On Leisure and Limbo

Adriatic Nodes of Tourism and Migration

Abstract

Contemporary artworks re-envision the Adriatic littoral as a frictional arena where tourism and migration converge, disrupting commercial images of seamless global connectivity. In installations and photographs by Renata Poljak, Ilir Tsouko, and Šejla Kamerić, beaches, hotels, and pools appear as liminal infrastructures shaped by both mobility and stasis, presence and absence, pleasure and struggle, and gendered dynamics. These non-commercial visuals challenge harmonised leisure imagery and design – envisioned for fluid exchanges, short stays, communication, ease, and equal access – by revealing protracted waiting, invisibilities, and exclusions. Viewed through a dis:connective lens, the coastal sites emerge as dynamic nodes of voluntary and forced movements, questioning commodified maritime regions. Artistic and personal perspectives deconstruct dominant spatial conceptions and simplistic globalisation narratives, including binarised stereotypes of tourism and migration. This analysis contributes to a global art history that recognises the overlooked modern Adriatic Mediterranean as a micro-laboratory of complex globalisation processes.