The Zollamt (customs house) in Bad Radkersburg was for many decades a frontier post. Today it is a venue for art: the Austrian-Slovenian border however, still exists in people’s minds. Tobias Putrih, one of the most well-known Slovenian artists of his generation, has set out in search of a place where you can still see the borders between Austria and Slovenia, although they have officially ceased to exist. He found this place in the prehistoric cave Potočka Zijalka, in the Karawanks mountain range that separates Central Europe from the Balkan Peninsula.
“Tobias Putrih – Routine Inspection” is a site-specific installation that transfers the cave at Potočka Zijalka as an artificial space into the Zollamt – where it is explored and filled with artefacts, and its identity examined. An arrangement of objects, drawings and films focuses on the struggle for borders. The cave becomes a place where light and dark mingle, it illustrates the transition between the familiar and the unknown.