The exhibition “The Mona Lisa and Superman: John Kennedy and the New Cultural Boundaries” marks the 100th anniversary since the birth of John F. Kennedy (1917-1963).
It is the fruit of collaboration between MSURS and Prof. Simona Čupić from the Department of Modern Art of the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade, author of a book of the same title voted the publication of the year by ICOM, and it is being staged with the support of the U.S. Embassy in Bosnia and Herzegovina. This exhibition is the first time that 4XJackie, a work by Andy Warhol kept at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade, is being shown in the Republic of Srpska.
This exhibition, produced by MSURS, shows the life of President Kennedy, a favourite public figures in the history of the U.S., and his wife, from his presidential inauguration to the tragic end, including the couple’s cultural activism, relation to contemporary art and the space race. The exhibition features a series of photographs, popular magazines, comic books and authentic documentary materials that helped build a personality cult around John Kennedy, illustrating the political and social circumstances in the U.S. in the early 1970’s, when a strategic change took place in the country’s official cultural policy.
The exhibits put a special focus on such historic cultural events as Kennedy’s inauguration, at which Robert Frost gave a speech, the complicated project of restoration of the White House under the supervision of Jacqueline Kennedy, the exhibition of the Mona Lisa in New York and Washington, concerts by Pablo Casals and Grace Bumbry, and how America’s contemporary artists saw John Kennedy.
What makes the exhibition more interesting is the said work by Andy Warhol, consisting of four photographs of Jacqueline Jackie Kennedy, as well as the video installation Death in Dallas by Belgrade-based Zoran Naskovski, the only artist from the region who has shown his work at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh.
Events accompanying the exhibition:
DOCUMENTARY SCREENINGS
- Thursday, 7 December, 7:00 p.m., Kennedys Don’t Cry, Cliff Robertson, 1975
- Friday, 8 December, 7:00 p.m., The Life and Times of John F. Kennedy, Cliff Robertson, 1964
LECTURE
- Wednesday, 15 November, 7:00 p.m., Professor David Lubin, “Frozen in History: The Kennedys Arrive in Dallas”
FEATURE FILM SCREENINGS
- Friday, 10 November, 7:00 p.m., JFK, Oliver Stone, 1991
- Friday, 15 December, 7:00 p.m., Jackie, Pablo Larain, 2016