Simon Hudolin is the recipient of the prestigious 2017 OHO prize for emerging visual artists in Slovenia. Since 2004 he works with Mateja Rojc as the tandem ‘Small But Dangers‘. Their practice spreads through a wide variety of mostly analogue visual media.
“Most of our works represents a poetic gesture, where the conflict between the thought and the object cannot be resolved. This reveals the emancipatory potential of language; the possibility of a small individual to manipulate ideologically determined meanings within the frames of language.
In 2005 we stole the old damaged tourist photograph of Log pod Mangartom, which was hanging on the platform of the Škofja Loka railway station. Although the police caught us in the act, we managed to get the photograph and later exhibited it in a gallery. In time, people at Slovenian Railways forgot about it and the photograph became part of our art collection. The function of the photograph in the gallery remained similar to its function on the railway station. It covered a part of a wall. Of course, a variety of contents were persistently trying to stick onto it. They all derived from the unbridgeable conflict between the object and its possible meanings. The photograph aroused our interest because of the way it looks. Its deterioration looked like a provocative hole. It sparked a need to fill the gap. We consciously resisted that need. The Mangart project is the initiation of Small but Dangers – the initial gesture that continues to decisively mark our work.”
