Marko Pogačnik (born August 11, 1944) is a

Slovenia Slovenia, officially the Republic of Slovenia, is a country in Central Europe. It borders Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the south and southeast, and a short (46.6 km) coastline within the Adriati ...

n artist and author.

Background

Sankt Paul Lithopunktur Marko Pogacnik 10052008 64

Pogačnik studied at the

Academy of Arts An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of tertiary education. The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, founded approximately 386 BC at Akademia, a sanctuary of Athena, the go ...

Ljubljana {{Infobox settlement , name = Ljubljana , official_name = , settlement_type = Capital city , image_skyline = {{multiple image , border = infobox , perrow = 1/2/2/1 , total_widt ...

, the capital of Slovenia, where he graduated in 1967. He was a co-founder of the neo-avantgarde artistic movement OHO, members of which were also

Tomaž Šalamun Tomaž Šalamun (July 4, 1941 – December 27, 2014) was a Slovenian poet who was a leading figure of postwar neo-avant-garde poetry in Central EuropeColm Tóibín (2004The comet's trail The Guardian, Guardian and an internationally acclaimed Absu ...

and

Slavoj Žižek Slavoj Žižek ( ; ; born 21 March 1949) is a Slovenian Marxist philosopher, cultural theorist and public intellectual. He is the international director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities at the University of London, Global Distin ...

. From the 1980s, he embraced a

holistic Holism is the interdisciplinary idea that systems possess properties as wholes apart from the properties of their component parts. Julian Tudor Hart (2010''The Political Economy of Health Care''pp.106, 258 The aphorism "The whole is greater than t ...

vision of art. He claims to have developed a method of earth healing similar to

acupuncture Acupuncture is a form of alternative medicine and a component of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) in which thin needles are inserted into the body. Acupuncture is a pseudoscience; the theories and practices of TCM are not based on scientif ...

by using pillars and positioning them on so called 'lithopuncture' points of the landscape. In 1991, he designed the official

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the last two being outer garments), originating in Europe. The coat of arms on an escutcheon f ...

of the newly constituted Republic of Slovenia. In the year 2006, he joined the Movement for Justice and Development led by

Janez Drnovšek Janez Drnovšek (; 17 May 1950 – 23 February 2008) was a Slovenian liberal politician, President of the Presidency of Yugoslavia (1989–1990), Prime Minister of Slovenia (1992–2002, with a short break in 2000) and President of Slovenia (20 ...

, the

President of Slovenia The president of Slovenia, officially the president of the Republic of Slovenia (), is the head of state of Slovenia. The office was established on 23 December 1991 when the National Assembly (Slovenia), National Assembly passed a new ...

at the time. In 1998, together with his daughter Ana, he founded the Lifenet movement, which has been described by scholars as a "typical

New Age New Age is a range of Spirituality, spiritual or Religion, religious practices and beliefs that rapidly grew in Western world, Western society during the early 1970s. Its highly eclecticism, eclectic and unsystematic structure makes a precise d ...

" group.Nikola Pešić
Marko Pogačnik (and the OHO Group)
'' World Religions and Spirituality Project'', April 30, 2017. He lives and works in the village of

Šempas Šempas ( or ; in older sources also ''Šenpas,''Navratil, J. 1894. "Slovenske národne vraže in prazne vére (Dalje)." ''Letopis Matice slovenske'' 138–201, p. 184. , ) is a village in the Vipava Valley in the Municipality of Nova Gorica in we ...

in the lower

Vipava Valley The Vipava Valley (; , , ) is a valley in the Slovenian Littoral, roughly between the village of Podnanos to the east and the border with Italy to the west. The main towns are Ajdovščina and Vipava. Geography The narrow valley of the Vipav ...

. In the last decade, the town of

Nova Gorica Nova Gorica () is a town in western Slovenia, on the border with Italy. It is the seat of the Municipality of Nova Gorica. Nova Gorica is a planned town, built according to the principles of modernist architecture after 1947, when the Treaty of pe ...

, in which municipal territory he resides, has commissioned a number of public monuments from Pogačnik, most notably the monument to the 1000 years of the first mention of Gorica and

Solkan Solkan ( or ; , or ''Salcano'') is a settlement in the Municipality of Nova Gorica in the Gorizia region of western Slovenia, at the border with Italy. Although it forms a single urban area with the city of Nova Gorica today, it has maintained th ...

, which stands in the town's central public square. Since 2008, a group of his monuments and birch trees, titled the ''

Hologram Holography is a technique that allows a wavefront to be recorded and later reconstructed. It is best known as a method of generating three-dimensional images, and has a wide range of other uses, including data storage, microscopy, and interf ...

of Europe'' (), stands at the crossroad of Tivoli Street () and Slovene Street () in Ljubljana. File:Monolito del parque central de La Magdalena (Marko Pogačnik).jpg, Monolith in the central park of La Magdalena neighbourhood in

Quito Quito (; ), officially San Francisco de Quito, is the capital city, capital and second-largest city of Ecuador, with an estimated population of 2.8 million in its metropolitan area. It is also the capital of the province of Pichincha Province, P ...

. File:Placa de Marko Pogačnik en la Plaza Grande, Quito.jpg, Medallion in the Independence Square of

. File:Monolito del Parque La Carolina (Marko Pogačnik).jpg, Monolith in La Carolina Park in

. File:Steinstele Bleiburg by Marko Pogačnik.jpg, Monolith in

Bleiburg Bleiburg () is a small town in the south Austrian state of Carinthia (''Koroška''), south-east of Klagenfurt, in the district of Völkermarkt, some four kilometres (2.5 miles) from the border with Slovenia. The municipality consists of the twel ...

(Austria).

Awards

In 1991, Marko Pogačnik received the Prešeren Fund Award for his work. In 2008, he received the

Jakopič Award The Jakopič Award, also known as the Rihard Jakopič Award ( or ''Nagrada Riharda Jakopiča'') is an art award in Slovenia awarded each year for achievements in the fine arts children's literature. It has been bestowed since 1969 by the Academy of ...

, the central Slovenian fine arts award. He was nominated two times for the

Right Livelihood Award The Right Livelihood Award is an international award to "honour and support those offering practical and exemplary answers to the most urgent challenges facing us today." The prize was established in 1980 by German-Swedish philanthropist Jakob vo ...

Publications

*''Nature Spirits and Elemental Beings - Working with the Intelligence in Nature'' (Findhorn Press, Scotland, 1996).

References

External links

Personal site
Markopogacnik.com. * {{DEFAULTSORT:Pogacnik 1944 births Writers from Kranj Spiritual writers Findhorn community 20th-century Slovenian sculptors 20th-century Slovenian male artists 21st-century Slovenian sculptors Jakopič Award laureates Artists from Kranj Slovenian environmentalists Living people Flag designers