PETRA – pop artist and her strategy
Expanded spaces of art have reached an expanded audience.

In Petra’s case we like to talk about a relaxed drawing and playful content, about an intimate story in relation to a public context in which it presents itself. This time though, I will focus on a component which is constitutive in her creation, recognisable and truly remarkable – and impossible to miss. That is the strategy of presentation which was most probably set of by the intense events at Metelkova in the autumn months of 1993, and then the projects came thick and fast between 1994 and 1997. During this time Petra took over, occupied, settled in, appropriated almost all possible mediums and spaces of presentation. She managed to establish a project-in-progress and attained a concentrated presence by taking over various public spaces and marked them with her presence. As a personality and an artist she was subject to a lot of attention and frequently appeared in the media.

I have approached the presentation of project by Petra Varl as a hit strategy by the first pop artist in the Slovenian arena. And what do I mean by a hit strategy? Petra’s hit strategy is built up on an intense activity and condensed presence – a temporal concentration and a spatial dispersal of projects, which are, however, always in the context of the city, the city as an aesthetic phenomenon, which can offer the contemporary stroller experience and surprise, as well as joy and pleasure.

By using artistic means and procedures, as well as advertising approaches, and with numerous collaborators, Petra has effectively intervened into the life of the city, the citizens of Ljubljana, and has been their favoured and indispensable artist for many years. She has settled in almost all established and marginal exhibition spaces, from galleries to urban and media venues – all those places where her works offered themselves to the gaze of the professional public as well as coincidental passers-by, the busy types hurrying by in a rush, or the strollers looking out for new experiences.

Petra experimented with various formats, mediums and means of expression, from large and monumental billboards and the advertising column, complex ambiences and installations, illuminated objects, campaigns and events, to illustrations and adverts in magazines and newspapers, invites, brochures and tiny objects and paraphernalia, as well as New Year’s decorations, sugar, gingerbread, small calendars and dominoes. The technique was either simple or demanding: drawing, lithography, painting, screen-print, photocopy and computer print; the material was paper, canvas, wood, metal, wallpaper, plastic foil, cardboard box …

She enhanced a condensed presence so that projects and leading figures migrated from space to space and linked up into a common tale. Her figures became recognisable inhabitants of the city and popular acquaintances that let passers-by know: This is us, Petra’s heroes and heroines. They talked about themselves and their author, but also about the possibilities and effects of art’s practice, when it ventures out on the street and to the markets, and swamps the media space.

I will try to enact Petra’s hit strategy with a presentation of her projects, accompanying events and “sweet surprises”, as she called them herself. While at the same time I will suggest some supporting points of analyses on how Petra actually built her presentation strategy and with what effects. In doing so I wish to avoid the trap into which an interpretation can easily get ensnared when it includes an image into a bigger whole, which brings up recognisable models and meanings, and includes also personal experiences. In that way the attention can easily be redirected to the representation of a sensible frame of reference, the complexity of the image itself, while its levels of expression and meaning, which can also be expressed by contradictions, can become blurred in doing so.

PRESENTATION
Memory is a space where stories happen for the second time.

First presentation venue (1994): Metelkova. In the former car park of the army barracks, along all three walls, the project Nose to Nose (3 x 30 m) and accompanying event – in the spot where one of the first destructive interventions by the authorities took place, in the area of the former army barracks, which were intended as a social and cultural centre. The compiled and blown up drawing produced in photocopy displayed a man and a woman – Petra and Primož, kissing like Eskimos and the verses of Andrej Rozman – Roza, nos ob nos … The strong wind did play up a bit, still the game of tennis was successfully played to the sounds of the saxophone and everything was recorded on video by Jasna Hribernik. Beforehand Petra drew a group of vivacious and friendly figures in bathing suits for the “Battle for Metelkova” banner, and soon after that, a little squad of even more peaceful and connected metelkovci – a painter, fiddler and writer – for a special edition of M’Zin dedicated to Metelkova.

Second presentation venue (1994): The story continued with the exhibition project Nose to Nose II, this time in Galerija ZDSLU near Metelkova, where besides the portrait gallery of Petra’s family in various colours and shiny patterns, the same two protagonists appear in a living room setting in a large “family” painting above a red sofa, only that they were framed in fur this time, despite being in the warm shelter of the gallery space.

Third presentation venue (1994): Metelkova again. For the Sestava v celicah (Composition in a Cell) project in the former army prison, Petra organised one of the captivity cells, settling in Three Gentlemen on blue and white stripy wallpaper. These corresponded from the demolished and marginalised environment with no exhibiting memory with the Three Ladies in the pink setting of Moderna galerija, an absolutely proper exhibition venue, as selected by Tomaž Brejc for the first U3 – Triennial of Slovenian Contemporary Art.

Fourth presentation venue (1995–1996): From both threesomes Petra chose one young lady and gentleman, got together with designer Maja Gspan Vičič and together they conceived the project Ljubljančani! (People of Ljubljana!) for the Urbanaria exhibition organised by the newly established Soros Centre for Contemporary Arts in Ljubljana. The young lady and gentleman both got their own name as personifications: Zvezda (park) and (Plečnik’s) Odeon. They became Petra’s most recognisable heroes and so-to-say permanent acquaintances of the people of Ljubljana. Their central location was on the crossroads of Zvezda park: on the advertising column and beside it they formed, along with participants, a year-long city calendar, being careful not to forget to write any major events on it. At the same time they appeared with suitable attire and disposition to the time of year and month. They danced, skated on ice, sunbathed and rode on motorbike, then again they hugged, separated or missed each other. The image on the column was different each month, the heroes did different things, different events (as part of Urbanaria or otherwise) followed one another in the city … Sometimes Mojca and Goro stepped among the people and performed a short sketch by the column, did a twirl, musicians played, poets recited, and passers-by stopped for a moment and listened. A new banner with a calendar was added to the image on the column each month, so there was less and less space for the two of them, but still they wove their tale in the form of a true television series slowly and persistently. And we could all only wish that everything would go well for them and that the story would never end. We knew them better and better, we loved them and missed them if they retreated somewhere. Or went somewhere nice, for a pie (My Mother’s Pie) to Mala galerija or for a coffee to Bled, from where they sent a postcard (Greetings from Bled). In the autumn Zvezda went to do the washing and hang and iron Odeon’s shirts at Mestna galerija (Stereotype exhibition), even though that was the first City of Women festival. Then they set off for Budapest together (The Collection of the P.A.R.A.S.I.T.E. Museum: Slovene Art of the 1990s), and then there was goulash and cake at the end of the year at Galerija Anonimusto honour the successfully completed year of Urbanaria. Soon after they helped visitors at Moderna galerija to draw in missing pairs of objects on the wall, advising them how to hang Petra’s drawing, which they got in return, in the right spot at home.

Fifth presentation venue (1995–2000): Then Petra made guest appearances in the world and media space: in international shows in Trieste, Graz, Novigrad, Bochum, Venice, Lisbon and Sao Paolo, and then in France, Mongolia and China. Similarly her likeable figures travelled across the media space (from Razgledi, Ciciban and Ars Vivendi to Dnevnik, Republika and Delo), we found them on book covers, city notice boards, in shop windows, on bags, t-shirts, hankies, cups and record sleeves, and they also found their bearings in the form of a web puzzle (dominoes) as part of the Internet Portfolio project. While at the same time Petra slowly began to step out of the wider public arena and her images unnoticeably moved into the flats of her friends and acquaintances, as well as totally unknown visitors who took a part in the game of dominoes (Commonplace). Depicted in the game were the signs, actually elements of everyday life, which is more of a private thing, one day after another, errand after errand, without any special traces or excesses. That is when Petra also got the opportunity to decorate a private apartment with large wallpapers and wall paintings. A step into the intimate were also the portraits, at first on the walls of a gallery and soon after that in the homes of those depicted.

Sixth presentation venue (2000–2003): gallery of portraits (Portraits – Galerija Equrna, Galerija sodobne umetnosti Celje, Galerija Loža). Petra produced about two hundred small scale paintings, this time family portraits of friends and acquaintances, from memory or photographs. In doing so, the computer was of great assistance to her. The portraits were schematized and universal, almost without personal traits, so that many a visitor could recognise themselves in the depictions. Some were happy, they photographed themselves and stuck their photo portrait into Petra’s album. Some asked her to do a new one.

Seventh presentation venue (now): Seven is a lucky number. A light studio in which, using simple, classical means (graphite pencil and coloured pencils), Petra endeavours to entice an image from the paper, which already embodies spatial dimensions. She wants the drawing to shine in itself, like the image on a screen, and does not want to have to use any technical or narrative additions or ornamentation. Sometimes only glass which steals in between the gaze and the image, at the same time illuminating and dimming it. Portraits for the third time, differently again, can also be large scale, with a self-portrait in the middle, and around there are daughter, friends, acquaintances, whom she has tried to depict like figures from magazine covers and so show that the difference is elsewhere, not in the face itself, but in the power of the image. Some are the so-called sewn portraits, sewn nudes which she presented for the first time in her open studio in 2005 together with Eduard Lesjak, who was the first to add abstract lines sewn in with a sewing machine to her pencil drawings printed on canvas. From then on Petra sews as well, on canvas or paper, to add emphasis or depth to the drawing. She sews using a sewing machine now as well. The hand stitched Gobelin tapestries (Zvezda and Odeon) or the digitally stitched outlines of faces (family portraits of friends) that she used to make were tests which she was not totally happy with. The sewing machine on the other hand is quick and reliable, it functions like a decisive extension of the hand, and the line it sews seems surprisingly self-confident to Petra. Now there is no longer a story in its immediacy, the technological procedure is also less visible – all her effort is directed towards the drawing itself, which she transfers onto transparent paper. And sometimes she attaches the drawings one after another in several layers between two glass surfaces.

STRATEGY – REALISATION
An image is drawn: as clear and pure as a letter.

When I say that Petra is a pop artist I am more talking about the effect rather than the content of her artworks: about how popular she has become and how ubiquitous her protagonists became and her drawing recognisable. It is also difficult to overlook certain connections to sources of pop art. Formally there are quite a few points of contact: repetition, stylisation, contour drawing, variations based on colour differentiation, inclusion of popular (ready-made) materials and procedures of popular culture, mass production, advertising strategies and design approaches.

Petra materialises the intimate/private life and public activities/art practice with a perpetual “portrait-making” of those close to her. In this way she often plays with a relaxed and controlled gesture, coincidence and a meticulously prepared plan, improvisation and programme. She does not subvert art’s authority in doing so, but rather offers her work to the gaze, to enjoyment, if you want. She does not comment, analyse, criticize, she does not resist …

Intense artistic planning, concentration of projects in time and space, and permanent heroes were probably the most obvious heralds of an increasing popularity. Whereas the hit strategy was conceived on the relationship between the private and the public, on the continuing story and on these visual, communicative and aesthetic approaches and procedures:

CLARITY/SYSTEM OF SIGNS

Petra draws her intimate world and in so doing blurs her personal touch, simplifies, typifies. The schematisation of figures is based on the deduction of information, a relaxed drawing, an unbroken outline, gestural features, emphasised line, flatness and clear basic contours. Stencils, patterns, repetition, variations, combinations. Images and words both in their own way convey the same. All this makes it easier to recognise and remember. With a reduction to the basic features, figures and objects have become visual signs and image-making elements of a sturdy visual composition. Such a pictographic method is characteristic of Petra’s oeuvre, including her latest drawings. The system of signs has been adapted to the dynamic of urban life, selective interest and superficiality, flightiness as it were. In reality the effects are such that it is simple, easy to just see something because the means of expression are reduced to a minimum, often only to a closed line in a black and white technique. But in actuality the simple means in art should not be equated with a simplicity of expression. The question is, let us say, how simple is it to draw a desired image in one swing/outline, so to say. Before that final piece/artwork there is a whole range of tryouts, versions, alternatives, and from the arsenal of that which is available, the artist then selects the one that is “right”, right for her. And we as visitors, observers never know what the process is behind it all, everything that leads to the drawing, which diverts our attention from the conditions of its production with its appeal and has the ability to enchant so easily.

RECOGNISABILITY

Petra’s projects have been conceived on stereotype, on relationships among recognisable figures and heroes, on an exuberant joy and everyday problems. The tale and its heroes were literally on everyone’s eyes, and very quickly became an indispensable part of urban life, they suited the environment while poked out at the same time, they stood out just as privacy always deviates from the public image. With a great concentration of projects and events, and regular appearances and presentations, Petra confirmed her presence in selected spots in the city over and over again. She left signs and traces. We easily recognised the figures from her own world. And even more, with time we no longer doubted as to their actual existence.

PICTURESQUENESS/DECORATIVENESS

Petra builds the relationship between the figures and the background clearly and recognisably. Her original picturesqueness and rhythmic arrangement of simple forms, shiny colours, patterned materials and almost arabesque pictorial signs form a visual frame of the story and image. The background is patterned through repetition and multiplication, the image in the middle of the city’s hustle and bustle produces the effect of clarity and order, which conveys a sense of peace and releases an aesthetic effect. At the start there is a bold black and white outline of the figure, into which the artist likes to later insert decorative patterns and materials. The paintings have become objects that together with the painted walls or patterned wallpapers form the ambience. Petra includes everyday objects into her ambiences, like for example a bright red sofa, and a large red fridge with pie and refreshing drinks. The installation of the paintings and objects in a horizontal line or a circular composition again bears witness to the rationally constructed visual tale, geometrically defined and balanced composition. And this gives the viewer a feeling of solidity as well as comfort. There is comfort in recognising the story through memorial images and personal experiences, as well as in recognising the systems of criteria and relations that have taken root in man through history.

REPRODUCIBILITY

In her work Petra uses the most diverse reproduction techniques. At first that was lithography, which suited her most as a painter. Then she began to transfer her drawings onto photocopies. The artist often conceived the possibilities offered by the photocopying machine (enlargement, multiplication …) and combining parts into a large poster-drawing as a presentation in non-gallery spaces – in the open where interaction with the (coincidental) passer-by occurs. This is where her projects were subjected to unavoidable changes and gradual deterioration by which they came close to an artistic campaign, a contemporary urban ritual.

Printing has a communicative, democratising and popularising role among the widest audience. But for Petra printing was, regardless of whether it was photocopy printing, classical printmaking, screen-printing or computer printing, also that interface, with the help of which she concealed her personal stroke (and story), she offered it to the audience in mediated form and included it into a wider and cultural context.

COMMUNICATIVENESS

The desire for a gaze, dialogue, response, gesture, sound or word held an important position in Petra’s creative process. Petra dealt with the question of how to present herself or appear and make a contact with the audience, the professional and the coincidental one, and how to sustain a dialogue with the viewer, in different ways. The likeable figures that we met were her representatives, while at the same time she often gave out lovely gifts to visitors and delighted them with small surprises, or she included them in her project actively and implicated them in the game.

In the urban environment, in the open, the intimate story is pieced together out of small parts of actual relations and collective accessories; through fragments in different locations, with permanent heroes and live accompanying events, Petra’s projects became part of the everyday, their heroes addressed passers-by, whereas Zvezda and Odeon in particular became two popular Ljubljana locals.

NARRATIVE/STORY

The story was always there, it wove itself among the heroes/heroines in the same image, be it a lady and her dog on their daily walk, a proud girl in front of a sports plane, a family on an outing, or a man and woman in a love affair. Or the story weaved itself slowly and persistently, from one scene into another, from one venue into another, between the figures and the background, between the image and the event, the protagonists and the audience, between those depicted and the artist.

But it can also begin otherwise, on the level of a study-based everyday and a practical experimenting in graphic techniques, where a creative friendship is woven and two stories are drawn at the same time apart and together. Photographs show Petra and Zora in the printmaking studio at the academy, at a painting colony, at a joint exhibition at Bežigrajska galerija and elsewhere, also in the temporary studio at Metelkova. Then there is Petra and Maja and their joint city calendar that addresses the people of Ljubljana, newcomers and visitors. And guest collaborators, musicians, actors, poets, Mojca and Goro, Primož, Miklavž, Roza, Pikalo ... All year the story is woven of the city and its citizens, space and time. Images of family entanglements from a personal story build cultural patters and with imagination reach into everyday life of everyman. But Petra’s images also tell us about the importance of respective conditions, friendships and acquaintances, as well as physical and symbolic spaces, real relationships and imaginary relations/desires.

Petra has shown the relationship between the private and the public, the individual and the collective through a visual language in a playful and mischievous manner. For fun and enjoyment. The story was personal, without any great theme, full of intimate innuendoes, but also family and social situations. In brief, a love story. About which stories and songs were written. About differences and similarities, closeness and kinship, small mistakes and fateful decisions, lost opportunities and forgotten moments.

Technological treatment procedures and image transfer produced a membrane, a distance which concealed the artist’s stroke. But now – in her latest images – it is as if the story condensed into the face. These are rare places in rare times. The face is a story. An image in pure presence, without travesty and media manipulation. A line drawing and colour field. A stain. And at the end, a tale about the drawing, about the artistic process, creative solitude.

PROCESS/VARIATIONS

Petra’s artworks are the storytellers, they can be the process or the final product. They are a poetic language and a (colour) substance of expressivity, a trace of discovery and invention and at the same time her statement. Small (un)intentional changes that occur in the working process itself, very frequently lead to the concept of variation – the concept that Edvard Munch for example attributed with great significance, so that he classed variation as a fundamental creative principle. And doing so, regardless of whether what happens is trial, play, combining, or else planning, rational conceptualisation. Petra’s individual images present diverse approaches, permutations, they are literally creative gestures and drawing skill, visualisations of thought processes and everyday preoccupations. Over and over again, and incessantly possibilities are being opened for continued development of experimental and creative thought – construction of combinatorial systems. We read the images through the differences – the differences between them and the deviance from the expected scheme. Our gaze slides across the pictorial plane, it strays from one image to another, stops – we notice the unrepeatable use of repetition as a support to the subtle diversity, we search for similarities and differences, we compare, construct systems.

In such a way the images bring us to a different understanding of the functions of art practice: to art as experience, process, as (life’s) current without a final product. To the experience that is tied together by a continuity of thought and experiment: methods of composition and construction, relations and size, surface plane and line, point and stain, colour and format, stroke and structure ... While the process in itself is the content, a surprising balance and cohesion, a game of chance, intertwining of differences, opposites and similarities – bearers of ethical principles and aesthetic effect.

Barbara Borčić, 2008

First published in Zora Stančič & Petra Varl " The Past Twenty Years" (pp. 80 – 143). Ljubljana: Mglc