This March, Balkan Textinnale brings together people, stories, and materials from across the region and beyond. From 5 to 24 March, the festival unfolds as a series of exhibitions and public events dedicated to textile as a contemporary art form: open, accessible, and deeply connected to everyday life.
The upcoming edition features 38 artists from 12 countries, working with textile in bold and unexpected ways. Rather than focusing only on traditional weaving or embroidery, Balkan Textinnale shows how fabric can speak about today’s world: migration, ecology, memory, and personal freedom. Textile here becomes a shared language one that everyone understands through touch, clothing, and home.
This year’s theme, DRIFTLANDS, reflects the experience of constant movement that many people in the Balkans share between countries, cultures, and identities. Through textile, artists explore how it feels to adapt, to carry memories, and to build new meanings while staying connected to the past.
The program is curated by Saška Kremenets and Katerina Ablamskaya, whose shared vision brings together international perspectives with a strong sensitivity to the cultural and social context of the Balkan region.
Participating artists include: Irina Kliuchnikova, Teodora Nešković, Ira Brana, Alina Gombats, Natasha Bayduzha, BLAU, Katarina Ivanović, Yulia Lukyanchenko, Lyuda Kalinichenko, Anastasia Ivanenkova, Lidiya Baranik, Irene Musina, Anna Fischer, Nelly Akchurina, Sveta Sher, Natasha Kosovets, Olga Posukh, Aysha Demina, Aleksandra Vorozhko, Liza Perelman, Milica Dukić, Julia Perfiletova, Katharina Büttgen, Olga Klimovitskaia, Anya Grositskaya, Maria Motyleva and Diana Smykova, Lisa Mur, Sari Szanto and Dasha Sz, Lana Morozova, Varvara Grankova, Julia Levykina, Yegor Hodeev, Pola Laamanen, Sasha Look, Marta Krasicka, Inna Grishechkina, Lera Nerybka, Julia Karih, and Juliya Parfenova.
Venues & Dates
Nordistica Gallery 5–20 March Internacionalnih Brigada 36, Belgrade
Woonder Studio 7–15 March Balkanska 44, Belgrade
Aut Bistro 10–24 March Strahinjića Bana 64–66, Belgrade
Distrikt Atelje 61 12–22 March Kreativni Distrikt, Bulevar despota Stefana, Novi Sad
We propose to explore “drift” as a way of existing as a material phenomenon and as an inner state.
Topics for exploration:
Waste and remnants: the material traces of civilization
Plastisphere: symbiosis and transformation of waste into new biotopes
Migrations and loss: displacement, rupture, the search for home
Inner drift: personal memory, forgotten or unnecessary objects
Drift as a path: openness to chance, letting go of control, aimless floating
Partners & Quote
Nordistica is the project’s partner
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"One day you, as a human, find yourself in this vast world surrounded by the unknown. Was it your intention or just coincidence, like a piece of styrofoam washed ashore?"
Team
What unites us is not only a shared interest in contemporary art but also a personal experience of change. Each of us has gone through migration, loss of familiar landmarks, and the search for a new home. This experience made us stronger and showed us how important it is to create points of support and connection between people.
For us, art is above all exchange, an opportunity to speak, meet, support each other, and only after that, beauty and technique. In every project, we look for ways to bring people together, so that even in drifting, you can find a shore.
