The Cage Effect from a Serbian Perspective

John Cage, a key figure and leading exponent of the experimental paradigm in twentieth century music, and in the performing and visual arts, was a reference point for testing the cultural openness of socialist countries during the Cold War. His influence appeared in various forms in Serbian music and art, primarily in the field of extended media, performance art, and musical minimalism. This paper discusses the reception of John Cage’s works in Serbia from the 1970s to the present day, ranging from transpositions and re-mediations of his aesthetic positions and poetic moves, to identification with them. Particular attention is paid to the appropriation of Cage’s concepts of silence, indeterminism, and chance operations, as phenomena highlighting the maturing of receptive views of Cage in Serbian music, in relation to the oeuvres of the composers in the group Opus 4 (Miroslav Savić, Milimir Drašković, Miodrag Lazarov Pashu, and Vladimir Tošić) and Katarina Miljković. Also, Cage’s appearance with the Merce Cunningham Troupe at the Sixth Belgrade International Theatre Festival in 1972 is considered in the context of both cultural connections and the resonances of his impact on the Serbian and Yugoslav art scene.