Iva Böhm

Born 1955 in Zagreb, Croatia.

Member of HZSU (Croatian Artists' Union)
Member of HDD (Croatian Designers' Association)
Professor of French and Comparative literature, University of Zagreb
M.A. in European Studies, Panthéon-Assas, Paris
Attended EnsAD - École nationale supérieure des Arts Décoratifs, Paris, France
Hubert Humphrey Fellowship, Penn State University, Violence, bullying and healing - art therapy.

Hector Mavridis Workshop, Thessaloniki, Greece

La Borne, Les Grands Feux

Exhibitions:
Gallery Nova
Kic Gallery
Automata Gallery
Underwater Surprise gallery near Babac Island, Adriatic Sea

Surprise Street Gallery, Trg žrtava fašizma, Zagreb 

Forest Surprise Spaces, mountain Sljeme
Orchestrated Surprise Gardens Zagreb, Vinkovićeva street 

Exhibiting in Croatia in turbulent times became irrelevant to me. I have chosen free open places accessible to everybody instead of galleries and museums or any other institutional places.
I started to show my work randomly in the streets, parks and outside the city in the fields, forests and under the sea. Objects of surprise with no value attached, ready even to be picked up by anybody. The interaction with the accidental observer carries the risk for the object to become stolen or broken, although not often, and the outcome of the encounter is sometimes a surprise itself. 

My activist act is a communicative performance with the purpose of raising awareness for the endless possibilities outside the institutional ones, for the free, natural spaces where the art can be encountered, stumbled upon, and where sudden interaction combined with the element of surprise brings people even not particularly interested in art, lonely walkers, accidental tourists, swimmers and divers, in touch with the creative expression. 

Last years I have created small ceramic areas in the sea near the Babac Island. The coordinates can be reached by mail.

Now, my work in ceramics expanded its itinerary in a free style back to established places. My ceramic become the uninvited, unwanted guest in the galleries and museums that invades the space, brings restlessness while questioning the sense of those spaces, changing the atmosphere in some zesty or even gloomy way.

That guest made of clay is weird, ugly or awesome and beautiful, many times hardly visible, other times an agent provocateur stirring quite a commotion. I usually take very small pieces inside official spaces, it makes the whole process easier. My work is not protected like the museum exhibits – we, people are no longer protected. In our lives now we are less protected than objects. 

Clay is our next body, when the soul will leave and travel some more.
The body of clay on the other hand has many advantages over our flesh - it has no pain, it heals after any break, it grows again in some form, it reborn after heavy beating, it hardens after spending some time in a  fire, it is always ready for surprises. 

Clay is my given grace and I am grateful for that love.