STA, 21 August 2022- Roman Uranjek, one of the founders of two the most influential Slovenian contemporary arts collectives, Irwin and Neue Slowenische Kunst, has died aged 60, several media have reported.

Born in Trbovlje in 1961, Uranjek entered the art scene with the Irwins in 1983, creating an an arts phenomenon whose influence stretches from the 1980s to the present.

The group became known for appropriating the iconography of social realism, Nazi propaganda, sacral art and archetypical images of Slovenian art, according to Delo newspaper.

In parallel he pursued his own artistic career and is best known for his project At Least a Cross a Day, which he launched in 2002.

The series contains over 25,000 crosses, a symbol closely associated with Irwin, that he created until his death.

Works by Irwin are part of major international arts collections and have been exhibited in the most prominent galleries in the world.

STA, 11 September 2020 - The legendary Slovenian band Laibach will perform at Ljubljana Castle for the first time ever to celebrate its 40th anniversary. The organisers had to reduce the capacity of the courtyard to the allowed 500 visitors due to Covid-19 safety measures, so the band added an extra concert on Saturday, which was also sold out.

According to the Ljubljana Castle website, the Laibach concert was planned as the opening event of the Dragon Festival, a traditional three-day event on the castle hill. Due to the current situation, most of the planned programme had to be cancelled or postponed to 2021. However, the Laibach concert marking the 40th anniversary of the band will go through as planned.

Laibach is one of the most famous and recognized Slovenian bands, well established on the international alternative or independent music scene. In its musical expression, Laibach combines different genres, from an experimental industrial sound to symphonic "militant" classicism and electronic music, the organisers wrote.

Laibach is the principal founder of the retro-avant-garde art movement in Slovenia, along with other groups from the art movement known as Neue Slowenische Kunst. Since its beginnings, the band has been creatively combining music with other media at live performances.

"Due to their uncompromising artistic attitude, as well as penetrating analysis of the political ideology of totalitarianism, Laibach had faced many difficulties, and between 1983 and 1987 the band was officially banned in Yugoslavia and Slovenia," the organisers recalled.

Ticket holders will also have access to a limited series of calendars for 2021 with 12 illustrations of the band members intertwined with photographs of Ljubljana Castle.

STA, 12 August 2019 - Slovenia will be the country in focus at viennacontemporary 2019, the largest international art fair in Austria, which will take place in Vienna from 26 to 29 September.

The fair will feature more than 100 galleries and 500 artists from 25 countries, providing a glimpse into the contemporary art scene in Central and Eastern Europe.

In focus will actually be a state without territory, the NSK State in Time, an ongoing project launched by the controversial Neue Slowenische Kunst (NSK) art collective.

The virtual state debuted in 1992 as a reaction to NSK's own activities and to political developments following the fall of the Berlin Wall.

It emerged a year after Slovenia gained independence, showing the artists' disapproval of national borders and promoting transnationality.

The State in Time boasts more than 15,000 citizens with their own NSK passports from around the globe, who held their first congress in Berlin in 2010.

Find out how to get your passport here

"The situation in Europe and the world shows just how relevant the NSK State in Time still is," viennacontemporary curator Johanne Chromik said during a recent presentation of the art show in Ljubljana.

Chromik also said the Slovenian section of the show had been curated by Tevž Logar, an up-an-coming Slovenian curator and art lecturer, who had chosen 13 artists.

Four Slovenian galleries will also be presented in Vienna, namely the Photon Gallery, Fotografija Gallery, P74 Centre and Gallery, and the Ravnikar Gallery Space.

Viennacontemporary is foremost a platform for art galleries to get new contacts, at the same time fostering dialogue and research.

All our stories on NSK are here

Slovenia is a chocolate box of green, stunning landscapes, but I have a greater fondness for city than country, and a love of cool, clean lines as much anything organic. Thus this week your attention is drawn to the work of Igor Andjelić, of Ljubljana’s Gallery Minimal. A striking figure who takes striking photos, he’s been part of the city’s art scene for decades – including as part of IRWIN and NSK, as well designing, among other spaces, ŠKUC and Klub K4 – and has works in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York (MOMA).

While Andjelić shows at various galleries, the best place to keep up with his work with minimal effort is Facebook, where you’ll find nice surprises, in black and white, on a regular basis.