Jože Slaček (SI)

Storytelling Platform
(stories of immigrants living in Maribor)
2014–16

The project has been gradually realized since 2014 and aims to act as a showcase for connecting, integrating, and enhancing contemporary cultural settings that have emerged with the surge of immigration. Members of various cultural and ethnic groups and minorities have always been present in Slovenia as well as Maribor. The storytelling platform includes stories of migrants from various parts of the world currently living in Maribor. The central goal of the project is to record, visually enhance, and present in a variety of ways the accounts of these storytellers – immigrants living in Maribor: the myths, legends, or folk stories from their respective homelands. Five storytellers are involved, all of whom have shared their stories either in their mother tongue, or in English or Slovene. The stories have been presented in workshops, where they were recorded (audio) and presented by means of various materials (puppets, collages, drawings, props) and also recorded in the form of short videos. In the immigrants' stories, the listener / viewer can experience archetypal themes and a connection with global universal myths, which is a step towards understanding different cultures. The project is innovative because it connects storytelling and the use of technology to present the stories: short stories as audio-records, radio broadcasts, (picture) books using AR codes, and animated films.

Jože Slaček, concept and visual design
Tanja Cvitko, editing and coordination of participating storytellers
Gregor Rojko, programming and technical implementation

Naključje 7 (Coincidence 7), Institute for Culture, performs programs and events in the wider creative field related to computer and media technologies – video, 3D, animation, computer or tabletop games and sound. The organization also performs programs connecting art and sciences, both social and natural.

Jože Slaček is a program coordinator, graphic designer, mentor, and author in the field of video, animation and multimedia. He was the initiator of the International Festival of Computer Arts (MFRU) in Maribor, and the first in Slovenia to regularly perform activities in the field of intermedia arts (since 1994), organizing lectures, exhibitions and festivals. He assists in creating productions and publishing books (Kiberfeminizem (Cyberfeminism), V drobovju računalnika (In the Guts of the Computer), Stelarc, Prihodnost računalniške umetnosti – 10 let MFRU (The Future of Computer Arts – 10 years of the MFRU Festival)). Slaček is also the concept leader and occasional selector for the MFRU festival (1995 – 2008). He participated in the production of the mfru hyperfilm and supervised the construction of the archive of the MFRU Festival. In 2009 he implemented the projects mfruTV – web TV, Prodajalna robotov (Robot Shop) and Virtualni organizmi (Virtual Organisms).He participates in the implementation of VR projects as an author and organizer: prostori in oblike (spaces and forms), hiperFasada (hyperFacade), Muzej robotov (Museum of Robots, in collaboration with Meta Kordiš and the Maribor Art Gallery), nanoUmetnost (nanoArt), and Kibernetično gledališče (Cyber Theater)).

Tanja Cvitko (1980), founder of a student theater group (2000), founder and president (2005–2009) of the Science Fiction Association Prizma, editor of 13 issues of the magazine Neskončnost (Infinity), organizer and moderator of literary evenings and multimedia presentations, head of PR for the association's projects (TV, radio and newspaper interviews), co-organizer and coordinator of the three-day sci-fi and fantasy festival Konfuzija (Sečovlje, 2007 and 2008), mentor of youth workshops, and president of the Association for Culture and Arts Zid na meji based in Kozjak near Ceršak (2011–2013).

Gregor Rojko (1980) has been actively engaged in the field of culture and graphic design for several years. He deals with graphic design (all types of printed materials) and print layout (magazines, books, posters, leaflets, ads, corporate visual images and identities). He obtained the National Vocational Qualification for website designer. He performs workshops and presentations of 3D printing in collaboration with the Youth Cultural Centre Maribor and the Cultural Incubator. In the field of computer sciences he works in video editing, photo processing and digital graphic image design.