MARIJAN MOLNAR

In his art practice that includes installations, video art, ambients, public actions, photography, site-specific and online installations, formed at the time of New Artistic Practice, Marian Molnar is questioning the personal identity, the duality of nature and culture, the perception of global relationships or the relationships between subject and object.

   After coating his own paintings with black color after the Academy, in 1977 – 1983 period Molnar was preoccupied with philosophical significance of the 4 elements: earth, water, fire and air, which he investigated with public actions "Earth and Fire", "Burning Paper On the Snow" in 1977. At that time Molnar was also interested in relationship of culture and nature, for example, in action 2Artist’s Daily Meal", as well in border areas, such as space between paper and gallery ("Work Frame", 1978.), and limits between body and space in performance, "Three Relations Body / Ambient" from the same year .

 
  He was a memeber of the  informal artist collective active in Podroom Gallery, in Mesnička 12 Zagreb, during mid-70s and early 80s, that merged friendship and artistic creativity in art scene that would later be named New Artistic Practice. During that period Molnar did the cycle of public actions entitled “For the Democratization of Art”, initiated in 1979 which involved action of collecting signatures for the democratization of art at the Republic Square in Zagreb’s center. In. 1981, magazine "Studentski List / Student Paper" published photographs of the same name, which present artists dressed as a terrorist, standing in front of the eponymous label.  That same year,  the ŠKUC Gallery exhibition in Ljubljana presented installation with the same inscription on a red flag with a white five-pointed star .Using the language and methods of ideology (the collection of signatures, and social and state symbols), the artist has tried to emphasize relation between art and the wider social context.

Suppression, absence, and family issues are common in the Molnar’s art of the 90s. The theme of absence is evident in Molnar’s  ambiental installation "Passion / Incest", exhibited at the Chapel Gallery in Ljubljana, in 1999. Five hospital beds are installed on five tons of salt, and interaction with the viewer is achieved through the headphones and blinking bulbs placed above the beds. During 2005 and 2006 Molnar has realized a three-part, online, site-specific project "Translation", which took place at three locations. The project explored the categories such as openness and closeness, and social indifference. In 2008. Molnar brought a Hrelić Flea Market vendor to the Barrel Gallery in Zagreb who, during the exhibition, moved his activity to the site.

   Marijan Molnar was born in 1951. in Reka, near Koprivnica. He graduated painting from the Academy of Fine Arts in 1976. He has exhibited in more than 80 group exhibitions and 40 solo exhibitions. J. Bubaš