Our Art Is Our Struggle! Our Works, Our Voice! Transformative Art Practices in the Current Student Protests: The Case of the ‘stUUdenti’ Exhibitions
Our Art Is Our Struggle! Our Works, Our Voice! Transformative Art Practices in the Current Student Protests: The Case of the ‘stUUdenti’ Exhibitions

Summary/Abstract: This article analyzes the transformative role of student-led artistic practices within the ongoing student movement and recent protests in Serbia, focusing on two exhibitions titled “stUUdenti”. Drawing on Jacques Rancière’s concept of aesthetic experience, the study explores the exhibitions’ content, organization, and social context to understand how collective art practices operate as forms of resistance, social critique, and community building. Research findings indicate that these practices disrupt traditional hierarchies within the art system, foster participatory engagement, and produce new social relations through embodied gestures, collective silences, and performative interventions. The exhibitions show how art can function as a tool for social transformation by merging aesthetic experience with activism, emphasizing care, vulnerability, and mutual empowerment. By foregrounding the intersections of art, activism, and social engagement, this research contributes to a deeper understanding of art’s role in facilitating societal change and fostering collaborative, community-oriented cultural practices.

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