Iva Kontic

Mechanical Dream has been inspired by the news that Crvena Zastava, a state car factory from former Yugoslavia (now in Serbia), had been sold to Italian automobile magnate Fiat. The work deals with culture and social phenomenon which this event had triggered. It explores different aspects of collective identity as defined by political and economic dynamics in the today’s shifting reality, starting from a particular case in the Eastern European context. Being a major industry product of the former communist state, Crvena Zastava cars contributed both in a historic and a symbolic way to the creation of the ‘authentic’ national identity to Yugoslav nations; yet, they were imitating foreign car models (mostly Fiat’s) from the very beginnings of the factory. In accordance to ambitions and paradoxes of the system that produced them, those cars represented something of a collective “mechanical dream”, which was synonymous to the 20th century progressive West and of its consumer-driven society. U.S. was actually the market where Crvena Zastava (Serb. ‘red flag’) reached its exportation peak! After the break apart of Yugoslavia in 1990’s, which was followed by the general collapse of its economy (lead by the same car factory), the image of socialist society changed dramatically: its ‘authentic’ values disappeared and its former identity was deconstructed entirely. The new fate of the factory - as that of many other factories in countries in transition - and its social reality bring a ‘solution’ for that crisis; a solution whose consequences remain unknown when viewed through the lens of economic and cultural colonialism.

Mechanical Dream has developed into a series of five photographs, a single-channel video and a painting. Commissioned by Cairo Prize 12, the work was first presented in the form of a mixed-media installation at Museo della Permanente, Milan. It has been subsequently shown both as installation and separately as video, photo-series or painting.