No matter how direct or simple, the use of language in fine art forms gaps rather than connections or analogies. It is this tension between the linguistic and pictorial poles that establishes the foundation for experimenting with and testing both the literary and the visual field. The legacy of concrete poetry and of early avant-garde experiments with the language, meaning and image remain pertinent even today when the seemingly neutral tools for linguistic expression, such as user interfaces, browsers and text editors, reshape and distort our ways of reacting to the world around us. Such tools have interfered substantially with the structure of the language, thus causing changes in the way that meanings are being linked, now being subordinated to the “copy-paste” principle of interfaces of linear, network or hierarchical design. Several of the exhibited works have abandoned the otherwise unquestioned use of such tools (by applying a non-narrative use of the text editor, or the “low-tech” digital book, by generating acsii poetry, by applying ideologically-marked typography), thus to establish new laws, express criticism of the technocratic use of the language and to encourage informed use.

Despite the new media, the book is far from being dead. When it comes to reading or storytelling or forming the public opinion, books, magazines and other printed media have not been losing their stand. It is the ritual of reading that acts as the medium for the transfer of meaning, and even if, in this case, it acts in relation to fine art, its role remains entirely narrative. Illustrations, video works and installations, on the other hand, are only widening the gap between what we have just read and what we are looking at. And when the image and the word are seemingly in harmony, as is the case with Magritte's statement This is not a pipe, the ambiguity is so much the greater.

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WORKS PRESENTED AT THE EXHIBITION 

Vesna Bukovec: How to fail successfully, series of drawings, Ink on paper, 2011/2013
Zvonko Čoh, Milan Erič: The Socialization of a Bull?, sketches, pencils, erasers (presentation of materials for an animated feature film, 78', production: Društvo ŠKUC, Emotionfilm, RTV Slovenija, 1998)
Tomaž Furlan: The Book, e-book, 2008
Marko A. Kovačič: A Corner for Young Communist with Recommended Reading, installation, 2009−2011
Damijan Kracina: Proteus Font, typography, webpage, installation, 1997−2011
Amir Muratović: From the Life of Books, video, 3'55'', 2010−2011
Alenka Pirman: Silent Lectures – The Most Beautiful Poems, computer animation, 2006; Ultimate Word, printed matter and audio recording, 23'45'', 2007−2009
Nataša Prosenc Stearns: Waiting Room, video, 10'20'', production: Kanalya Pictures, 2005
Zoran Srdič Janežič: Scribbled Words, video, 5'15'', poetry: Jana Putrle Srdič, production: Gulag, 2005; Ceci n'est pas un croquis, book, production: Gulag, 2012
Petra Varl: Rich Poor, wall painting, 2010; Smoker, road sign, 2010; The Book of Serigraphs, production: MGLC, 2010
Rajko Vidrih: BODY, Diversely loiterer, volume II, No 1, screen print on newsprint, 28. 11. 1991
Jaka Železnikar: Proverbs, mobile app, 2011; Asciidarij 2, responsive online visual and sound poem, 2013; Asciidarij, interactive language-visual structure, 2001; Ascii Kosovel, biographical portrait, 2004, Europroverbs, generative and combinatory work of language expression, 2005.