The SDS is worried one minister may have known about this. SDS MP Andrej Hoivik told the press on Thursday that the SDS had asked for an emergency session of the parliamentary Culture Committee at which it will call on the ministry to produce the report to double-check the publicly accessible data on funding NGOs in culture in the last decade.
He said that more than EUR 55 million had been spent on art production, "from film production to exhibitions and various performances", in this period.
The SDS is convinced that "in a number of cases, cultural figures have abused their status, and their work has not contributed to increasing culture in the region". Hoivik pointed to several recent art performances of "concern" to the SDS, including a installation by a group of artists entitled Breathe, in which naked people with bags on their heads stood in the window of the Fotopub gallery. He said that "the recent developments" pointing at sexual abuse at Fotopub exhibitions showed that public funds are used to fund projects that are hardly "art with added value".
It is also extremely worrying that artists spend public funds on entertainment while not paying their subcontractors or submitting annual reports, as required by law. Hoivik finds this to be unacceptable "given the information about girls, even minors, being abused at the performances organised by Smodej and about unlawful possession of illicit drugs". It got EUR 52, for the period for the Festivalpub project and EUR 4, in and , with the ministry finding no irregularities in the use of funds.
.jpg "Sluts in Ljubljana")
The association is, however, behind in submitting its report and was thus urged to do so by the end of August, the ministry explained. Hoivik is also worried that some members of the government, or the coalition Left party, may have known about the alleged abuse of young women at Fotopub. He pointed to "audiovisual evidence" on the internet showing that the Left's leader Luka Mesec, now labour minister, "was spotted at one of the Fotopub exhibitions".
