Independent Creative Art Spaces Leadership Training, Paris 2007

Name of your organisation: Zavod Pekarna magdalenske mreže

 

Website of your organization: www.pekarna.org

 

How is your organisation funded? Pekarna is non-profit private institutions. Our funding varies – it is partly self funded, some programmes are partly funded by Ministry of Culture and/or Municipality of Maribor, some programmes sometimes receive money from foundations.

 

Explain what your organisation is about (to somebody who does not know about it).

 

Pekarna Magdalenske Mreže was founded as an organisation for encouraging and supporting of the programmatic and project cooperation among individuals and groups conducting artistic, cultural, educational, research, ecological, informative and humanitarian activities as well as for granting assistance in solving on their short or long-term residential needs for creative spaces.

 

However, in past few years art production is far less than it should/could be and in order to increase it, Perkarna needs to find a new shape, new vision and new role and is looking for ways of transforming itself into more active.

 

Describe how your organisation is engaged in international cooperation and exchange.

 

Most common form of international cooperation is hosting foreign bands, predominantly from alternative scene and some guest visual artists. However, for the past year, Pekarna hosts a group of French artists ‘La Vitrine’ (http://www.la-vitrine.eu) as its pilot residency project.

 

The other form of international cooperation is exchange of ideas and EVS volunteers with some of the TEH members.

 

Describe how your art space relates to the local community. If you are about to open an art space, explain how you related to the local community in your previous experiences.

 

We have good relationship with local authority and some opinion leaders and/or city officials representing different communities, but we’re lagging behind with outreach programmes and consistent audience building, mainly due to lack of knowledge and resources.

 

Soon, gentrification of the area will present both new opportunity and threat, as local community is changing in its structure.

 

What are the major internal and external challenges your organisation is facing?

 

Internal:

• to find a new vision and definition, new role for Pekarna, both in scope of city, local community and as part of European Capital of Culture in 2012 (and beyond!)
• being understaffed / staff not competent enough
• re-organisation
• fund-raising
• maintenance and renovation of the complex
• ambiguity of legal status
• co-ordination of management of the complex with other inhabitants, that are not members of Pekarna Magdalenske Mreže

External:

• lack of City cultural policy
• lack of funding
• gentrification of the area
• ambiguity of legal status

What are the main achievements and strengths of your organisation?

 

To me, the main strength of Pekarna is that it (still!) believes in the guiding principles and idea(l)s of working not-for-profit, sharing, equality, supporting (alternative) arts and culture for the benefit of its creators and public.

 

Other strengths are, that it is only centre of its kind in north-east of Slovenia (the only other comparable centre is Metelkova in Ljubljana) and it’s position in Maribor – it is only cultural centre on the right bank of river Drava, that divides city in two halves.

 

But what I see as a major strength…it is heaps and heaps of its as of yet unused potential.

 

Main achievement…concerning the funding, political climate, its legal status I should probably say “sheer fact that it still exist.” But in reality,I am proud on some of the festivals that are going on, some of the wonderful venues that we keep in shape, I am proud that we keep trying to influence city’s cultural policy, that we support also the projects, that have no chance to be funded and that we can make a lot with a little money and a lot of good will.