Contemporary Croatian artist Tomo Savić Gecan is the winner of ACCELERATE Croatia Award 2017 and is going to CERN residency. ACCELERATE Award is a unique one-month research residency at CERN where the artists are given the opportunity to work in one of the world's leading scientific institution for particle physics. It is a part of the Arts at Cern programme that inspires new creative dimensions by connecting artistic vision with leading scientific discoveries and opens a dialogue between artist and scientists in the field of particle physics.

Each year ACCELERATE Award is pursued in partnership with organizations from an individual country whose artist apply for participation through an open call. This year, Croatia was invited into partnership. By now, CERN hosted many of acknowledged artists such as Bill Fontana (US), Anselm Kiefer (DE), Ryoji Ikeda (JP), artistic duo Evelina Domnitch and Dmitry Gelfand (NL), semiconductor (UK) and many more.

ACCELERATE Croatia Award is organized in partnership with KONTEJNER | bureau for contemporary art praxis from Zagreb (Croatia), Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Croatia and Ruđer Bošković Institute from Zagreb (Croatia) and it is dedicated to Croatian artists.

International jury composed of Mónica Bello (head and curator of Arts at CERN), Daniel Figueroa (theoretical physics from CERN), Stahl Stenslie (Norwegian artist, director of PNEK and a professor of Art & Technology at Aalborg University, Denmark), Nevena Tudor Perković (Head of Service for International Cultural Relations at Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Croatia), Sunčica Ostoić and Olga Majcen Linn (curators from KONTEJNER) considered twenty applications and selected Tomo Savić Gecan's entry who will represent Croatia at residency in CERN.

Residency at CERN provides a stimulative environment for research development and collaboration with some of the today's leading scientific minds. Residency gives insight into different aspects of scientific research and provides the artist with accommodation and stipend of 5000 CHF. This experience will be curated by Mónica Bello, head and curator of Arts at Cern.

Tomo Savić Gecan was born in 1967 in Zagreb, Croatia. In his work, he explores communication and interaction by transforming space and unusual relations between time and space. Invisible, absent and emptiness are the subjects of Gecan's work. He exhibited in many local and international galleries and museums in Croatia, Slovenia, Netherlands, USA, Germany, France, Taiwan, Italy, Poland, Austria, Serbia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia and was one of the Croatian representatives at Venice Biennal (2005). He lives and works in Amsterdam.