Lala Rascic was born in 1977 in Sarajevo, Bosnia & Herzegovina. She lives and works in Sarajevo and Zagreb.
Rascic's inquisitive research into audio drama and the installations she has gone on to develop out of this interest are both enthralling and refreshing. Although there are strong references to period style and found material, Rascic plays with the genre’s traditional roles and themes to invent new narrative threads and a contemporary angle from which to present the medium. Her personal participation in the stories she forms, or adopts, is paramount. The way Rascic imparts energy through her characters’ reincarnations and opens her installations to involve the audience, allows those viewing her work to feel that they are implicated in the narrative and part of a shared experience.
Rasic's installation “Sorry, Wrong Number” is an interpretation of a famous audio drama from the 40s. The audio track and the image only synchronize for brief moments and this seemingly technical mistake evokes the feeling of early black and white television broadcasting. When the image and sound occasionally sync-up the resulting coincidence seems uncanny, as it becomes evident that the distorted voices do in fact belong to the performer. This shifting in and out of synchronization comments on the impossibility of communication and refers to isolation. The same theme is present in the narrative of the radio play. The main story-line is about an invalid woman who spends all of her days in her room. Her only link to the outside world is her telephone. One night she gets the wrong connection and overhears the plan for a murder. While desperately trying to warn the police, she realizes that she has overheard the plan for her own murder. “Sorry, Wrong Number” was originally broadcast as part of the “Suspense” program on CBS in 1943. The part of Lenora Stevenson was played by Agnes Moorhead. The radio play had immense success. It ran on CBS until the 1960s and was adapted several times in Hollywood.
Rascic's solo exhibitions include Brighter Than a Thousand Suns, The Good Children Gallery, New Orleans (2011); Flags, Para_Site Gallery, Graz (2011); A View from the Outside - Reloaded, Sigmund Freud Museum, Vienna (2011); Videonale, Kunstmuseum Bonn (2011); D-0 ARK Undrerground, Konjic (2011); The Damned Dam, Jedinstvo, Zagreb (2010); 3 Damned Utopias: 3 narrative performances by Lala Rascic, Zvono, Sarajevo (2010); Individual Utopias, Museum of Contemporary Art of Vojvodina, Novi Sad and Zeta Art Gallery, Tirana (2010); Have a look, Have a Look!, FormContent, London (2010); Contemporary Photography, Bascarsija Nights Festival, Kursumli Medresa, Sarajevo (2010); Prospect 1.5, The Good Children Gallery, New Orleans (2010); Where Everything is Yet to Happen, SpaPort, Banja Luka (2010).
Lala Rascic works with ARC Projects,
Sofia and B.O.P. Gallery, Zagreb.
For additional information about this artist, visit Mutual Art
