Interview with Jasmina Cibic by Chris Clarke

Abstract

Jasmina Cibic’s artistic practice across film, performance and installation rigorously interrogates the aesthetics of politics. Her works are situated within grandiose architectural settings of national pride and power, from state assemblies to cultural monuments, while drawing on the historical events and individuals that determine shared conceptions of identity. In this interview, Cibic discusses ideas of soft power in relation to several recent projects, including the 2021 film The Gift, State of Illusion from 2018, and the Nada trilogy of 2016–17. In each of these projects, artistic production is examined in terms of its relationship to propaganda, ideology and identification, the ways in which culture is utilized and whom it is intended to serve.