In June 2000, at ten city-lights locations in the center of Zagreb Andreja Kulunčić installed posters with portrait of an employee of department store Nama, with caption "NAMA - 1908 employees, 15 department stores". Appropriating resources, values and places of advertisement, the artist initiated public debate on economic transition in Croatia. The employee at the poster symbolizes individual and collective disasters that accompany changes in Croatian economy.

The project NAMA - 1908 employees, 15 department stores had been realized within the exhibition "What, How & for Whom, on the occasion of 152nd anniversary of Communist Manifesto" (June/July 2000, Croatian Association of Artists, Zagreb), curated by Ana Devic and Natasa Ilic, that questioned wide range of social issues, focusing on complex relations between art and economy. What, how and for whom, three basic questions of every economic organization that are operative in almost all segments of life, as well as in the process of planing and realization of artworks, were taken as the point of departure for exhibition concept and its realization. The exhibition presented the works of 47 artists from 16 European countries.

Two weeks before the exhibition opening, after a long process of communication with Union of workers of Nama, at ten city-lights locations in the center of Zagreb Andreja Kuluncic installed posters with the image of a female employee of Nama, a chain of department stores that was very successful in Croatia at the times of Real Socialism. Its name comes from 'NArodni MAgazin', 'The People's Store'. After several years of paradoxical situation in which the company practically ceased to exist but the stores were still kept open by employees who occupied them, in 2000 Nama finally bankrupted.

The project by Andreja Kulunčić Nama: 1908 employees, 15 department stores indirectly deals with solidarity risked by market economy burdened by transition process. In the transition process, the state lost its status as the political-administrative representative of solidarity based on work, and the new civil-social form of power based on private property had been established. In this new context, the state acquired the function to regulate the conflicts resulting from unsolvable contradictions of the new system, which becomes repressive whenever these conflicts can not be funneled by procedures of parliamentary democracy or some negotiable solution. Sociability is no longer based on solidarity, but on conflicts.
The artist realized simulation of advertising that questions current economical situation, appropriating marketing strategies and various locations of city-lights in Zagreb. Once Nama had been the strongest chain of department stores that for decades tried to satisfy the shopping appetites of socialist workers, and in late 1990's its glorious story ended in bankruptcy. The poster depicts female worker of department store in almost portrait manner, with text "1908 employees, 15 department stores". Woman figure is more real and "truthful" than figures in usual advertising, but its bodily posture and facial expression suggest trust, stability and safety. The text is equally ambiguous, pointing toward quantitative dimension, and only the knowledge of the company's situation endows the numbers with qualitative dimension of a tragedy.
There is a face behind the numbers. Worker at the poster faces us. Her face is exposed to our gaze, it appeals to viewer and put a certain demand. The face cancels working uniform that makes the figure interchangeable. Face is unprotected, it is denuded, it is naked, a surface phenomenon that appeals to us, demands the fundamental ethical fact of obligation to other, outside ourselves.
The project is pointing to the fact that problem of Nama is not isolated, reminding us on the workers of various companies that bankrupted during transition process. In author's words:
"Motivated by newspapers articles and workers strikes in the largest Croatian chain of department stores, and trying to respond to the issues raised by the exhibition "What, how & for whom", I started to communicate with workers and Union members, trying to find the way to locate their "personal" problems within public dialogue and considerations. I did not face the problem from the point of money, guilt, commerce, ownership, and transition process or "good and bad" roles in the story. I was thinking about market economy that we have been entering and that brings something new, takes something away, raises questions and updates problems.
How do people manage? Are individual destinies (if one can say that for 1908 workers) relevant "social sample"? Did we enter into ownership transformation too fast or too slow? Do we discuss these issues from sufficiently 'human' viewpoint, faced with completely different way of life? How do we keep up with it? Who manages to keep up and who does not? What happens to those who failed? Does it have wider connotations or are these just individual "failures", "incapability" and "sad destiny"? Are language skills, young age and computer literacy the only "value" at the labor market? Is the newspapers claim that "people over 35 have no chances to get the job" provocative enough for public thinking and discussion?

Poster realization:
Concept: Andreja Kuluncic
Photo: Mare Milin
Styling: Robert Sever
Make up: Sasa Jokovic
Employees of Nama department store:
Branka Stanic, Biserka Kanenaric, Barbara Kovacevic
Project documentation: Ivo Martinovic

Print M-Ros, Europlakat Proreklam, Futura DDB, HDLU, Arkzin pre-press and Rutta Zagreb, June 2000