NADA PRLJA
FYR Macedonia/UK
Nada Prlja was born in Sarajevo, moving at an early age to Skopje, Macedonia. Since 1999 she has been living and working in London.
Prlja's work deals with the complex situations of inequality and injustice in societies in transition, ranging from political and economic to religious issues.
The project 'Advanced Science of Morphology' (2006), consisting of 26 combinations of the national flags of the states that once made up Yugoslavia, replaced (in June 2006) the flags of the EU member states in Marble Arch Park, London, posing questions about the possibility of the existence of any Union. This project has provoked highly charged reactions in the media and the public, every time it has been displayed in any country within Europe.
In a similarly provocative manner, the project 'One City, Two Voices' (2007) questions issues related to religious propaganda. In Skopje, Macedonia, Prlja visually juxtaposes a monumental, illuminated cross of the Orthodox religion (raised on the apex of Skopje's mount Vodno), with an illuminated object consisting of her own initials NP (positioned on the roof of the Macedonian National Gallery). As a continuation of the same project, she questions the religious propaganda implied by the ever growing number of mosques in the city, by broadcasting a voice singing opera from a series of loud speakers positioned within the Muslim community to coincide with the Muslim 'call for prayer'.
Prlja's work deals with the complex situations of inequality and injustice in societies in transition, ranging from political and economic to religious issues.
The project 'Advanced Science of Morphology' (2006), consisting of 26 combinations of the national flags of the states that once made up Yugoslavia, replaced (in June 2006) the flags of the EU member states in Marble Arch Park, London, posing questions about the possibility of the existence of any Union. This project has provoked highly charged reactions in the media and the public, every time it has been displayed in any country within Europe.
In a similarly provocative manner, the project 'One City, Two Voices' (2007) questions issues related to religious propaganda. In Skopje, Macedonia, Prlja visually juxtaposes a monumental, illuminated cross of the Orthodox religion (raised on the apex of Skopje's mount Vodno), with an illuminated object consisting of her own initials NP (positioned on the roof of the Macedonian National Gallery). As a continuation of the same project, she questions the religious propaganda implied by the ever growing number of mosques in the city, by broadcasting a voice singing opera from a series of loud speakers positioned within the Muslim community to coincide with the Muslim 'call for prayer'.
NADA PRLJA
Two Deaths in the Society of Fear, book & newspaper, 2005
Courtesy of the artist