People
The people behind Rizoma
Founders
Barbara Kukovec
Director & Founder
Barbara Kukovec (1980) graduated from AGRFT Ljubljana and holds an MA from Goldsmiths College, London. As an actress and performer she has collaborated with many creators (D. Živadinov, T. Zgonc, M. Gržinić, A. Šmid, R. Waltl, I. Peternelj, B. Jablanovec, J. Janša, M. Reiter) in diverse productions across Slovenia and internationally.
Her artistic work was marked by collaboration with the international contemporary art platform Via Negativa. Between 2002 and 2012 she co-created six performances that critically marked the Slovenian performing arts space. She has been awarded the Sever Student Award and Golden Bird (2003), with residencies in New York (2008), Sheffield (2009) and Birmingham (2011).
In 2020 she co-founded Zavod Rizoma with Rob Canning, where they explore placing contemporary artistic practice in the context of the countryside.
Rob Canning
Founder
Rob Canning is an Irish musician, intermedia artist and educator. He has produced music for the concert hall, theatre, screen and dance productions as well as working in a range of site-specific and improvisational contexts. His compositions have been performed internationally and presented at conferences including ICMC, LAC and NIME.
Since the late 90s, his work has relied solely on FOSS (Free and Open Source Software). As a free culture advocate and educator he has worked closely with the GOTO10 media art collective, Openlab, London Hackspace and SPC medialab, as well as working for many years as a senior lecturer in Networked Digital Media in UK universities.
He holds a PhD in music composition from Goldsmiths University, London. He now lives and works in Slovenia developing a rural art program at Rizoma, operating at the intersection of technology, permaculture and performing arts.