PRISHTINË.- The National Gallery of Kosova announced the open call for the 15th edition of Muslim Mulliqi International Exhibition, titled RADICAL COPIES, curated by May Makki.
In 1979, the Prizren-born conceptual artist Goran Đorđević launched an international strike of the “art system.” Denouncing what he described as the artist's alienation from the conditions and products of artistic labor, he called on fellow artists—such as Marina Abramović, Hans Haacke, Lucy Lippard, and Sol LeWitt—to boycott the system for several months. Forty artists responded, and while some expressed curiosity or enthusiasm, most declined.
Following the failure of the strike, Đorđević developed a body of work that can be characterized as “radical copyism.” Rather than producing original works, he meticulously copied canonical artworks, interrogating the theoretical and aesthetic dimensions of authorship, originality, value, and the status of the artwork itself.
Drawing on this turn in his practice, RADICAL COPIES is an open call that revisits copying as a critical, aesthetic, and political practice. We invite artists, performers, publishers, researchers, and others to consider the copy in all its forms: as reproduction, reenactment, citation, duplication, bootleg, mimicry, preservation, translation, and refusal. What can a copy do that an original cannot? How might copying become a strategy for critique, collective authorship, and expanded circulation?
Alongside deliberate acts of copying, we are also interested in moments when formal resemblance emerges from radically different historical or material conditions. Consider, for instance, how a portrait by artist Feriha Rada, slashed when her gallery in Prizren was ransacked by the Serbian Forces in 1999, bears a formal resemblance to Lucio Fontana's celebrated Tagli (Cuts). Though the gesture appears nearly identical, its origins and consequences could not be more different. Such moments invite us to consider how formal echoes can illuminate the political conditions that separate one image from another as much as those that bring them together.
We welcome submissions across all media that engage with these questions and expand our understanding of the copy as a critical form.
RADICAL COPIES, scheduled to open in March 2027, will feature a selection of invited artists, alongside those selected via this open call. The call is extended to applications from artists based in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Kosova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, and Slovenia.
The artists selected via the open call will be eligible for the Muslim Mulliqi Award which will be granted by a jury of professionals.
Application deadline: September 15, 2026.
Submission requirements: CV, Artist statement or proposal, Portfolio (max. 15 pages).
Submit your application materials at info@galeriakombetare-rks.com.
The selected artists will be notified via e-mail by November 20.
