The Museum Lapidarium
is pleased to invite you to the opening of the exhibition
Jiři Kočica – Pregnant Diotima
Rigo Gallery, Friday 2 August 2024 at 9 pm.
The Slovenian academic sculptor, pedagogue, and essayist presents an ambient installation centered around a life-sized full-body figure representing Diotima, a character from Plato’s Symposium who acts as Socrates’ teacher on Eros. Jiři Kočica examines themes of ancient beauty, divine beauty, love, and immortality as if in a modern scientific laboratory where:
„Sections of the human figure are inserted into a laboratory equipment frame on glass plates/trays. The material and laboratory coldness of this element prevent it from being mistaken for a tray stand in a cafeteria or fast food restaurant. The tray stand is technologically too sophisticated and aesthetically too industrially refined for that. These sections contain special gel leaves on which the sequences of the human genome are recorded. At the top is a head, actually a negative cast of a head, which gives the whole shape the identity of a human body. The head is a classic generic feature that further confirms the human form, while the slices below reminiscent of MRI scans. Diotima is pregnant,/…/“
Vasja Nagy-Hofbauer
Pregnant prophetess, gel for electrophoresis and DNA analysis, 3D print © Jiři Kočica
Jiři Kočica (Slovenj Gradec, 1966), sculptor and writer, conceptual artist, theorist and lecturer. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Ljubljana (1991), in the class of prof. Luj Vodopivec and prof. Tomaž Brejc. At the same academy, he is finishing his postgraduate master’s studies under the mentorship of prof. Dušan Tršar (1993). He worked as a professor at the High School for Interior Design (STrŠ) in Ljubljana and as an external associate at the Faculty of Education in Maribor (Department of Fine Arts). So far, he has exhibited at several solo and group exhibitions in Slovenia and abroad. In 2003, together with his colleagues, he completed an extensive project of conversion and renovation of the former military prison on Metelkova street in Ljubljana into the Celica Youth Hostel, for which they received numerous awards. He is the author of several public sculptures, of which the installation in the Pregl Research Center of the Institute of Chemistry in Ljubljana stands out. He published texts on the theory of art in several books and magazines. In 2018, he was nominated for the Kresnik award after publishing the novel Izvirnik (Original). During his career, he also worked as a curator. Since 2018, he has been teaching several study subjects at the Department of Visual Arts and Design of the University of Primorska in Koper.
Detail of the pregnant Diotima in the studio, 2017 © Jiři Kočica
dr.sc. Jeriica Ziherl & Jiri Kočica, foto arhiva MML
Jiri Kočica, foto MML
Opening exhibition, foto MML
Opening exhibition, foto MML
Opening exhibition, foto MML
Opening exhibition, foto MML
Opening exhibition, foto MML
