. The photos capture fragments of urban life and aim to highlight the dichotomy between individual identity and conformity to global trends. Specifically, the photos show how architecture represents local identity but people increasingly conform to global patterns. They also portray the tension between apparent peace in public spaces and the underlying threat of conflict. The exhibition aims to question whether modern cities force a consumerist mentality and

1. Fragments of time and place in photograpy
Barbara Jakše Jeršič & Stane Jeršič
THE DISCREET CHARM OF PEACEDISKRETNI ŠARM MIRU
Fragmenti časa in prostora v fotografiji

2. Sarajevo - Ljubljana - Portorož - Benetke - Dunaj - Munchen - San Francisco.
2003 - 2005.
Sarajevo - Ljubljana - Portorose - Venice - Vienna - Munich - San Francisco
2003 -2005

3. Fragmenti časa in prostora v fotografiji Fragments of time and place in photograpy
Barbara Jakše Jeršič & Stane Jeršič
DISKRETNIŠARMMIRU
THEDISCREETCHARMOFPEACE

4. Koroški pokrajinski muzej
Slovenj Gradec
02.09. - 24.10.2005
Koroški pokrajinski muzej
Glavni trg 24
2380 Slovenj Gradec
Slovenija
tel : +386 (0)2 88 42055, 88 22930
dir : +386 (0)2 88 22931
fax: +386 (0)2 88 42055

5. Najnovejša serija fotografij Barbare Jakše in Staneta Jeršiča
nastaja v angažirani vizualizaciji sodobnih, z uniformnostjo glo-
balizacije ožigosanih urbanih ambientov na različnih koncih sveta.
S tenkočutnim prediranjem tančic zunanjega videza mestnega
utripa se fotografa spuščata v zakulisje fragmentiranih okruškov
življenja, ki jim vselej zoperstavljata izpraznjeno, skoraj sterilno
izhodiščno podobo, nekakšno arhetipsko veduto prepoznavne
mikrolokacije, v panoramskem posnetku razširjene v sugestivni,
domala metaforični »psihološki portret« prostorov, neposeljenih
s človekom, a z jasno čitljivimi sledovi njegove siceršnje prisot-
nosti. Natančni, visoko estetizirani črno-beli posnetki ne sledijo
individualni identiteti izbranega okolja, ujeti skušajo vzdušje
napetosti pričakovanja: navidezne oaze miru in posvojene, organ-
izirane varnosti so tudi prizorišča nenehne latentne nevarnosti
sodobnih urbanih spopadov.
V arhitekturnih okvirih Ljubljane, Dunaja, San Francisca,
Münchna, Benetk in ožigosanega mesta Sarajeva skušata Jeršič
in Jakšetova poudariti dihotomijo človekovega funkcioniranja
v ambientih sodobnega sveta, v katerem se individualnost
posameznika utaplja v splošno sprejetih kodih zapovedanega
obnašanja množice. Na izjemno tenkočuten način opozarjata na
svojevrstno krizo identitete urbanega, saj izpostavljata konflikt
med arhitekturo oz. stavbami kot nosilkami lokalne prepoznavnos-
ti, ter ljudmi, ki v naprezanju po aktualnem vživetju v zahteve časa
in prostora prostodušno podlegajo vzorcem globalnih trendov.
Kot da bi bil realni prostor ujetnik sedanjega trenutka, kot da ne
bi bilo zgodovine, morda le še novica prejšnjega ali tega dneva,
kot da bi vsaka individualna zgodovina izčrpala svoje motive in se
znašla v nenehni izpraznjeni sedanjosti, prestreljeni s ponorelim
hlastanjem za čim hitrejšo konzumacijo dobrin. Figure se zlivajo
z okoljem, v njem izginevajo, se konformistično zapredajo v
njegove nevidne niti in skupaj z njim oblikujejo iluzijo navidezne
simbioze, diskretnega šarma miru v hipertrofiranem ritmu
vsakdanjega življenja. Krhkost logike urejenega, nadzorovanega
stanja stvari najbolj jasno razgalja prav fotografija, saj kot podoba
ne obstaja v realnem, vzvrtinčenem in pospešenem dojemanju
časa. Izrgana iz konteksta realnega časa, uklenjena v negib-
nost in tišino, veliko prepričljiveje kot vseprisotna, neulovljiva
elektronska gibljiva slika označuje stereotip vsakodnevne
reciklaže globaliziranih vzorcev bivanja v sodobnem svetu.
Življenje v večjih mestih s hitrim kopičenjem spreminjajočih se
podob in oblikovanjem vedno novih javnih prostorov kot ključnih
elementov urbanih strategij resnično ne prinaša stabilnosti,
nasprotno, povzroča razdrobljenost in izgubo orientacije.
Fotografske podobe so lahko zato fotografije česarkoli: podobe
klišejsko prepoznavnih prostorov mestne identitete in podobe
spregledanih, morda še bolj avtentičnih efemernih ambientov,
ter kogarkoli: ljudi, ki so neznani drug drugemu, ki se zbirajo
v skupine, vrste, mimoidoči, ki se srečujejo v trenutku, ki nima
opraviti s preteklostjo.
Razen morda v Sarajevu. V mestu nepredstavljivega trpljenja,
kolektivnega sovraštva, medsebojne solidarnosti, dvoumnega
odpuščanja in globalne brezbrižnosti, v mestu brez vzora in
vzorca, z avtentično in znova vzpostavljeno, v marsičem vsiljeno,
ponarejeno identiteto, ter nepreglednim labirintom sveže izko-
panih grobov. Ali je tukaj, v nedrih bodoče skupne, zaokrožene
Evrope nastavljeno zrcalo resnične mentalitete lažnih prerokov
Zahodnega sveta ter razgaljena demarkacijska linija Novega
svetovnega reda in njegovega razsutega sistema vrednot?
Stane Jeršič in Barbara Jakše ne iščeta odgovorov in zaključene
vizure sveta, saj se bržkone samo sprašujeta: Ali so sodobna
urbana okolja v resnici prisiljena v proizvajanje potrošniške
mentalitete kot edinega pragmatičnega cilja družbene strukture?
Ali je vizualni red, kakršnega lovi njuna kamera, zgolj večno
ponavljajoča se simulacija prostora v njegovi globalni, namišljeni
razsežnosti nekakšnega umetno nadinvestiranega sveta, v
katerem ni več prostora za lucidno misel posameznika in epifanijo
podobe - ikone, ki navdihuje?
Marko Košan
The latest series of photographs by Barbara Jakše and Stane
Jeršič takes shape in the conscious and committed visualization
of contemporary urban environments in various parts of the world
that have been “branded” by the uniformity of globalization. Sen-
sitively piercing the veils of the external appearance of urban life,
the photographers enter a behind-the-scenes space of fragmen-
tary scraps of life against which they place an emptied, almost
sterile initial image, a kind of archetypal view of a recognizable
microlocation, expanded in a panoramic photograph into a sug-
gestive, almost metaphorical “psychological” portrait of spaces
unoccupied by human beings but with clearly legible traces of
their presence. The precise, highly aestheticized black-and-white
images do not follow the individual identity of the chosen environ-
ment; rather, they try to capture the atmosphere of the tension
of expectation: apparent oases of peace and adopted, organized
security are also the settings for the constant latent danger of
contemporary urban conflicts.
Within the architectural frameworks of Ljubljana, Vienna, San
Francisco, Munich, Venice and the stigmatized city of Sarajevo,
Jeršič and Jakše try to emphasize the dichotomy of human
functioning in the environments of the modern world, in which the
individuality of the human being is drowned in generally accepted
codes of the prescribed behavior of the crowd. In a very subtle
way, they draw attention to the unique identity crisis of the urban,
by exposing the conflict between architecture – or buildings – as
the props of local recognizability, and the people who, in their ef-
forts to accustom themselves to the demands of time and space,
ingenuously succumb to the patterns of global trends. As though
real space were a prisoner of the current moment, as though
there were no history but perhaps only news from yesterday or
today, as though every individual history had exhausted its motifs
and found itself in an unending, empty present, shot through with
a frenzied clutching at consumption, as rapid as possible. Figures
blend with the environment, they disappear in it; they wrap
themselves conformingly in its invisible threads and, bonded with
it, form the illusion of apparent symbiosis, the discreet charm of
peace in the hypertrophied rhythm of everyday life. The fragility
of the logic of the ordered, controlled state of things is most
clearly exposed by the photograph: as an image it does not exist
in the real, vertiginous and sped-up conception of time. Torn from
the context of real time, fettered in immobility and silence, it char-
acterizes – far more convincingly than the omnipresent, elusive
electronic moving image – the stereotype of the daily recycling of
globalized patterns of living in the modern world.
Life in big cities, with the rapid accumulation of changing images
and the constant formation of new public spaces as key elements
of urban strategies, does not truly bring stability. Quite the oppo-
site, it causes fragmentation and loss of orientation. Photograph-
ic images can therefore be photographs of anything: images of
the clichéd spaces of urban identity and images of overlooked,
perhaps more authentic ephemeral environments; and of anyone:
people who are strangers to each other, who gather in groups,
queues, passers-by who encounter each other in a moment that
has nothing to do with the past.
Except perhaps in Sarajevo. In a city of unimaginable suffering,
collective hatred, mutual solidarity, doubtful forgiveness and
global indifference, in a city without pattern or model, with an
authentic and re-established identity, in many ways imposed and
falsified, and a confused labyrinth of freshly dug graves. Or has a
mirror of the true mentality of the false prophets of the Western
world been set up here in the bosom of the future common, com-
plete Europe, and the demarcation line of the New World Order
and its fragmented system of values been laid bare?
Stane Jeršič and Barbara Jakše are not looking for answers and
a final vision of the world. They are probably merely asking them-
selves: Are modern urban environments really forced into the
production of a consumerist mentality as the only pragmatic goal
of social structure? Is the visual order of the kind their camera is
hunting merely an eternally repeating simulation of space in its
global, imaginary dimension of a kind of artificially overinvested
world, in which there is no more space for the lucid thought of
the individual and the epiphany of the image/icon that inspires?
Marko Košan

54. Barbara Jakše Jeršič (1967) in Stane Jeršič
(1957) ustvarjata na področju fotografije od
leta 1987 in živita v Sloveniji. Izdala sta vrsto
monografij, imela številne samostojne razstave in
bila uvrščena v skupinske predstavitve v
Sloveniji kot tudi Evropi, Japonski in Ameriki.
Njuna dela so vključena v uveljavljene javne in
zasebne zbirke fotografije.
www.portfolio.si/jaksejersic/
barbara.jakse@guest.arnes.si
stane.jersic@guest.arnes.si
Barbara Jakše (1967) and Stane Jeršič (1957)
have been working in the field of photography
since 1987 and lives in the Republic of Slovenia.
In the next few years they published several
books, have many one-person exhibitions and
have been selected in different group shows in
Slovenia as well as in Europe, Japan and the
United States. Their photographs form part of
of well-known public and private collections of
photography.