From 3 December 2015 to 2 February 2016 the Jakopič Promenade in Ljubljana's Tivoli Park will be displaying the exhibition One Planet, One Water. The exhibition shows stories from all over the world, captured on film by travellers, photographers and humanitarians that care about the future of our planet. The poet Aleš Šteger also paid homage to water as he wrote a poem dedicated to the exhibition and this vitally important natural source. The exhibition is part of the project Water, developed by the Museum and Galleries of Ljubljana in collaboration with numerous partners (from 24 June 2015 to 8 May 2016 the City Museum of Ljubljana is also showing the exhibition titled Water) and it is the first commemoration of Ljubljana celebrating the title of European Green Capital 2016.

AUTHORS PRESENTED AT THE ONE PLANET, ONE WATER EXHIBITION
Versatile artist, Andrej Lupinc completed the Secondary School of Design, Ljubljana in 1980. In the 1980’s he studied film at Belgrade College of Film and Theatre, and served cameraman and director of photography at ŠKUC-Forum video production (later to become Forum Ljubljana). He is also one of the founding members of the band Laibach. At the time he was producing experimental videos titled Keller. His videos and documentary films include V 8. minutah okoli sveta, Kip, Odvrženi and Okus po hitrosti. Since 1982 he has been a cameraman at the Slovenian national television. In recent years he has been increasingly known as a poet and writer (Mala šola muharjenja, Umetne muhe in druge laži).

It was last summer that Marko Hutter, living in Ljubljana, already had his photographs exhibited at the Jakopič Promenade. Back then he presented a series made in Istanbul during the filming of the docu-fiction Mesto, ki se ozira v nebo (a TV Slovenia production). For a number of years, Hutter has worked as a cameraman at the National Television, whereas recently he has served as Director of Photography for a number of documentaries. Whenever he shoots, photo camera remains his constant companion. His main focus in the current series is hydroelectric power plants. “A story of three rivers” is a photo coverage of hydroelectric power plants on the rivers Drava, Sava and Soča.

Žiga Koritnik, a photographer and cameraman, decided to branch out on his own after a long career at the Slovenian national TV. He is particularly known for photographing musicians. Faithful to the B&W technique, he has portrayed a number of global names in music.  A few years ago he surprised everybody by tackling landscape photography. He focused on the Bohinj Lake, his view of Bohinj being shown in this exhibition. The place had thrilled him so much that he would be visiting at night, in early mornings, repeatedly, whenever he felt that the lake would change, allowing him to capture the special light. Rather than simply producing landscape photographs of the lake, Koritnik was also interested in the people, their way of life and the folklore.

World traveller, peace campaigner, independent author and humanitarian activist Tomo Križnar and his wife Bojana Pivk Križnar have long been endeavouring to stop military violence and the extermination of the last indigenous people who still live in touch with nature in areas rich in natural resources in Sudan, and are tragic witnesses to, and victims of climate change and local wars for water.

The photographs by Tomaž Podobnikar take us through Burma or Myanmar, a sunlit land and a land of sunny people, who are living in friendly communities, even though often without electricity.  They travel on foot or by ox carts or boats. The photographs primarily focus on the moments captured in the surroundings of shallow lakes, where people had gradually established proper lake-dwelling settlements and surrounded them with floating gardens.

Matej Simonič is a cave-diving photographer. In 20 years as a diver, he has logged about 2000 dives. He has been a cave diver for 15 years, working in various countries such as Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Italy, France, and Mexico. His photos present the underwater caves Suhadolca and Kompolje Cave; in the latter one can see more than 60 olms and more than 100 freshwater shrimps during a one-hour dive.

In homage to the indispensable element, poet Aleš Šteger wrote a poem dedicated to water exclusively for the exhibition in the Jakopič Promenade.

The photography students from the Secondary School of Design and Photography in Ljubljana have created their own series of underwater photographs: they worked independently to prepare the set, develop the shooting script, examine the movement of fabrics and human body in water, and, naturally, ensure the sessions were safe. Special attention was given to communication with models so that they could meet the photographers’ expectations entirely. This is what creates a special atmosphere and takes the photograph to a higher creative level.

The last photo series has been created in cooperation with the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Ljubljana. To tell the history of the Netherlands is to tell the story of flooding. Over the centuries the country has experienced countless floods that claimed tens of thousands of lives and forever changed the landscape.
However, the Dutch fought back: after the year 1000 people started building dikes to protect themselves from the water. Windmills were introduced in the 15th century, just in time to ensure that the subsiding lands could continue to be used for agriculture and to provide for the drainage of lakes.


ONE PLANET, ONE WATER
Photography exhibition
Jakopič Promenade, Tivoli, Ljubljana, 16. 7.–27. 8. 2015 & 3. 12. 2015–1. 2. 2016
Produced by: Museum and Galleries of Ljubljana, represented by Blaž Peršin; Ljubljana Tourism, represented by Petra Stušek
Authors: Marko Hutter, Žiga Koritnik, Tomo in Bojana Križnar, Andrej Lupinc, Tomaž Podobnikar, Matej Simonič, Aleš Šteger, Secondary School of Design and Photography in Ljubljana, Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands
Curators: Maja Bahar, Irena Šinkovec
Expert Assistance: Marija Skočir
Translations: Alenka Ropret
Language editing: Katja Paladin, Alenka Ropret
Graphic Design: Planar
Photographs printed by: Fotoformat

The exhibition was made possible by: