Legal battle against political abuse of art: interview with Maja Smrekar

Maja Smrekar, K-9_Topology: Autoportrait, Photo: Anze Sekelj and Hana Jošić

Maja Smrekar’s acclaimed K-9_topology series has, for over a decade, explored the entangled kinship between humans, dogs, and technology through a deeply embodied eco-feminist lens. Her work has gained international recognition, but in recent months it has also been severely misused in a far-right political campaign, exposing the vulnerability of artists when their practice is appropriated for ideological battles. In this interview, Smrekar reflects on the broader context of her artistic research, the challenges posed by political abuse of art, and the need to build collective resilience against censorship. These pressing issues will be addressed on 11 September in Ljubljana, Slovenia, at the 2025 conference Taboo – Transgression – Transcendence in Art & Science (TTT).

Ewen Chardronnet : Could you recontextualise the origin of this research on the co-evolution of humans and dogs, humans and wolves, how did you start 10 years ago?

Maja Smrekar: Back in 2013, I was talking with my producers at Kapelica Gallery about what direction I should take next. We had been working together for a few years already, but at a certain point, I didn’t really know where to go from there. This is when curator, Jurij Krpan, asked me a very simple but powerful question: What is the one topic that never stops pulling you in?
And without thinking too much, I said: dogs. I’ve always been fascinated by them—especially by their relationship with humans. I kept wondering: when did this bond begin? Why did they stay with us? Why did they allow us to shape them the way we did? And why do they always seem so grateful, so loving, and so willing to collaborate with us?

So we decided: okay, let’s work on that. But I felt I needed to start at the very beginning—with the history of domestication. How, why, where, and when did it actually happen? Since dogs come from the wolf—I wanted to firstly talk to people who study wolf ecology. Eventually, I connected with the biologist Miha Krofel from the University of Ljubljana, who specialized in wolves and other large carnivores. At the time, he was involved in a big project called LIFE WolfAlps EU, focused on coordinated wolf conservation. I ended up spending almost a year with him, following his work.

The project itself lasted several years and aimed to regulate wolf populations in Slovenia. It brought together everyone who has to deal with wolves—hunters, livestock farmers, dog breeders, shepherds. Before that, wolf numbers had only been estimated in very rough ways: a hunter might spot a pack here, another a lone wolf there, and based on that they’d say something like, well, we probably have 80 to 100 wolves, let’s kill 15 this year. The LIFE project changed that by introducing a rigorous, systematic count, which then informed legal decisions about culling.

I joined the biologist on many of his trips through the Slovenian wilderness. He was constantly on the move, checking tracking devices, collecting wolf scat to study DNA, and mapping out family lines. I was fascinated by the whole methodology of population tracking. I’d spend time in the car while he disappeared into the forest, wearing special clothes he kept hidden there for weeks so the wolves wouldn’t catch his scent.

Those long drives became my chance to ask endless questions. Since he didn’t have much spare time, the car became my classroom. I would interview him about everything—wolf ecology, taxonomy, biology, behavior. Then I’d go home, read more of his recommended literature, and come back with new questions. It was almost like having my own private seminar on wolves for nearly a year.

EC: And you were asking about wolf-human relations?

MS: Yes, but I wasn’t only asking scientific questions. I was also curious about the cultural, humanistic side. For example, I asked him why the wolf is always the villain in fairy tales—like Little Red Riding Hood. We also talked about the mythology of werewolves, and how wolves, like eagles, owls, snakes, rats, spiders or tigers, belong to that group of “charismatic animals” we either fear or revere. He told me something fascinating: he had never encountered any reliable scientific or historical record of wolves killing and eating a living human, except in extremely rare cases of sick or abnormal animals. But he did point to many medieval texts describing wolves and bears feeding on human corpses during pandemics and plagues. In those times, when sanitation protocols didn’t exist, bodies were often discarded outside city walls. Wolves, being both hunters and scavengers, would feed on them. The sight must have been horrific, and that collective memory likely shaped the image of the wolf as a dangerous, almost demonic creature in human culture.

These conversations, blending science with cultural history, were incredibly enriching for me. I was reading a lot about the parallel evolution of humans and wolves at the time, so every discussion opened up new layers of understanding. It wasn’t just about biology—it was about mythology, fear, kinship, and the long, entangled history of our two species.

EC: You could also relate this to your personal story?

MS: I first came to this subject from a sentimental place. I grew up as an only child in a family that bred dogs, so for me “family” always meant living with many of them. My earliest memories are full of dogs, and my emotional connection to them was very strong. But I never really knew why this bond between humans and dogs was so deep—or how it went all the way back to humans and wolves cohabiting 35 to 40,000 years ago, long before the agricultural revolution, when humans were still nomadic.

Researching this was fascinating, especially learning that it wasn’t humans who colonized wolves, but rather wolves who came to us. Human groups would throw away scraps—mostly bones and leftovers that weren’t edible to them. For wolves, whose entire survival strategy is based on conserving energy, this was a perfect opportunity. Their ecology is about investing the least energy possible, which is why they usually hunt weak or sick prey, stabilizing the ecosystem in the process. So of course, they would take the food that humans discarded—it was the most efficient survival strategy.

Fast forward thousands of years, to about 12,000 years ago, when the agricultural revolution began in different parts of the world. Some wolves stayed close to human settlements, living on the edge of villages while still keeping the structure of wolf pack dynamics—their incredible sense of smell, hearing, and vision meant they became early-warning systems for danger. Over time, this changed humans too. Gradually, our bodies began to produce less adrenaline and cortisol—the hormones of stress and threat—because wolves were taking over that role of protection. In parallel, humans started producing more refined levels of serotonin, the hormone that supports tolerance and social cohesion.

This shift freed up energy for humans as well: instead of being constantly on alert for predators, they could invest more attention in agriculture, and eventually in culture—developing art, rituals, and technologies. In a way, the presence of wolves co-created the conditions for human civilization to flourish. Slowly, over many generations, some wolves never went back to the wilderness. They remained at the margins of human settlements, and through this long cohabitation, they became dogs.

And eventually dogs themselves began to adapt to us. They discovered that by making their eyes look larger and their bodies less threatening, they received not just food, but also affection. Humans welcomed them into homes, into beds, into the intimacy of everyday life. This mutual gaze and closeness raised oxytocin levels in both species—the hormone of bonding and love. That’s where this extraordinary reciprocity comes from. Dogs give us love because we give it to them, and this exchange has become biologically embedded in both species.

So what really struck me is that dogs and humans co-evolved together. We didn’t just domesticate them—they also domesticated us. Living side by side created a kind of mutual selection pressure that shaped our biology, our emotions, even our culture. That’s why I often say: no matter what cultural hierarchies claim, in a very real sense, we are equals.

EC: It was also around this time that you developed the Ecce Canis project on the co-evolution of serotonin between humans and wolves, consisting of an olfactory installation that the public could experience at the bottom of a cornucopia-shape environment covered in fur, evoking the caves where humans lived at the beginning of the relationship between wolves and humans. At the time I was working as a curator at the Antre Peaux in Bourges and I wanted to work on an anniversary project of the Kapelica Gallery, and Jurij Krpan told me about your work. Shortly before that, we had met Jean-Philippe Varin from Jacana Wild Life Studios in the Sologne forest near Bourges, a zoologist, wildlife photographer and renowned animal trainer for the cinema, who had worked on Jean-Jacques Annaud’s The Bear, the deers of Hannibal Lecter, or on Harry Potter’s snowy owl and eagle-owls, among others. Varin, who has since passed away, was nearing the end of his career and wanted to work locally with us, so I told him about your work and ideas and he agreed wholeheartedly with what you just said about the co-evolution of humans and wolves, even mentioning the special role of women in this process during the cave era. He was enthusiastic and even told me that your ideas reminded him of when he worked with packs of wolves for video clips of french pop singer Mylene Farmer. The idea of inviting you to work with him then emerged. And you came in residency to prepare an exbibition and performance at the Bandits-Mages Festival 2014 in Antre Peaux.

MS: Thank you so much for making that possible! Coming to Jacana Wildlife Studios felt like arriving home. We worked hard there, but I was so happy, probably full of oxytocin (laugh). What struck me most was being surrounded by animal ethologists, people who truly know how to communicate with other living beings. We came to work with wolves and wolf-dogs, but Jean Philippe showed us—sometimes in person, sometimes on video—that you can actually communicate with any form of life. Not just with the big, charismatic animals like tigers or bears, but also with bees, with birds even while they’re still inside their eggs, with worms, fungi, bacteria. Communication can happen through behavior, through food, through light, through vibrations and frequencies—it’s about tuning into the right channel.

I had already understood, in some way, that human language is a system, an institution. It helps us enormously, but it can also trap us inside our own expressions. With other living beings, you first have to learn their language—their behavior, their biology, because everything is connected. Behavior is always tied to physiology, to biology, even to technology, which is of course true for humans as well. This way of seeing the world has helped me so much when communicating with people. Sometimes, when I don’t understand someone, or when I find myself lost in a group, I pause and simply observe. I ask: what is their language? How are they communicating, and why? Then I try to meet them there, to speak in their terms, if it’s possible. And – that’s also ethology.

So the time I spent at Jacana was not only invaluable for my project—it was deeply important for me as a person. I grew there, I learned something essential. That’s why, whenever I talk about this project, especially about the preparations, I always return to that experience. Because it wasn’t only research; it was a lesson in how to live and how to connect with the other.

EC: Can you describe your first encounter with the pack?

MS: I arrived with a certain confidence about communicating with the pack of canines. I thought: well, I know dogs, this won’t be a problem. But of course, I quickly discovered that even though their DNA is almost identical, wolves are not dogs—they are something else entirely. When we first met with the wranglers—Jean Philippe, Véronique Gérault, and Christophe Gaudry—they explained the chain of command, the ways of communication, how we would approach the animals. And honestly, at that moment, I thought to myself: yes, I know this already. But when I actually stepped into that enormous enclosed space with two wolves and three wolf-dogs, I realized I knew nothing.

The largest one leapt at me immediately, pinned me to the wall, and nipped me on the cheek. It wasn’t aggressive—he bit very gently—but it was so fast, and I was terrified. I didn’t show it outwardly, but of course they felt it, because instantly the whole pack withdrew. And that’s when the wranglers explained something crucial: it’s not enough to hide fear, you have to not feel it. Because the pack doesn’t respond to fear with attack—it’s not about danger—it’s about energy. Nervousness, insecurity, tension: they simply don’t want that energy in their pack. They won’t attack you, they’ll just exclude you. And I thought: how wise. What a lesson for life.

So the wranglers encouraged me to claim the space in a calm, relaxed way. To walk into the center, to settle myself, to be still but grounded. Slowly, the animals became curious again. They began to test me—brushing past me, bumping into me lightly, circling me. Not aggressively, but persistently, to see whether I would lose my calm. My task was simply to stay steady, to hold the space without resistance or nervousness. And at some point I realized: I have to trust the wranglers completely. They were my translators, between me as the newcomer and the animals who lived by an entirely different set of rules. So I surrendered to their guidance.

Véronique then told me to kneel on the ground. She explained that the alpha female’s acceptance would be decisive—the whole pack would follow her lead. And indeed, it was the alpha female who came forward, took my hand gently in her muzzle, and led me to the center. This was the moment the wranglers had prepared me for: I was told to stay low, to look the others in the eye—but never the alpha male, because my gaze could mean a challenge to him. So I met the eyes of the others, and one by one they approached. Soon, they were licking my face, circling, brushing their bodies against me. They never stopped moving—it was so different from dogs, who might eventually settle down into calmness or cuddle. The wolves and wolf-dogs remained in motion, but their movements were full of touch, contact, curiosity, inclusion. And I had to reciprocate, to respond to their generosity with my own. I felt incredibly privileged to be accepted.

It was such a profound lesson: that true calmness is a language in itself. A state of being. And that nonverbal communication—being together in silence, in trust with another species—was extraordinary.

From there, we began rehearsing the performance. The wranglers were very serious about preparing the animals, ensuring they would feel at ease in another space, in front of 200 people. My role in the performance, I decided, was to become a landscape. I wanted the animals to carry the action, while I remained still, as a surface, a presence. Of course, there were references—Beuys, Kulik—artists who had performed with canines. But I felt my position was different. Beuys had used the coyote as a metaphor; Kulik had embodied the dog itself – as a symbol. For me, in 2014, it felt essential to approach it from a posthuman perspective—not as metaphor or paraphrase, but as coexistence. The human and the animal on the same level, both part of nature, both entangled in culture, in biology, and history.

So I wanted the wolves and wolf-dogs to eat directly off me—food made from starch and meat, reflecting our co-evolutionary pressures of digestion (dogs digest starch, not wolves, ed.). But of course, to make this possible, we had to rehearse carefully. In a pack, food can trigger tension, even conflict. The wranglers worked tirelessly to ensure the animals were relaxed, to curate the situation, to make sure no fights broke out. And I had to be consistently kind, consistently trusting and calm, while they ate from my body.

What mattered most was trust. If they didn’t trust me, they wouldn’t stay with me on stage, especially not under the eyes of 200 people only meters away. But because of the preparations, wranglers’ care and the animals’ willingness, it became possible. And for me, it was not just a performance. It was a lesson in calmness, in generosity and trust.

Maja Smrekar, performance “I hunt nature and culture hunts me”: making-of at Jacana Wildlife Studios (Philippe Zunino & Ewen Chardronnet, 12’45”):

EC: Another important factor was the context in which the work and discussions with Jean Philippe took place. He belonged to an older generation of filmmakers and, during the process, he often mentioned the criticism he was currently receiving for his methods. On the one hand, more and more filmmakers were using digital special effects to create animals, and he complained that it looked so fake and that actors and directors were no longer building real relationships with animals during filming. He felt that working with real animals required specific skills and dialogue, which disappeared when everything was digital. On the other hand, he was also criticised by some animal welfare organisations, which considered the methods of his generation to be exploitative, both in his films and in his workplace, which functioned in part as a zoo. At the time, he was under intense media pressure regarding animal welfare, and I remember questioning certain practices, such as placing beepers on birds’ eggs, as you mentioned earlier. I remember hearing his frustration with this new wave of criticism at the end of his career, directed at both his work and his workplace. Yet at the same time, his knowledge and close relationships with so many species were truly impressive, and I was in awe of that. I think in a way this project allowed him to rise above the controversies; I think he enjoyed collaborating with you because you were genuinely committed to the animals, not just interested in capturing an image. For him, it was important to show, at the end of his career, that he valued communication with animals, as well as the care, love and knowledge that can only be acquired through direct contact, and not just through conceptual ideas about human-animal relationships. I think this was a key element of Jean Philippe’s commitment to the project. How do you address the issues he may have faced in your artistic strategy?

MS: Working with Jean Philippe and his team of wranglers taught me a great deal —precisely because his approach was rooted in direct contact. No matter which dogs are my companions at a given time, we always engage in what we call training. Because this is where a real bond is formed, much deeper than when we are just taking a walk. Taking a walk is beautiful, of course, but when you work with a dog—when you train to communicate with each other – learn a sport together—that’s when the dog and the human truly feel part of the same pack, and that’s when communication becomes much more profound. It’s not just about commands, or learning new skills and tricks, but about discovering each other. Both humans and dogs are about community—we like to be together, we like to cooperate. It’s simply what we are – social animals. Donna Haraway has written the bible on this in When Species Meet.

When I had the immense privilege of working with an ethologist—someone who was not merely preparing animals for film and performance, but who carried a profound, practical knowledge of animal behavior —I realized this was something I wanted to keep exploring in my work: these parallel evolutions and shared histories with other species. I also understood that if I was to continue collaborating with animals—as I later did, not only in K-9_topology—it would always have to be in collaboration with professionals. I would describe what I sought to achieve artistically, and they would define what was possible—always within the framework of the well-being of both human and animal. Later, when working with different canine collaborators, we always began with a period of simply getting to know one another, and only then, we decided together whether we were truly a good match. Nothing was ever forced.

Maja Smrekar, “I hunt nature and culture hunts me”, performance at Bandits-Mages festival, Antre Peaux, Bourges (Fr), 2014, with the wolves: Chaar’ey Charushila, Black Pearl, Hu’nass, Ankhara; voix: David Legrand; film: Philippe Zunino:

EC: By organising the performance we knew in Bourges there was a provocative dimension to it, for a so-called “mature audience”. Even Jean Philippe knew there was, but he was never having any problem, and even saying it was making a lot of sense, knowing your statement on co-evolution. Do you think what happened recently is because people have prejudices when it is in the realm of contemporary performance art, as it triggers some taboos because it requires engagement, and doesn’t remain on a theoretical level, or at distance in a film or a video clip? I mean, this led these extreme right politicians, with zero consideration for your private life, to just instrumentalize some of the images, in a populist manner, as a weapon to trigger reactionary voters.

MS: What has happened recently is nothing less than a reflection of the current Zeitgeist. Society is in regression—we all see it, feel it, know it. The right is thriving, becoming increasingly aggressive, while conservative ideas steadily creep into everyday life. In many countries, abortion rights once thought secure must be fought for again. Censorship and conservatism are resurfacing even in the art field, where moralism pours through, disguised as a return to “roots” or folklore—often just masked nationalism—or dressed up as seductive technology with no real depth behind it. Even ecology has become an overused and abused term – too often reduced to little more than greenwashing.

What troubles me most about the rising tide of the far right was revealed in my own local case —by how timidly the cultural scene responded to the referendum campaign on pension reforms for awarded artists. In February, Slovenia’s right-wing SDS party, currently in opposition, escalated its long-standing culture war, branding contemporary art as “degenerate” and weaponizing my work to fuel moral panic. They stole a picture of my photo performance, altered it, stamped it with their logo, and turned it into a propaganda poster, conveying a message entirely opposed to my artistic and personal beliefs. For more than five weeks, these posters were displayed daily at booths across the country, while right-wing members of the parliament relentlessly amplified them on social media. It was brutal.

Meanwhile, the media presented my name and work in distorted ways. Television repeatedly showed the propaganda poster in debates, often alongside insults, straight lies and without context. On social media, I faced threats, waves of offensive comments, ridicule, misogyny, and outright hatred. I received threatening emails and phone calls late at night, even my mother received humiliating texts. Journalists contacted me repeatedly without consent, often invasively. In the neighboring street, a protester shouted into a microphone, calling me a “bitch.” Graffiti appeared in the city stating opposition to “dog breastfeeding,” and on election day, the Catholic Church in collaboration with the right-wing party displayed posters in front of churches depicting elderly citizens suggesting that their pensions would “surely be higher” if they had “breastfed a dog” instead of working hard. People consequently began recognizing me everywhere—on the street, in shops, at the post office. This constant exposure, combined with the saturated atmosphere of hatred, created a profound sense of lost control and security. Even everyday tasks became exhausting, leading to chronic fatigue.

During these months, I did receive a few private messages and calls of sympathy from colleagues —but while kindness existed behind closed doors, in the public space where the attacks were taking place, compassion was almost completely absent. There were exceptions: a few individuals spoke out publicly, and institutions like the Academy of Fine Arts and Design issued letter of support, and 44 other cultural organizations issued a collective public letter. A few media outlets stood by me. But the attacks were highly organized, relentless, and carried out daily for three months—and in some forms, they continue even now.

In public space, the Minister of Culture was the only one that defended me loudly and consistently —and I am deeply grateful, but still, it was profoundly troubling to be a ping-pong ball between the left and the right while most of the cultural scene stayed silent which I don’t really understand.

This campaign was not about me—it was about humiliating art and culture, all of us. As cultural workers and artists, we are the first to defend fundamental civil rights through our work—freedom of speech —which we exercise in the public sphere. If—or when—the right wing comes to power again, it won’t only be a few that are always targeted. We will all be. These past months have been a chance to strengthen ourselves collectively for the struggles ahead, because there are no systemic platforms that protect us. We have only each other.

EC: Don’t you think that even the producers or curators, including us in Bourges, tend to take an image that is a little bit more provocative as a communication tool when bringing you to a festival?

MS: As professionals, we have to prioritize context above all, rather than fixating on what might be perceived as merely provocative. For me, provocation was always secondary in my work. Honestly, I never considered it particularly provocative —my reference points are the Russian avant-garde, the Vienna Actionists, and body art that had already been thoroughly explored by the turn of the millennium. In that perspective, I felt my work was just a drop in the ocean compared to what had already been done—and continues to be done—across many art fields.

I also think my work simply landed in the wrong place at the wrong time to become co-opted into a political PR strategy. The attack wasn’t because my work is so utterly provocative — but because it became useful in a very specific political context here in Slovenia, and similarly before the 2017 elections in Austria.

And furthermore, my concern is not whether the public dislikes my work —there will always be audiences who strongly agree or disagree—but when politics abuses art as a weapon. When a well-funded political machinery, backed by a network of right-wing media and followers, launches a coordinated attack on a single artist or artwork—dismissing it as “not art”—it undermines the legitimacy of the entire professional art field. Once art is taken out of context, altered, or misrepresented, political exaggeration becomes necessary—precisely because, it seems to me, the original work was never radical enough to sustain their narrative. This was particularly clear in Slovenia, where the rhetoric even invoked the zoophilic taboo—an extreme, deliberate distortion revealing just how far these misogynist narratives can be twisted and weaponized.

EC: Well, there is still a nakedness question, being naked with an animal, which seems taboo for them.

MS: (Laughs) In the end, it really comes down to people’s own biases —their personal issues that get triggered the moment they see someone – especially a woman – naked with an animal, without bothering to consider the context. Isn’t it striking that such a depiction can provoke outrage, yet the same people can drive past a billboard with a naked female body selling products, or watch images of massacred children in Gaza, Ukraine, or Sudan on the news, and feel almost nothing? That, to me, is what is truly perverted. But this whole situation also reflects the Zeitgeist: conservatism is on the rise everywhere, and it’s frightening how quickly it is being normalized. The female body is once again under attack—tolerated only when framed as a reproductive object. In my work I am always interested in the universal meanings a certain act can carry —especially now, at a time when the female body is increasingly being claimed by certain discourses as the property of the state, the law, or even the church.

Consider, for instance, the cradle myth of Ancient Rome —the cradle of humanism itself. Rome, as the story goes, was founded because a she-wolf nursed two abandoned infants who later built the city. In my work, I simply reversed the myth: instead of a wolf nurturing humans, a human nourishes a self-domesticated wolf. From there, other statements emerged: that nature will always outlast culture, and that the future may well belong to other living beings, even when humans bring about their own destruction.

The K-9_topology series was both universal and intimate. Of course, this came from a deeply personal place too —from my own emotional memory of growing up as an only child in a family where love was not much expressed, and where dogs became my true companions, my family. They gave me what I needed to survive psychologically —oxytocin, touch, love and presence. So in Hybrid Family, I wanted to claim this parallel evolution with dogs and wolves, the first animals to live alongside humans, thousands of years before horses or cats.

I also wanted to show that milk is not exclusively tied to pregnancy, the womb, or a “female” body. Milk can be produced by many kinds of bodies, including those identified as male, or those that don’t conform to binary definitions at all. In this sense, the project proposed an expansion of family structures—not as a rejection of the nuclear family, but as a way of opening it up, of extending its possibilities.

Later, in the fourth project —which became the final exclamation point of the entire series— I created what I call a molecular sculpture: not only in form, but in process, a sculpture of co-evolution. My intention was to symbolically return the DNA of human, wolf, and dog into the same ecological relationship they once shared, when all three species co-regulated their environment and maintained a natural equilibrium. Today, however, humans and dogs stand as the two most invasive species on the planet. Against this backdrop, the act of combining my oocyte with the fat cell of a dog—fully aware that the cell could not survive beyond a few days because of biological incompatibility —was conceived as a gesture of a temporary cohabitation on the molecular level.

This was an ecofeminist statement: a choice to use my reproductive material not for what conservative part of society expects of it, but as an artistic medium to imagine shared futures and relationships. And this is precisely where the problems began. Right-wing groups, unwilling to engage with these ideas, saw only an attack on the nuclear, white, heteronormative family. They refused to contextualize or acknowledge the extensive exhibitions, lectures, books, articles—even documentaries—that had already framed these works. Instead, they reduced the entire series to a single emblematic image, stripped of context, and weaponized it as a patriarchal warning about what art—especially when created by a woman—must not do, and what statements must not be made.

EC: There’s a full directive of the EU parliament voted last year about improving the professional status of artists in the European Union, saying we should, the cultural sector, work on harmonizing the artist status, because some countries have better status than others in the EU, etc. And it’s actually the year of implementation, because they voted in 2024. Yet, during the winter, when cultural organizations were overwhelmed with tight EU funding applications, another paradox became clear: while institutions were busy working within EU frameworks, the far right, unable to act on the EU level, was mobilizing attacks locally. How do you see this gap between EU-level promises and the realities artists face on the ground?

MS: It’s nice that the EU Parliament voted to improve the professional status of artists, but my experience shows that, in reality, there is no platform to protect artists from far-right campaigns utilizing them and their work for political propaganda—neither locally nor at the EU level. Similar attacks have targeted artists in Sweden, Poland, Hungary, Turkey, Slovakia, Croatia, Austria, and Slovenia, yet no one in the EU Parliament addresses this. We are left on our own, in a society fragmented into small interest groups, each chasing the next gig in order to survive.

The situation you mentioned also reveals how many individuals and institutions —both governmental and nongovernmental—are forced to compromise constantly, constrained by EU rules, global capitalism, and underlying conservative ideologies. This was particularly evident in the fragmentation of the scene before the referendum: some criticized the government’s proposed new criteria for artists’ pensions because they excluded certain important fields, even though the criteria would be revised and updated every five years. While the referendum ostensibly concerned these criteria, it was in reality about disciplining leftist politics by smearing the cultural scene as a whole. Many others hesitated to participate at all, following the coalition’s call to ignore the vote entirely. Ironically, the entire referendum campaign unfolded while many were fully absorbed in EU applications, seemingly oblivious—or deliberately oblivious—to what was happening locally.

In any case, all kinds of compromises inevitably result in self-censorship. I believe compromise is not an option. What we must do is confront the system from within, united as a pack—a community—subverting it from the inside and resisting together.

EC: And it’s not the end of the story. Unfortunately for you this is going to be lasting for some time, as the justice procedure will take time. What should you say to the community that will receive this?

MS: The legal action will take at least five years, during which I expect to spend at least €12,000. If my lawyer were not working pro bono —we agreed that in case of success he would receive a percentage of the compensation— the costs would be about three times higher. This amount covers only court-related expenses: fees for the court appraiser and expert, and documentation costs, such as collecting and archiving more than 300 media publications mentioning me since February 20. In short, this will be a long and exhausting fight, but one I feel is my duty.

But not everything has been negative. After an article in The Guardian in May, I was contacted by a group of curators, theorists, and producers —among them you from France, Jens Hauser from Germany, Dalila Honorato from Greece, Tatiana Kourochkina from Spain, and later Uroš Veber from Slovenia and François Robin from France. You generously offered expertise and resources to help launch the online platform artkinship.org, through which we are now gathering signatures and donations for the lawsuit. Since then, individuals and art organizations have joined —contributing signatures, sharing newsletters, and donating— including Slovenian artists and institutions, as well as members of civil society. For this, I am deeply grateful, as it restores a sense of agency that is incredibly important in my situation. Through their response, parts of the cultural community showed that it can still unite and resist attempts to delegitimize artists and their work. At the same time, I understand it as an exercise to remain vigilant and connected, as such political pressures are often only the first step toward broader efforts to control and discipline culture—a reality that has become very evident to me.

This is why your solidarity in proposing the artkinship platform has been profoundly meaningful. It represents not only support for me as an individual, but also a clear stance against attempts to restrict artistic freedom and impose political pressure on the cultural sphere internationally. If I win the lawsuit and the SDS party is required to reimburse the court costs, I will donate those funds to an international platform supporting artists persecuted by autocratic governments. I will do the same if I raise more than what is needed for this case. I will also keep the public fully informed about all proceedings on the platform, because the fight for freedom of speech is essential.

Art has always been a vital force in shaping public debate—within politics and beyond. It provokes critical thought, and only through critical thought can society defend its most fundamental rights and freedoms: peace, security, dignity of the vulnerable. Art carries the power to ignite social change—and this is precisely what the far right fears most. Let’s use our power!

Sign the Open Letter

Donate at Artkinship.org

Join the debate at the 2025 conference Taboo-Transgression-Transcendence in Art & Science (Ljubjana, 9-13 Sept)

More on Maja Smrekar’s work