“Every time a man of culture dies, something is lost forever: the treasure stored in his memory needs to be recreated. Knowledge, without affective culture, is untransferable,” wrote Roland Barthes regarding the death of art critic Gaëtan Picon. Barthes’s thought is quite suitable considering Matičević’s curatorial commitment, accompanied by deep intellectual sincerity and unique enthusiasm he easily transferred to his coworkers.
Reading his critical texts and catalogue forewords to solo exhibitions of Dalibor Martinis, Ivan Kožarić, Duba Sambolec or Dubravka Rakoci, gathered in the book edited by the Museum curators Iva Rada Janković and Marija Gattin, it is evident that he was not only a knowledgeable interpreter of works of art, but also a visionary who could identify and anticipate phenomena, i.e. authors who would shine bright and change the paradigms on the local scene. Many of his ideas and insights are still relevant, adding to the fact that he was the torchbearer of the idea of a new Museum of Contemporary Art building, which he saw in Paromlin, a facility since only recently expecting a realisation of its own location potentials.
Wishing to motivate greater care in institutional memory in this 70th anniversary year of MSU and determined to foster the affective transfer of intergenerational experience and knowledge, we have invited artists and curators, only a small portion of the scene due to the informal conversation surrounding the exhibition, to share their memories, experiences and anecdotes about working, creating, curatorial procedures and friendship with Davor Matičević.
The conversation hosts the art duo Sanja&Mario Bachrach Krištofić, Markita Franulić, head of the Nikola Tesla Technical Museum, artists Boris Cvjetanović and Darko Fritz, and retired MSU curator Tihomir Milovac.
The conversation is hosted by the exhibition co-curator Željko Luketić and Leila Topić.
