18.5.2010, KUD France Prešeren, Trnovo, Ljubljana
organized by the Liberal Academy and the Serbian Cultural Centre “Danilo Kis”
Serbian media phenomenon: The media-production company Peščanik
Conversation with editors Svetlana Lukic and Svetlana Vukovic
Peščanik (“hourglass”) has a ten years of independent life: the first time was broadcasted 02.02.2000 on Radio B92. We could say that today Peščanik, who is named after the book of Danilo Kis, the rest of that spirit which is on Radio B92 lived mid-nineties
Exceptional media strategy Pescanik involves a combination of radio news, commentary, interviews and reports- once a week for a 90 minutes (the part is taken over by four more radio stations in Serbia), publishing (30 books in five years), video and film production, web site (with records) and direct contacts creators Peščanik on stands outside Belgrade, in “deep” Serbia. Radio broadcasts listens 400,000 people and the website visits about tens thousands of people form around the world. It is the keenest and thereby free media in Serbia. Video documentation talks about the constant surveillance, threats and violence committed by nationalists: Peščanik’s team was helped the police in few occasions. Compared to other oases of liberal and anti-nationalist thought in Serbia, Peščanik is a media giant. It’s run by two women, Svetlana Lukic and Svetlana Vukovic. Peščanik is a political variety of so-called civic option in Serbia, which has only one common thread: It is open to the question of responsibility for the war and for criticism of nationalism. Usually such people are in a relatively protected environment of a large city, Belgrade. Peščanik is the first media which moved Belgrade’s intellectual elite and the rebels into the interior of Serbia: it is about opening eyes on both sides.
On the web site Pesščnik you can find texts eponymous Danilo Kis, who talk about the prophetic power of a great writer: read the news and go back to the shelter of thoughts. Cultural merit of two editors are huge: on the banks of the Peščanik are saved and allow the publication of the whole series of people, who have refused or other media which are failed, such as, for example. Feral Tribune, cartoonist Corax, Petar Lukovic, and many others. Cultural criticism genre that is survived on thaks to Peščanik. The provocative paradox is that Peščanik carefully fosters international cooperation and information and at the same time restores invincible Balkan oral tradition.
Talk was moderated by Svetlana Slapšak.