It explores relationships between an individual, a space and a city, examining why a place is special to someone and what prompts an individual to perceive a place differently.

Special Place in the City is an ongoing project of the art group KOLEKTIVA from Slovenia. The aim is to approach a new city with a slightly different strategy and create a new artwork. It charts new emotional maps and discovers locations that people sense intimately. Inhabitants of every city are asked to present their special place and tell its story, regardless of whether it is positive or negative.

The focus is on two aspects, the first being the intimate perception of individuals’ stories. There is a psychological element in observing an individual and the personal history linked to a location. Watching unique portraits of inhabitants and their revelations offers a voyeuristic pleasure and a possibility of identifying. The second essential aspect is the city. Stories of individuals provide a new or different reading of places, and uncover multiple meanings created by the experience and memories of the inhabitants.

The long-term vision is to create a wide collection of urban living strategies in European (and maybe even worldwide) cities consisting of stories, memories, facts, opinions, ideas, advice and solutions from as many people and cities as possible. Kolektiva wants to build an alternative “tourist guide” of each city, which can offer a different view of the space and its inhabitants based on participation of the local individuals and communities. The main goal is not only to produce an interesting “reading” for visitors, but to mark, preserve and render visible a collection of personal stories and histories for future generations of citizens.

In each new edition/city, the first activity is to invite people to participate. This approach changes from city to city: asking passers-by, appointing participants for video filming in particular environments, approaching specific target groups by open call or direct invitations.

The second stage is processing and editing the collected material. The next stage is preparing the exhibition and (sometimes) continuation of collecting responses from exhibition viewers. The last stage is publishing material on the project’s website.

WHAT ARE THE OUTPUTS?

"The positive outputs are getting to know different cities and different people, finding out new interesting personal stories and memories and widening Kolektiva’s perception of living in a city. Also the positive output is to build a network with new partners (art professionals and institutions).

The negative output is the difficulty of finding people (citizens) who are willing to cooperate in the project. In some cities people are quite reluctant to give away their personal stories and memories. The result could sometimes be shallow and stereotypical answers to our questions or not responding to our invitation to participate." (Vesna Bukovec, Kolektiva)

WHAT IS THE REASON FOR THE COLLABORATION WITH EACH PARTNER?

"Mainly the reason to collaborate with partners is because we receive an invitation or apply for a residency or exhibition in order to present our project or carry out a new edition in a new city. The exception was Professor Marko Krevs, PhD, from the University of Ljubljana. He offered collaboration in his research on emotional aspects of geography." (Vesna Bukovec, Kolektiva)

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THE PROJECT ENCOUNTERS DIFFICULTIES?

"The main difficulty is not getting a response from the city's population. Sometimes this problem also occurs due to lack of effort from partner organisations. Since we are always strangers and not familiar with the local scene (except in the project in Ljubljana, our home city) and we usually don't stay for a long period of time, we cannot go to great lengths to find interesting and cooperative people as much we would want to. To find participants we must in many cases rely on our partner who invites us to make the project in their city. We would wish more involvement in finding participants of our partners in the future. We try to solve the lack of participation in the preparation stage by inviting visitors of the exhibition to participate with their input." (Vesna Bukovec, Kolektiva)

WHAT ABOUT THE FUTURE?

"We are looking for new partners to help us carry out new editions. Until now we made the editions of the project in relatively small or middle sized cities. In the future we would like to make them in bigger cities as well. We are also looking for funding to translate all the existing materials into English. In the next few years, we plan to publish a book presenting the most interesting parts of the project." (Vesna Bukovec, Kolektiva)

WHY IS COOPERATION IMPORTANT?

"Cross-cultural cooperation enables artists and other art professionals to work on more ambitious projects and achieve wider audiences. Cross-country cooperation also enables different perspectives in the research field and opens new possibilities to the artists." (Vesna Bukovec, Kolektiva)

The project is financed by Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia and by partners in each city where the project was carried out.