61st Oktobarski salon: The Contingency of the Universe

61st Oktobarski salon: THE CONTINGENCY OF THE UNIVERSE

Exhibition period

From 7 to 13 November 2026.

• DOB//Gallery

Selected by the French curator Numa Hambursin, the exhibition features 27 local and international artists who will be presented to the public across five exhibition venues in Belgrade, including the Gallery of Dom omladine Belgrade.

For several decades, concepts historically inseparable from art—such as beauty, the sublime and the masterpiece—have been excluded from the vocabulary of contemporary creativity. Yet they still retain all their sharpness when it comes to conceiving works of art and what artists invest in them. Thinking about form is, in fact, a prerequisite for contemporary art that is at once accessible and demanding, capable of combining intellectual depth with visual intensity.

Beauty is far more than a mere fact perceived from the outside; it is an expression of projection, a will that resists our visual self-satisfaction and the transience of the moment. The sublime appears when words become powerless, at the very edge of what the imagination can still encompass.

A masterpiece is revealed over time, when a work proves indispensable and no single interpretation can exhaust its depth.

No one will find a definitive answer in these words. On the contrary, they trace lines of force that must be experienced. The uncertainty of their contours preserves their fertility and prompts each of us to form our own judgment. In this way they resonate with Hannah Arendt's definition of art as:

an immortal work that mortal hands can create and perform

compelling us to distinguish, among artworks, those that endure from those that fade.

Coming from different generations and backgrounds and working across a wide range of practices, the artists make the artwork a place where thought becomes presence. A view of the world is complete only through the form that conveys it. In that tension the artwork acquires its necessity, surpassing both commentary and mere visual effect. Amid the continual flow of images that are instantly replaced, it establishes a different kind of duration. It belongs to the present without being exhausted by it, aware of the history that precedes it and of what it can still convey. In this way, individuals can enter into dialogue without dissolving into the global language of contemporary art.

André Malraux phrased this demand as:

"Art is what makes man more than the contingency of the universe."

Aesthetics thus ceases to be merely a matter of decoration. It touches what saves existence from insignificance, contingency and mere necessity. This is not a nostalgic return to beauty, but an attempt to understand what in art frees us from mere chance.

If man is chance, art is what opposes that chance.

Beauty will never be the opposite of commitment. It is one of its most effective instruments. A work of art works when it gives an idea a form that discussion alone cannot create. Its power lies precisely in surpassing slogans and insults and in being rooted in the long term—in the sphere of memory. It reaches the part of us that argument cannot reach; it moves conviction from the domain of thought into the domain of experience. Art gives judgment time to mature and preserves the space in which those who think differently can still meet. Sensation and effect feed one another, so beauty is not an abstract conception floating above reality. It is an inexhaustible source of resistance, a horizon essential for transforming the world. Here in Belgrade, in October 2026, this conviction acquires a particular resonance.

The Gallery of Dom omladine brings together six artists originally from the former Yugoslavia whose artistic paths testify to the significant place this region occupies in the history of European art. Based in France, Filip Mirazović, Davor Vrankić, Brankica Žilović and Marko Velk have developed distinctive bodies of work while maintaining a deep connection to their place of origin. Two works by Dada and Vladimir Veličković, prominent figures in European artistic creation of the second half of the 20th century, situate this encounter in a broader historical context.

For this exhibition, the first four artists were invited to engage with the question of beauty through works specially conceived for this space. Filip Mirazović's paintings reassess notions of power and the violence of history. Davor Vrankić uses pencil to create fantastical worlds of exceptional precision, where imagination seems to shift the boundaries of reality. Brankica Žilović uses sewing and embroidery as tools to reflect on memory and territories. Marko Velk's charcoal drawings bring to life figures imbued with the memories and anxieties of the contemporary world. These artistic practices are united by the same aspiration: their meanings are not revealed at first glance but demand that the viewer pause and devote time to grasp their full significance.

Oktobarski salon is realized under the auspices of the Belgrade City Secretariat for Culture.