Ljiljana Blagojević - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Ljiljana Blagojević

Planning Perspectives, 2019

ABSTRACT This article explores housing models and hybrid typologies advanced as part of an urban ... more ABSTRACT This article explores housing models and hybrid typologies advanced as part of an urban renewal programme in Belgrade (Serbia, former Yugoslavia) in the 1980s. We argue that these typologies were tested against the socialist-modernist model of mass residential construction that had been dominant since the 1960s. Our research identifies the design methodologies employed in the insertion of collective housing typologies into an elite residential quarter of traditionally-planned detached family houses, in the case of high-standard housing project Dedinje II/2 (1979–1986) designed by the architect Zoran Županjevac. The article particularly focuses on local adaptation of the transnational concept of designing spaces of transition between community and privacy. Instrumental in this adaptation, we aim to show, was the educational experience and professional practice critical of radical modernism gained by the architect in the USA, UK and Austria. In particular, we find that the project reflects the transfer of knowledge and experience across cultural, geographic and political contexts. The resulting typologies, we contend, not only represented an example of a pluralist approach to late-socialist architecture but provided models for re-thinking housing in the transition to the market economy of the post-socialist period.

Planning Perspectives Volume 35, Number 6, 2020, 2020

The article explores housing models and hybrid typologies advanced as part of an urban renewal pr... more The article explores housing models and hybrid typologies advanced as part of an urban renewal programme in Belgrade (Serbia, former Yugoslavia) in the 1980s. We argue that these typologies were tested against the socialistmodernist model of mass residential construction that had been dominant since the 1960s. Our research identifies the design methodologies employed in the insertion of collective housing typologies into an elite residential quarter of traditionally-planned detached family houses, in the case of high standard housing project Dedinje II/2 (1979–1986) designed by the architect Zoran Županjevac. The article particularly focuses on local adaptation of the transnational concept of designing spaces of transition between community and privacy. Instrumental in this adaptation, we aim to show, was the educational experience and professional practice critical of radical modernism gained by the architect in the USA, UK and Austria. In particular, we find that the project reflects the transfer of knowledge and experience across cultural, geographic and political contexts. The resulting typologies, we contend, not only represented an example of a pluralist approach to late-socialist architecture but provided models for re-thinking housing in the transition to the market economy of the post-socialist period.

Architektura&Urbanizmus, 2017

Architecture and ambience of the low-rise high-density single-family housing estate Petlovo Brdo ... more Architecture and ambience of the low-rise high-density single-family housing estate Petlovo Brdo in Belgrade, Serbia (1967-69), relate everyday social production of space in socialism as a contemporary vernacular outcome of the notions of the folkloric and the peripheral. Socio-spatial balance between the individual and the communal, pursued by the estate’s architects Elsa and Branislav Milenković, is achieved by variation of seven apartment types in four house types and their diverse grouping in immediate neighbourhoods with pedestrian circulation. Architectural design upholds modular coordination, apartments’ use-value as a function of layout disposition, environmental mindfulness and aesthetic of domesticity and small scale urbanity.

Le Culture della Tecnica, 2016

THE ARTICLE AIMS TO ADDRESS IN THE MOST DIRECT AND LITERAL WAY THE TOPICS OUTLINED, PRESENTED AND... more THE ARTICLE AIMS TO ADDRESS IN THE MOST DIRECT AND LITERAL WAY THE TOPICS OUTLINED, PRESENTED AND DISCUSSED AT THE INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM «MODULAR DESIGN: Prefabricating the Postwar Landscape», held at the Politecnico di Milano, Di- partimento di Architettura e Studi Urbani in October 2013.

Anuarul Centrului de Studii de Arhitectură Vernaculară, UAUIM / Vernacular Architecture Studies Centre annual publication of „Ion Mincu” University of Architecture and Urban Planning, Bucharest, 2015

This article looks at vernacular art and its milieu that had been seen by the eyes of Charles-Édo... more This article looks at vernacular art and its milieu that had been seen by the eyes of Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (1887-1965), when he visited Serbia in 1911 on his, now famous, voyage d’Orient. This voyage, across Northern and Central Europe, Balkan and the Mediterranean – via Dresden, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest, Tǔrnovo, Gabrovo, Adrianople, Constantinople (Istanbul), Mount Athos, Athens, and southern Italy – proved to be of the utmost importance for Ch.-É. Jeanneret, or as he was later known Le Corbusier, as an artist and architect.

Architectural Research Quarterly, 2013

arq: Architectural Research Quarterly, Volume 17, Issue 3-4, Dec 2013

The article examines the post-WW2 expanded understanding of the concept of Mediterraneità or Medi... more The article examines the post-WW2 expanded understanding of the concept of Mediterraneità or Mediterranean-ness in the South Adriatic coastal region of Montenegro in the former Yugoslavia, primarily as a modernist recourse against the demand for productivity and tenets of socialist realism and socialist aestheticism. The discussion of Mediterraneità refers to recent research of Italian architecture by Michelangelo Sabatino (2010), arguing that over the period of thirty years in its wider resonance across the Adriatic littoral, the original notion was adapted to different regional, cultural and socio-political contexts. This article specifically analyses the theory of modular coordination of the architect Milan Zloković (Trieste, 1898 – Belgrade, 1965), professor of architectural composition and design at the University of Belgrade, and its application in the tourist colony Hotel Mediterranean in the city of Ulcinj in Montenegro, which he realised in co-authorship with his son, architect and engineer Đorđe Zloković (1927, Trieste) and daughter, architect Milica Mojović (1932, Belgrade), in the early 1960s. In order to achieve meaningful if economically highly restrained design and efficient construction for developing mass tourism of the Montenegro littoral, the architects argued for the usefulness of modular coordination not only from the rational but also from the compositional point of view. The article explores a specific understanding of modern Mediterraneità in the Ulcinj colony which combines scientific means of modular coordination and the spirit of vernacular building in stone. The methodology combines historical and theoretical interpretation with geometric and proportional analysis of typology and modular coordination. The original graphic geometric methods are derived from the theory of the architect Milan Zloković through comparative analysis of Le Corbusier's Modulor, Alexander Klein's method of successive increments and Richard Padovan's interpretation of proportional systems correspondences. The article brings previously unpublished photographic documentation from the period.

The Journal of Architecture, vol. 18, no. 6, Dec 2013

This article examines the ‘one:table’ installation in the pavilion of Serbia at the 13th Internat... more This article examines the ‘one:table’ installation in the pavilion of Serbia at the 13th International Architecture Exhibition in Venice (2012). The large empty table put on public view by its co-authorial team of ten architecture graduates is argued to be meaningful beyond its reasoning as an exhibit responding to the Biennale theme of ‘common ground’. The inquiry aims to demonstrate that this one simple object has an important critical effect in the architectural discourse of post-socialist Serbia. Its effect, it is argued, is complementary to designs for prominent buildings in Belgrade by the world-renowned architects Zaha Hadid, Daniel Libeskind, Wolfgang Tschapeller and Sou Fujimoto. Conversely, its implicit criticality is compared to the method and media of an analogous case of post-modern critique in the installation ‘Table (of a Dancer, of a Marksman, of a Philosopher)’ (1982) by the architect Mustafa Musić. The aim of the article is to compare the two exhibitions where the thematic of the table as architectural exhibit opens a discussion of criticality in post-modernist and post-socialist moments. The article discusses the two table installations in terms of Jacques Derrida's thesis of ‘hauntology’, which is itself derived from the analysis of another table, that is, a ‘simple wooden table’ used by Karl Marx in his seminal section on ‘the fetishism of the commodity and its secret’.

Český lid: Etnologický časopis, 100 (3), 2013

The article examines the rise of informal spatial practices in the areas left in the shadows of t... more The article examines the rise of informal spatial practices in the areas left in the shadows of the socialist planning system, in Belgrade (Serbia, former Yugoslavia) in the 1970s and 1980s. By looking into the relation of spontaneous interventions with the constitutionally enacted system of territorial self-management, we explore both the enclaves of everyday life forming in parallel to the hegemonic and homogenous plan, and highly formalised, planned attempts at emulating spontaneous practices in large housing projects. The research is based on comparative analysis of planning documentation and illegal interventions, period sources including letters and memos written by architects and illegal constructors, available statistics and published polemics. The article argues that many of the unresolved contradictions of the socialist period can be seen as the seeds of those practices which have been part of the post-socialist transition and its spatiality from the 1990s onwards. Indifference toward self-management, cynicism of the everyday in the blind spots of socialist society and the planning profession’s failure to deal with informality, are reproduced within the post-socialist city through unrelenting consumption of the common space.

Prostor, vol. 21, 1 [45], Jul 2013

Architektúra & urbanizmus: journal of architectural and town-planning theory, vol. 46, no. 3-4, Dec 2012

“… this plan inverts the logical manner in which a bourgeois city expands by introducing into the... more “… this plan inverts the logical manner in which a bourgeois city expands by introducing into the heart of the metropolis the residence as a decisive factor”
Manfredo Tafuri and Francesco Dal Co (Architettura Contemporanea, 1976)

The article presents, documents and analyses six residential blocks in the centre of New Belgrade (Serbia), which form the core of this modern socialist city and provide housing for some 50,000 inhabitants. Although all six blocks closely follow the composition and urban planning parameters set in the unifying Plan of Central Zone of New Belgrade (1960), the architectural design of the residential buildings and associated social services programs (schools, kindergartens, community centres, etc.), as well as urban design of open spaces demonstrate diverse approaches. The blocks were realized in the period of fervent construction between 1960-1980 as state of the art socialist modernism in architecture, and each was designed by a different group of prominent architects of the period, locally celebrated as the “Belgrade School of Housing”. Their architecture demonstrates clearly the shift of design paradigms from the white minimalist modernism of the early period to new brutalism of exposed concrete from the 1970s. Particular attention was paid to the question of dwelling and its use value, and consequent meticulous study of residential units design, which resulted in a number of alternative solutions to the normative flats. Also, the paper will look into high quality landscape architecture of public open green spaces of the blocks, children playgrounds and recreation areas.
Finally, the full significance of these six blocks becomes apparent when they are investigated not only from architectural but from town planning point of view. The blocks are located in the centre of New Belgrade’s modern urban structure, which stretches between two independently developed historical cities of Zemun and Belgrade, on what was historically a marshy alluvial plain bordered by the rivers Sava and Danube with no previous settlement. With the construction of New Belgrade, the territorial autonomy between two historical centres evolved in time into a unique situation of a modern city acting as an integrating urban structure of the metropolis. The six blocks in question are thus more than an assemblage of socialist housing, they form the core of the modern city in the heart of the metropolis, and as such they are at the centre of contemporary post-socialist transformations.
One of the pertinent questions concerns the relation of new development to the urban structure, architecture and social space of these blocks. How can invisible boundaries between dilapidating and ideologically stigmatized socialist housing and new commercial, leisure and high end residential development be dissolved? What qualities of socialist architecture but also of its social space need to be recognized and preserved, and where can the new development make a difference? Some recent studies present the current processes of urban change in bright and positive light of an eagerly awaited progress towards market economy, while others see the paramount importance of modernist architectural heritage and the need for its protection and preservation. Can we argue that the balance between the two is to be found in the appreciation of the urban landscape quality of the modern city and its housing blocks, and in the perspective of ecological urbanism?

SPATIUM International Review, no. 28, 2012

This paper traces urban history of Belgrade in the 19 th century by looking into its waterscape i... more This paper traces urban history of Belgrade in the 19 th century by looking into its waterscape in the context of its transformation as the capital of the Princedom of Serbia. Aiming to underline the importance of water as a resource, with the view to contemporary environmental concerns, we explore how citizens historically related to waterscape in everyday life and created a specific socio-spatial water network through use of public baths on the river banks and public fountains, water features and devices in the city. The paper outlines the process of establishing the first modern public water supply system on the foundations of the city's historical Roman, Austrian and Ottoman waterworks. It also looks at the Topčider River as the most telling example of degradation of a culturally and historically significant urban watercourse from its natural, pastoral and civic past to its current polluted and hazardous state. Could the restitution of the Topčider River be considered as a legacy of sustainability for future generations, and are there lessons to be learned from the urban history which can point to methods of contemporary water management?

Spatium International Review, no. 25, 2011

The paper explores the introduction and articulation of ideas and aesthetic practice of postmoder... more The paper explores the introduction and articulation of ideas and aesthetic practice of postmodernism in architecture of late socialism in Yugoslavia, with the focus on Belgrade architecture scene. Theoretical and methodological point of departure of this analysis is Jürgen Habermas's thesis of modernity as an incomplete, i.e., unfinished project, from his influential essay "Die Moderne: Ein unvollendetes Projekt" (1980). The thematic framework of the paper is shifted towards issues raised by Habermas which concern relations of cultural modernity and societal modernization, or rather towards consideration of architectural postmodernity in relation to the split between culture and society. The paper investigates architectural discourse which was profiled in Belgrade in 1980s, in a historical context of cultural modernity simultaneous with Habermas's text, but in different conditions of societal modernization of Yugoslav late socialism. In that, the principle methodological question concerns the interpretation of postmodern architecture as part of the new cultural production within the social restructuration of late and/or end of socialism as a system, that being analogous to Fredric Jameson's thesis of "Postmodernism, Or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism" (1984).

SAJ - Serbian Architectural Journal

The term or concept of realism seems to be recurring in recent theoretical inquiries, from debate... more The term or concept of realism seems to be recurring in recent theoretical inquiries, from debates in philosophy and aesthetics to those in theory and practice of architecture. Since 2000, the architectural discourse has been concerned with a wide range of related issues coming from its own post-critical debates on utopianism and realism and the possibility of an 'utopian realism', as suggested by Reinhold Martin (2005). The debates on realism resonate in the architectural theory anew as a reflection on the Manifesto of New Realism by the philosopher Maurizio Ferraris from 2011. The questions of realism vs. postmodernism, "new realism" on the ashes of post-modernism, critical and operative notions of realism and the like, have been asked both through practices of contemporary architecture and through reconsideration of the socialist realism in history and theory of architecture. The thematic issue of SAJ: Architecture Utopia Realism aims to further the ongoing disc...

Perspecta 41 The Yale Architecture Journal: “Grand Tour”, edited by Gabrielle Brainard, Rustam Mehta and Thomas Moran, 2008

Art-e-fact, an on-line magazine for contemporary art and culture. Thematic issue «Glocalogue», guest edited by Žarko Paić, Marina Gržinić and Zoran Erić, Dec 2005

Bauwelt (Berlin), 36-04, StadtBauwelt 163, Sep 23, 2004

Treći program br. 123-124, 2004

Planning Perspectives, 2019

Planning Perspectives Volume 35, Number 6, 2020, 2020

Architektura&Urbanizmus, 2017

Le Culture della Tecnica, 2016

Architectural Research Quarterly, 2013

arq: Architectural Research Quarterly, Volume 17, Issue 3-4, Dec 2013

The Journal of Architecture, vol. 18, no. 6, Dec 2013

Český lid: Etnologický časopis, 100 (3), 2013

Prostor, vol. 21, 1 [45], Jul 2013

Architektúra & urbanizmus: journal of architectural and town-planning theory, vol. 46, no. 3-4, Dec 2012

SPATIUM International Review, no. 28, 2012

Spatium International Review, no. 25, 2011

SAJ - Serbian Architectural Journal

Perspecta 41 The Yale Architecture Journal: “Grand Tour”, edited by Gabrielle Brainard, Rustam Mehta and Thomas Moran, 2008

Art-e-fact, an on-line magazine for contemporary art and culture. Thematic issue «Glocalogue», guest edited by Žarko Paić, Marina Gržinić and Zoran Erić, Dec 2005

Bauwelt (Berlin), 36-04, StadtBauwelt 163, Sep 23, 2004

Treći program br. 123-124, 2004

Architectural History, 2017

The Journal of Architecture, vol, 20, no. 2, Apr 2015

The Journal of Architecture, vol. 17, no. 5, Oct 2012

"Dobrović in Dubrovnik" traces the past and the present of avant-garde modern architecture constr... more "Dobrović in Dubrovnik" traces the past and the present of avant-garde modern architecture constructed in the nineteen- thirties, in the Mediterranean landscape of the south Dalmatian coast of the Adriatic Sea. Comprehensive historical, theoretical, and phenomenological readings of events and forms, in two essays by architects Krunoslav Ivanišin and Ljiljana Blagojević respectively, describe a specific yet, by its spirit, universal Venture in Modern Architecture. Spatially condensed to an area within ten square miles and temporally to less than ten years, these quintessentially modern villas, gardens, and hotels built seventy years ago by the architect Nikola Dobrović (1897– 1967), are presented through previously unpublished original design drawings, black and white photographs from the period of their construction, and the contemporary color photographs by Wolfgang Thaler. The color plates depict precisely the beauty in decay of heroic works of international modern architecture and convey admirably their meaningful Mediterranean resilience.

Modernism in Serbia is the first comprehensive account of an almost forgotten body of work that o... more Modernism in Serbia is the first comprehensive account of an almost forgotten body of work that once defined regional modernism at its best. The book reconstructs the story of Serbian modernism as a local history within a major movement and views the buildings designed in Belgrade in the 1920s and 1930s as part of a larger cultural phenomenon. Because so many of the buildings discussed are disintegrating or have been destroyed or altered beyond recognition, the book serves not only as a documentary and critical study but also as a preservation resource. Most of the photographs and plans have never been published outside of Serbia, if at all.

In restoring this work to its rightful place in the history of modern architecture, the book also sheds new light on a number of other stories. These include the influence of Le Corbusier and of the Yugoslav avant-garde movement Zenitism and the impact of international modern movements on the theoretical underpinnings of Serbian modernism. One of the subplots follows the story of the Group of Architects of the Modern Movement in Belgrade and its four founding members, Milan Zlokovic, Branislav Kojic, Jan Dubovy, and Dusan Babic. Through an examination of their work and that of other modern architects, most notably Dragisa Brasovan and Nikola Dobrovic, the book discusses the identity of Serbian modernism as it was established in the period from 1925 to 1940. The book also identifies those buildings that represent the purest examples of Serbian modernism and analyzes the qualities that make them quintessentially local forms while part of the larger modernist movement."

Grupa MEČ: Retrospektiva od 1975. do 1990. , 2019

Publikacija u izdanju Muzeja savremene umetnosti u Beogradu koja nudi teoretski osvrt na vreme po... more Publikacija u izdanju Muzeja savremene umetnosti u Beogradu koja nudi teoretski osvrt na vreme pojave Grupe MEČ, zatim na njene istorijske relacije, a takođe i osvrte na vreme osamdesetih godina dvadesetog veka.

Second World Postmodernisms: Architecture and Society under Late Socialism, ed. by V. Kulić, 2019

The chapter explores printed matter as agency of architectural discourse of postmodernism in Serb... more The chapter explores printed matter as agency of architectural discourse of postmodernism in Serbia (former Yugoslavia). Fairly consistent and rather dynamic architectural discourse of postmodernism, set against the grain of architecture production of socialist modernism, emerged in Belgrade from the mid-1960s from an intergenerational, heterogeneous, long, and discontinuous process of critique by research, theory, and design.

Lifting the Curtain, ed. by P. Bujas, I. Kovacevic, 2018

This chapter in Lifting the Curtain book looks at diverse types of alternative design practices a... more This chapter in Lifting the Curtain book looks at diverse types of alternative design practices and collectives that had emerged in Belgrade, Serbia, during the socialist era. I would argue that there were practices developing under political, ideological, economical or social constraints of the socialist period, that demonstrated alternatives in both architectural sense of the design itself and in the sense of professional practice diversity. In the recent two decades, deep research of ideas, networks and processes of the Cold War era’s bipolar world has started to show a great variety in practicing architecture on the other side of the Iron curtain, which were largely overlooked in previous research. I propose in this chapter, that the alternative practices largely anticipated the socialist system’s aftermath, that is, the ways of entrepreneurship, individual initiative and collaborations between public and private sectors.

French Artistic Culture and Interwar Central East Europe, ed. by: Tamara Bjažić Klarin, Ljiljana Kolešnik, 2017

The connections between French artistic, intellectual and architectural cultures, and architects ... more The connections between French artistic, intellectual and architectural cultures, and architects who were educated or practiced in Belgrade run both deep and wide over the twentieth century. This chapter outlines select nodes in the complex web of long-lasting relations, that comparatively show changed attitudes and practices in a diachronic perspective. I look into modern architectural discourse advanced by Belgrade architects exposed to the French architectural culture in which they participated in a number of different ways in the interwar period and, for purposes of comparing, advance the view into the 1960s. The aim is to pinpoint themes of research interest in a provisional map that comparatively charts several interpretative strategies of the French architectural culture. In that way, I would argue, we can start to discern certain thematic autonomies or, rather continuities of the professional and academic issues that cross over historical and ideological divides. The main research question, thus, concerns relation of differences of individual architects’ focus, circumstance or experience, and of common spirit of interpreting or transferring the experiences of the French urban culture. Rather than focusing on interwar examples of emulating the French Renaissance style in many Belgrade façades or, alternatively, on explicit Corbusianism in the post-war socialist modernist blocks across Serbia and the former Yugoslavia, in themselves and otherwise notable, I will search for cases that are argued to be connected thematically or in some other ways that are not immediately obvious. These are proposed as changing points of transference of a certain intellectual climate that is specific to the French culture and architectural discourse.

EWC Vol. 2, Re-Scaling the Environment New Landscapes of Design, 1960-1980, ed. by Ákos Moravánszky, Karl R. Kegler

In this chapter, I explore a particular case of architectural method and practice which is argued... more In this chapter, I explore a particular case of architectural method and practice which is argued to have been advanced in response to rising demands for industrialization of construction in conditions of relative economic and technological underdevelopment in 1960s Yugoslavia. In the current age of digital design and fabrication it may seem outdated to look back at changes in analog design methodology toward the industrialization of construction. Thus, rather than exploring the well-rehearsed narrative of a technology shift or its outcomes, I focus on the shift in what I propose to call architectural intelligence. The multiple meanings of “intelligence” apply for architectural intelligence also: the capacity for understanding, the action or fact of mentally apprehending knowledge of something, information, the mutual conveyance of information, the obtaining of information and the like

Urban Revolution Now: Henri Lefebvre in Social Research and Architecture, ed. by Christian Schmid, Łukasz Stanek and Ákos Moravánszky, 2014

CONTENTS Introduction: theory, not method - thinking with Lefebvre, Christian Schmid, Łukasz Sta... more CONTENTS
Introduction: theory, not method - thinking with Lefebvre, Christian Schmid, Łukasz Stanek and Ákos Moravánszky. Part I On Complete Urbanization: The trouble with Henri: from theory to research, Christian Schmid; During the urban revolution: ‘conjunctures’ on the streets of Dhaka, Elisa Bertuzzo; When Lefebvre meets the East nowadays: urban redevelopment in Hong Kong, Wing-Shing Tang; Henri Lefebvre and ‘colonization’: from reinterpretation to research, Stefan Kipfer and Kanishka Goonewardena. Part II Contradictions of Abstract Space: Plan Puebla Panamá: the violence of abstract space, Japhy Wilson; ‘Greater Paris’: urbanization but no urbanity: how Lefebvre predicted our metropolitan future, Jean-Pierre Garnier; The production of urban competitiveness: the modelling of 22@Barcelona, Greig Charnock and Ramon Ribera-Fumaz; Reconstructing New Orleans and the right to the city, Christine Boyer. Part III Everyday Architectures: Ground exploration: producing everyday life at the South Bank, 1948-1951, Nicholas Beech; The space of the square: a Lefebvrean archaeology of Budapest, Ákos Moravánszky; Architecture as assemblage of power(s): an inquiry into the spatial textures of post-socialist Sarajevo, Mejrema Zatrić; ‘In and through’ São Paulo: Lefebvre’s regressive-progressive method, Fraya Frehse. Part IV Urban Society and its Projects: Architectural project and the agency of representation: the case of Nowa Huta, Poland, Łukasz Stanek; The debate about Berlin Tempelhof Airport, or: a Lefebvrean critique of recent debates about affect in geography, Ulrich Best; Novi Beograd: reinventing Utopia, Ljiljana Blagojević; Lefebvrean vaguenesses: going beyond diversion in the production of new spaces, Jan Lilliendahl Larsen. Index.

Autogestion, or Henri Lefebvre in New Belgrade, ed. by Sabine Bitter and Helmut Weber, 2009

The artist book by Sabine Bitter and Helmut Weber is based on an unpublished orginal text by Fren... more The artist book by Sabine Bitter and Helmut Weber is based on an unpublished orginal text by French philosopher and urbanist Henri Lefebvre which is printed as a facsimile. This central text is contextualized and interpretated by accompanying commentaries and texts by Ljiljana Blagojevic, Zoran Eric, Klaus Ronnberger, and Neil Smith.

The text from Henri Lefebvre was submitted as part of a proposal with French architects Serge Renaudie and Pierre Guilbaud for the International Competition for the New Belgrade Urban Structure Improvement in 1986, sponsored by the state of Yugoslavia. In his urban vision for New Belgrade—the capital of former Yugoslavia founded in 1948—Lefebvre emphasizes the processes and potentials of self-organization of the people of any urban territory to counter the failed concepts of urban planning from above. For Lefebvre, at this late point in his life, the promises of both modernist capitalist as well as state socialist architecture and city planning had failed. Yet, Lefebvre viewed New Belgrade and Yugoslavia as having a particular position in what he has elsewhere called “the urban revolution.” As Lefebvre states, “because of self-management, a place is sketched between the citizen and the citadin, and Yugoslavia is today [1986] perhaps one of the rare countries to be able to pose the problem of a New Urban.”

Città dei Balcani, città d’Europa. Studi sullo sviluppo urbano delle capitali post-Ottomane, 1830-1923, ed. by di Dogo M., Pitassio A. , 2009

Nel secolo che corre dal Congresso di Vienna allo scoppio della I guerra mondiale l'assetto polit... more Nel secolo che corre dal Congresso di Vienna allo scoppio della I guerra mondiale l'assetto politico della penisola balcanica conobbe una profonda trasformazione. Là dove si espandeva da secoli il dominio diretto o indiretto dell'Impero ottomano sorsero una mezza dozzina di stati indipendenti.
Le nuove élite politiche e intellettuali, influenzate dalla cultura laica dell'Europa illuministica e romantica, guardarono con ammirazione e invidia ai modelli di società e stato dell'Europa occidentale. La trasformazione ebbe come protagoniste le città, e in particolare le nuove capitali, che dovevano proporsi come modello fisico e culturale per tutto il paese, nonché come collettore “naturale” delle sue risorse. Nell'assumere un aspetto “moderno ed europeo”, le capitali balcaniche erano incoraggiate a disfarsi delle vestigia “ottomane e orientali” dal comune sentire urbanistico del tempo, che guardava agli avanzi del passato come a un intralcio al risanamento delle città.
I contributi a questo volume collettaneo trattano del rinnovamento ottocentesco di Atene, Belgrado, Sofia, Bucarest, Budapest (città non balcanica ma investita da processi analoghi a quelli in corso più a sud-est), e tematicamente spaziano dalla circolazione dei modelli urbanistici e architettonici al mutamento dei costumi e alla crescita economica e demografica nelle capitali ufficiali, senza trascurare i casi alternativi di città che capitali non ebbero a divenire.

Prilozi za istoriju MSU, ed. by D. Sretenović, 2016

Resume in English The Culture of Contemporaneity and the Architecture of the Museum of Contempora... more Resume in English
The Culture of Contemporaneity and the Architecture of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade
The chapter examines the architectural principles and conceptions engaged by the architects Ivan Antić and Ivanka Raspopović in their design of the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) in Belgrade, 1960-1965. The main research question regarding the design of the Museum and relations of its architecture to culture of contemporaneity of the period arises from the negative reception of the Museum’s abstract modernist form and its fluid internal space and exhibition arrangements, by politicians and artists alike. Following a brief account of the institutional and design stages, the analytical part of the chapter considers questions of architectural modularity, proportions and structuralist conception of the building. In comparative terms, these aspects are examined against a concurrent project for the Memorial Museum in Kragujevac, designed by the same architects in the year of the MCA opening, that is in 1965. In the sequel, the architectural aspects are interpreted through looking at the curatorial theory and practice by Miodrag B. Protić, the Museum’s founder and long term Director, and their reflection in spatial and formal terms. In parallel, theoretical arguments from the period as articulated by Matko Meštrović, one of the most astute art and social theorists in the former Yugoslavia of the time, serve to underline relevant issues of the culture of contemporaneity that can be recognized in the architecture of the Museum. Finally, the chapter concludes by a comparative reading of the Museum’s dynamic and open internal space and Adrian Forty's interpretations of foyer spaces of the Royal Festival Hall in London. The two respective public buildings’ interiors are deemed akin, not by their architectural or formal qualities, but, more importantly, by the social interaction they engender for the users in their everyday operation as public spaces.
Since 2008, however, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade remains closed. In total absence of its public and users, with its art collection stored in the National Bank’s vaults, the Museum is rendered invisible even if its carcass still looms over trees in the flat landscape of New Belgrade along the river Sava. Abandoned as one of the key material symbols of a condemned socio-political project which conceived and made it be, the Museum gradually disappears from public consciousness, as if a mirage and not a modern public building that it is.

Keywords:
Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade, Ivan Antić, Ivanka Raspopović, modernist architecture, proportion, architectural group form, spatial fluidity

Istorija umetnosti u Srbiji, XX vek. 3. tom. Moderna i modernizmi, 1878-1941., ed. by M. Šuvaković, 2014

Istorija umetnosti u Srbiji XX vek, tom 2. Realizmi i modernizmi oko hladnog rata, ed. by M. Šuvaković, 2012

Uticaj klimatskih promena na planiranje i projektovanje I, 2011

Istraživanja publikovana u ovoj monografiji realizovana su u okviru projekta "Istraživanje klimat... more Istraživanja publikovana u ovoj monografiji realizovana su u okviru projekta "Istraživanje klimatskih promena i njihovog uticaja na životnu sredinu: praćenje uticaja, adaptacija i ublažavanje" , koji finansira Ministarstvo za prosvetu i nauku Republike Srbije u okviru programa Integrisanih i interdisciplinarnih istraživanja za period 2011-2014. godine. Ključne reči: envajronmentalna istorija arhitekture, urbani pejzaž, zelena arhitektura, envajronmentalna estetika, ekološki održivo društvo, tehnološka održivost, ekološka održivost.

SAJ vol. VI, (2) 2014, 2014

Politika, 2022

Beograd gubi identitet, pretvoren je u toplotno ostrvo

Architecture of Deconstruction: Interviews, 2013

Promocija međunarodnog monografskog zbornika "VEČITO - Bogdan Bogdanović" održaće se 17. decembra... more Promocija međunarodnog monografskog zbornika "VEČITO - Bogdan Bogdanović" održaće se 17. decembra u Biblioteci grada Beograda (Rimska dvorana) sa početkom u 19h.
Zbornik donosi tekstove istoričara umetnosti, arhitekata, hroničara i esejista Bogdanovićevog stvaralaštva koji su sarađivali sa retrospektivnom izložbom povodom stogodišnjice Bogdanovićevog rođenja tokom dve prethodne godine i gostovanja u ukupno 13 gradova regiona. Izložba je premijerno bila postavljena tokom septembra i oktobra 2022. godine upravo u Biblioteci grada Beograda (Galerija Atrijum). Urednica zbornika je mr Mare Janakova Grujić, autorka pomenute izložbe. Na promociji će govoriti: prof. arh. Aleksandar Radojević, arh. dr Ljiljana Blagojević i arh. mr Marin Rajković. Voditelj promocije je arh. Srđan Gavrilović.

The lecture explores relations between modern architecture and vernacular culture in the South Ad... more The lecture explores relations between modern architecture and vernacular culture in the South Adriatic region of the former Yugoslavia, in today’s Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, and Croatia. The turn to vernacular as valuable heritage, architectural inspiration as well as technical knowhow, was largely related to the rise of tourism in the 1930s and its development in the region over the decades following WW2. Architectural use of vernacular materials and motives not only responded to the commercial demands for authenticity of tourist experience, but, as I would argue, it opened a way out of modernism’s own crisis and the growing criticism of its formalism, monotony, alienating coldness, and the like. I will ask if and in what ways, in parallel to professional and economic agendas, interpretative approaches to vernacular culture responded to changing political, that is, ideological narratives. In other words, can a study of architectural recasting of traditional building practices, materials and typologies lead to a better understanding of the politics of vernacular and its outcomes in today’s architecture.

Da li se pored tradicionalnih formi razgovora, kao što su intervjui arhitekata, predavanja, panel... more Da li se pored tradicionalnih formi razgovora, kao što su intervjui arhitekata, predavanja, paneli ili saopštavanja i diskusije na naučnim skupovima ili stručnim sastancima, dijalog o arhitekturi odvija kroz arhitektonsku kritiku, istoriju i teoriju?
Da li savremene tehnologije i platforme proširuju polje razgovora?
Kako se u javnosti podstiče utemeljen i slobodan dijalog o arhitekturi i koje nove ideje ili poglede na disciplinu takav razgovor može da pokrene?
Kako možemo razgovorom da mislimo o arhitekturi?

Vizura aperta 2019 JANJINA - LASTOVO NAPUŠTANJE - PRIHVAĆANJE

As in any an intelligence operation, design intelligence relies on gathering information and evid... more As in any an intelligence operation, design intelligence relies on gathering information and evidence, deciphering documents and codes, and deploying acquired knowledge cleverly in the right moment. Its sources are both internal to the design discipline and interdisciplinary. Its use, likewise, may be either internal to or mediatory between disciplines or circumstances, access to knowledge, technology, power and such.
Design intelligence makes possible shifts between disparate worlds: developed or developing, central or peripheral and mainstream or marginal, first or second or third worlds, North-South / West-East, and so forth. I propose to look specifically into operational, political and design intelligence deployed by the Belgrade architect Milan Zloković in finding an innovative method and practice of carrying out state-of-the-art system design for efficient low-budget and low-technology construction on sites located the towns of Prizren and Ulcinj, in the 1960s.

Muzej grada Beograda, Italijanski institut za kulturu i Izdavačka kuća Clio pozivaju vas na razgo... more Muzej grada Beograda, Italijanski institut za kulturu i Izdavačka kuća Clio
pozivaju vas na razgovor o knjizi

GRADOVI BALKANA, GRADOVI EVROPE
Studije o urbanom razvoju postosmanskih prestonica 1830-1923.

pozdravna reč
Zoran Hamović, glavni urednik IP Clio
Davide Skalmani, direktor Italijanskog instituta za kulturu u Beogradu

govore
Marko Dogo, istoričar / Tuija Katalan, istoričarka / Ljiljana Blagojević, arhitekta / Emanuela Kostantini, istoričarka / Katrin Orel, istoričarka / Milan Ristović, istoričar / Bojan Kovačević, arhitekta
moderiraju
Katarina Mitrović, istoričarka umetnosti i Bojan Mitrović, istoričar

četvrtak, 7. jun, 19 sati, Konak kneginje Ljubice (Kneza Sime Markovića 8, Beograd)

Ovim predavanjem o Novom Beogradu, u okviru programa obeležavanja pedesete godišnjice Splita 3, u... more Ovim predavanjem o Novom Beogradu, u okviru programa obeležavanja pedesete godišnjice Splita 3, upitaćemo koliko godina je tom nešto starijem poduhvatu modernog urbanizma socijalističke Jugoslavije? Koliko su bliske storije i istorije ovih dvaju modernih urbanih struktura, koje danas prolaze kroz procese strukturalnih promena jednako po dubini i na širokom planu, ali istovremeno doživljavaju i lokalnu i globalnu kritičku i kulturalnu reevaluaciju? Uz to, upitaćemo, koliko se novi gradovi 20. veka koji jesu nastali planskim nacrtima na čistom papiru, kakav su i Split 3 i Novi Beograd, mogu razumeti i tumačiti kao istorijski autonomni urbaniteti. Od kog momenta se računa njihov početak, godina nulta, kada je jasno da su oba neraskidivo istorijski povezana sa milenijumskim geopolitikama prostora gradova Splita odnosno Beograda. Da li se urbana istorija novih gradova koji su vršnjaci njihovih sredovečnih stanovnika na pragu trećeg doba tek pamti ili beleži od momenta kada je počelo građenje ili od kada se počelo misliti o gradu na tom određenom mestu?
Na spomen-ploči omladinskih radnih brigada u Novom Beogradu, ćiriličnim pismom je uklesano da je ovaj grad nastajao „svesno, planski i s ljubavlju“, počev od „jedanajestog Aprila hiljadu devetstočetrdeset osme“ [sic!], dakle, pre tačno 70 godina. Taj početak o kojem svedoči natpis na memorijalu vizuelno vrlo precizno beleži monumentalna uljana slika Bože Ilića „Sondiranje terena na Novom Beogradu” nastala u godini nultoj. Uprkos dokumentima naslikane odnosno u kamenu uklesane objave početka grada, a kako ću predavanjem predložiti, istorija u prostoru Novog Beograda počinje vekovima, a njegova urbana istorija decenijama ranije i to kroz traume ratova i nasilnih promena granica. Traumatični počeci Novog Beograda, tvrdićemo, i danas se jasno čitaju u njegovom prostoru upravo na linijama nespojivosti sa istorijskim gradovima Zemunom i Beogradom, između kojih je, kao jedna sasvim autonomna moderna struktura, postao gradom.

Predavanje će predstaviti kritičko razmatranje modernog urbanizma Novog Beograda, koje je formuli... more Predavanje će predstaviti kritičko razmatranje modernog urbanizma Novog Beograda, koje je formulisao francuski filozof Anri Lefevr (Henri Lefebvre), u saradnji sa arhitektima Serž Renodijem (Serge Renaudie) i Pijerom Gilboom (Pierre Guilbaud) 1986. godine, a u odnosu na njegovu teoriju “prava na grad”. Osnovni cilj predavanja je da se Lefevrova kritika modernog urbanizma i njegovi predlozi primene principa "prava na grad” u urbanističkom planiranju sagledaju u odnosu na noviju istoriju Novog Beograda i njegov savremeni razvoj.

Predavanje se bavi pitanjem arhitektonskog pisma kroz razmatranje izvora i procesa zapisivanja, č... more Predavanje se bavi pitanjem arhitektonskog pisma kroz razmatranje izvora i procesa zapisivanja, čitanja i arhitektonskog mišljenja koji za rezultat imaju arhitektonski tekst, dokumentarni zapis, analitički ili kritički ogled o arhitekturi, konačno, u tome, i kroz to pisanje, teorijski zapis. Uvidom u nekoliko primera arhitektonskog pisma moderne epohe – Le Corbusiera, Nikole Dobrovića i Bogdana Bogdanovića – ispitaćemo kako se putem zapisa konstruiše, za svakog autora specifična, mreža relacija između različitih epoha, vremena, konteksta i metoda discipline arhitekture, imenom teorija arhitekture. A kako čitanjem uočavamo, teorija o kojoj svedoče zapisi izabranih autora nije zatvoren sistem, niti je homogena, niti jednoznačna, već se može razumeti kao proces disciplinarnog preciziranja kroz pisanje, koje se menja u vremenu kroz odnos autora prema svetu, veku i arhitektonskom problemu samom.

Lectures: Le Corbusier and Serbia 20th March 2017, "Charles-Édouard Jeanneret’s Voyage to the Eas... more Lectures: Le Corbusier and Serbia
20th March 2017, "Charles-Édouard Jeanneret’s Voyage to the East: notes, drawings and photographs from Serbia"
27th March 2017, "Lessons Learned by Serbian Collaborateurs at Le Corbusier’s Parisian Atelier at 35 rue de Sèvres"

U predavanju na temu " zaborava " , odnosno " o zaboravu i zaboravljenima " , ispitivaću veze izm... more U predavanju na temu " zaborava " , odnosno " o zaboravu i zaboravljenima " , ispitivaću veze između arhitekture i amnezije. Predavanje će biti rečeno u formi unutrašnjeg dijaloga arhitekta između projekta i projiciranja, istorije, teorije i tumačenja. Govoreći kao arhitekt projektant, obrazovana u modernističkoj paradigmi novuma-a, ideala samo-referencijalnog početka, originalnog projekta, radikalnog raskida sa prošlim, postaviću pitanje koliko je amnezija važna u utvrđivanju arhitektovog vjeruju. Da li arhitektonsko projektovanje kao projiciranje novog, i novogradnje i prostornog uređenja, i obnove i rekonstrukcije, pretpostavlja amneziju? Da li se radi o totalnoj amneziji, ili o delimičnoj; koliko bljesaka sećanja je inkonsekventno? Da li je amnezija neophodni uslov arhitekture? Inverzno, govoreći kao arhitekt pisac, autodidakt u paradigmi kraja istorije, postaviću pitanja tumačenja upravo bljesaka sećanja koji su osnov teorije discipline arhitekture.

ASA, 2023

Razgovor vodila arhitekta dr Ljiljana Blagojević "Ovo je fundamentalni pogled na svet. Kaže da ka... more Razgovor vodila arhitekta dr Ljiljana Blagojević "Ovo je fundamentalni pogled na svet. Kaže da kada gradite jednu građevinu, ne možete to činiti izolovano, već svojim aktom morate popraviti svet oko nje, i unutar nje, tako da u širem pogledu svet na tom mestu postane koherentniji i celovitiji; ta građevina koju podižete zauzima svoje mesto u mreži prirode, onakva kakvom je vi načinite", rekao je svojevremeno britanski arhitekta Kristofer Aleksander. U zrelim godinama, beogradski arhitekta Mustafa Musić i danas stoji među stvaraocima koji neguju ideale Kristofera Aleksandera o potrebi da svojim delima poprave svet oko sebe.

NAGRADE ASOCIJACIJE SRPSKIH ARHITEKATA 2020. Strukovno udruženje arhitekata Asocijacija srpskih a... more NAGRADE ASOCIJACIJE SRPSKIH ARHITEKATA 2020. Strukovno udruženje arhitekata Asocijacija srpskih arhitekata tradicionalno dodeljuje godišnje nagrade arhitektima za životno delo i priznanja kompanijama i pojedincima. Ovogodišnje nagrade za životno delo nose imena velikana srpske arhitekture, teorije i istorije arhitekture: dr Milutina Borisavljevića i dr Zorana Manevića.
ODLUKA ŽIRIJA O DODELI NAGRADA ASOCIJACIJE SRPSKIH ARHITEKATA 2020. Na telefonskoj sednici održanoj oktobra 2020. godine, žiri Asocijacije srpskih arhitekata u sastavu: prof. arh. Aleksandar Radojević, predsednik žirija, arh. Slobodan Maldini, zastupnik Asocijacije srpskih arhitekata, arh. Mario Jobst, arh. Slobodan Dragović i prof. dr arh. Petar Arsić doneli su odluku o dodeli Velike nagrade Asocijacije srpskih arhitekata-ASA za životno delo: Nagrada "Dr Milutin Borisavljević" dodeljuje se dr arh. Ljiljani Blagojević, Nagrada "Dr Zoran Manević" dodeljuje se arh. Milošu Stankoviću.

Exhibit A: Exhibitions That Transformed Architecture, 1948–2000, by Eeva-Liisa Pelkonen, 2018

Summary of postmodernist architecture exhibitions in 1980s Belgrade, Serbia

Субота 9. април 2016. kulturni.dodatak@politika.rs

Gostovanje izložbe Originalno o Nikoli Dobroviću (bina 2017), u galeriji MMC Luka, Pula, Hrvatska... more Gostovanje izložbe Originalno o Nikoli Dobroviću (bina 2017), u galeriji MMC Luka, Pula, Hrvatska u okviru programa Dani arhitekture u Istri.

bina 2017 ORIGINALLY ON NIKOLA DOBROVIĆ: CONTEMPORARY ARCHITECTURE DRAWING GLOSSARY photographs M... more bina 2017 ORIGINALLY ON NIKOLA DOBROVIĆ: CONTEMPORARY ARCHITECTURE DRAWING GLOSSARY
photographs Milica Lopičić

У знак обележавања 50 година смрти архитекта Милана Злоковића, професора Универзитета у Београду ... more У знак обележавања 50 година смрти архитекта Милана Злоковића, професора Универзитета у Београду – Архитектонског факултета, поново се уверавамо у трајност и актуелност поука његовог уметничког, пројектантског, академског и научног рада. Вредности које његово дело носи за архитектуру и културу наше средине и региона бивше Југославије истакнуте су у многобројним научним и стручним радовима у последњих педесет година. Архитектонски факултет у Београду има нарочито важну улогу у очувању и промовисању вредности које је професор Милан Злоковић својим четрдесетогодишњим академским радом уградио у темеље савременог архитектонског образовања. Концепција свечаности обележавања 50 година од његове смрти представља стога прилику да се дело Милана Злоковића сагледа на свеж начин из више углова гледања, наиме из аспекта документационе изложбе као и из аспеката студентског рада, кроз говоре на Свечаној академији и записе у публикацији која се објављује поводом свечаности.

Exhibition of reproduced projects by the architect Ivan Leonidov from the collection of the Shchu... more Exhibition of reproduced projects by the architect Ivan Leonidov from the collection of the Shchusev State Museum of Architecture, Moscow, Russia. Ceremonial Hall, Faculty of Architecture, University of Belgrade, October 3-24, 2013

Zbornik rezimea, Program, 2024

dr Ljiljana Blagojević, dia ASPEKTI TEME „NAJLEPŠA FASADA“ U ARHITEKTURI I ISTORIOGRAFIJI Tema „n... more dr Ljiljana Blagojević, dia
ASPEKTI TEME „NAJLEPŠA FASADA“ U ARHITEKTURI I ISTORIOGRAFIJI
Tema „najlepša fasada” razmatra se kao projekat i kao predstava, odnosno, kao racionalna, tehnička stvar sa svojom unutrašnjom sadržinom, i kao pojava, vidljiva predstava, ogledalo projekta. Osnovno pitanje – da li se estetska kontemplacija vodi projektom ili predstavom – tiče se aspekata sagledavanja i izgleda fasade u arhitekturi i istoriografiji.

Description of the Conference Theme: Radević's architecture is a radical act of mediation. Risin... more Description of the Conference Theme:
Radević's architecture is a radical act of mediation. Rising to prominence in postwar Yugoslavia, her buildings speak on all scales, engaging geo-political and social complexities. Drawing from knowledge of materiality and vernacular traditions within her native Montenegro (formerly Yugoslavia), her work filters modernism's globalized forces through an intimate, place-based lens. Radević's civic spaces re-centered provincial knowledge and facilitated a socially-progressive public sphere within the Yugoslav socialist state. At age 29, Radević became the youngest and only woman to receive the national Yugoslavian Borba Award for Architecture in 1968 for her design of Hotel Podgorica. Prominent projects such as the Podgorica Bus Terminal, Petrovac Apartment Building, and Monument to Fallen Fighters express Radević's commitment to generating a symbiosis between civic engagement and landscape design through the use of local building materials, bold forms, and generous proportions. Radević articulated her own cross-cultural practice, working simultaneously between the United States, Japan, France, Russia, and Yugoslavia, where she eventually returned for the remainder of her career.

Several new insights into life and work of architect Nikola Dobrovic, 1897-1967.

Knjiga apstrakta - Book of abstracts, 2017

Naučni skup posvećen arhitektu Nikoli Dobroviću

Ovaj prilog pulskom skupu «ruševina/memorija/obnova» ne prati akademske obrasce, sa jasnom name... more Ovaj prilog pulskom skupu «ruševina/memorija/obnova» ne prati akademske obrasce, sa jasnom namerom i ciljem da pokrene, ako ne polemiku, onda kritiku, makar samog priloga ako ne njegovog sadržaja, a u čast arhitekti čiji je život i rad uvek i iznova bio kritika svega i sebe samog i kojem je posvećena izložba crteža koja gostuje u Puli na Danima arhitekture Istre. Arhitekt Nikola Dobrović (1897, Pécs– 1967, Beograd), i za života i danas, pedeset godina mrtav, kao i njegovo arhitektonsko delo, razrušeno, oronulo, ubuđalo, gde god da je bilo izgrađeno – u Beogradu, Pragu, Dubrovniku, Igalu, Lopudu – teret je sa kojim se teško nose i akademska i politička i društvena javnost. Dobrović je bio, kažu njegovi savremenici, intransigentna ličnost. Još su intrasingentnije njegove kuće. Stoje, jedva, ali i dalje prkose.
Sopstvenici tih nominalno zaštićenih spomenika kulture, što ih oni koji ih štite nisu u stanju da održavaju, opterećeni su ovim neupotrebljivim, neisplativim, neprodavljivim nekretninama, kao da su toxic assets. Ili se nekako ipak koriste, tako što neka njegova kuća uklanjanjem betonskih potesa postaje šik hotel, nekadašnji moderni hotel oguljen do betona postaje nužni smeštaj bednih radnika koji postavljaju kamen na drugi hotel, generalni štab vojske gigantski skeletni okvir za billboard sponzora proizvodnje i trgovine oružjem. Kako ranih 2000-ih rekoše, slikajući se ispred Dobrovićevog Generalštaba za TV privid demokratije postsocijalističkih političkih kampanja, dva kandidata za beogradskog gradonačelnika, parafraziram, te ruine komunističkog doba su za rušenje, a na njihovom mestu biće izgrađeni sjajni moderni hoteli, tada, ili u skorije doba, spomenik utemeljitelju države iz srednjeg veka – figurativni. Ipak, kada sam prošle godine iseljavala kancelariju na čijem zidu je tada kao vlasništvo institucije u kojoj sam radila ostala da visi akvarelisana perspektiva beogradske zgrade PRIZAD – konkursna skica rađena 1937. u Dubrovniku sa idejom fasade obložene bunjastim kamenim rasterom, insprisana dubrovačkim zidinama, a ostvarena tek nekih dvadeset godina kasnije u Beogradu – jedina prava dragocenost u mom posedu u toj sobi bila je upravo jedna bunja ivanjičkog kamena skinuta sa bombardovanog Generalštaba. Original, neprocenjivi. Odbacujući teret, predala sam bunju u amanet studentu koji mi je svojevremeno pomogao da je u sobu unesem.
Neprocenjivi Dobrović, dakle, ili teret?

The paper explores architectural design methods and related tools of drawing in research of histo... more The paper explores architectural design methods and related tools of drawing in research of historical cases and interpretation of architecture theory by a new generation of digital design trained architects and students from the University of Belgrade (Serbia), University of Zagreb (Croatia), ETH Zurich (Switzerland) and RWTH Aachen (Germany). The object of study is modern architecture in the Mediterranean, and the historical cases are two summer houses designed by the architect Nikola Dobrović (1897, Pécs– 1967, Belgrade), on the island of Lopud in the Adriatic: Villa Vesna, designed in 1937 and constructed in 1939, and the unrealized design for the architect’s own house from 1965, for the site by the sea shore in the intermediate vicinity of the first house. The paper is based on archival and photographic documentation and sources that were studied and interpreted in the process of conceiving and executing the architectural drawings exhibition “Originally on Nikola Dobrović: Contemporary Architecture Drawing Glossary”, held in the gallery of the Cultural Centre of Belgrade as part of the Belgrade International Week of Architecture, BINA 2017. The paper addresses issues related to, consequences and effects of using architect’s tool of drawing analysis and digital drawing techniques in history and theory research and design theory.
We will open with a glossary of terms theorized by Dobrović in 1950s and 1960s in his text books Contemporary Architecture, volumes 1-5, as interpreted sixty odd years later by M. Arch. students in the elective course work “Contemporary Architecture Theories” through analytical drawings of Dobrović’s modernist architecture. The two – glossary and drawings – formed the basis for a series of international workshops on architectural drawing and on exhibiting architectural drawing. The main discussion focuses on 15 detailed analytical drawings produced by digital means, that came through the workshops. Drawings present the outcome of a convoluted process of teaching and learning by delving into and demystification of Dobrović’s technique of building and design, through detailed re-projecting the meaning of chosen notions such as “stich”, “volume”, “trace”, “water”, “level”, “landscape”, “Mediterranean”, “lightness”, “heaviness” and “textile”. Study focused on construction details and joints of materials and functions, whereby the existing villa served as a manual for construction drawings of the unbuilt house next to it. Considered equal, the built and the unbuilt were studied in parallel as contemporaneous to each other, despite a 30-year gap between the two projects, aiming to extract from the historical cases the theoretical notions that are usable for current design preoccupations. In conclusion, we will discuss issues of exhibiting and public, that is, lay perception of architectural drawings, executed and presented not as actual project drawings but as artwork in a gallery. How abstract are concrete construction details when drawn as part of an art project; is the drawing a medium that allows both abstract projection of the lay beholder and concrete projection of the trained eye; finally, could it be argued that the building lays in the eyes of the drawing’s beholder?

Plenary Session - High Level Discussion Panel Social Cohesion and Equity: inclusive cities, socio... more Plenary Session - High Level Discussion Panel
Social Cohesion and Equity: inclusive cities, socio-economic equity, migration and refugees in urban areas, culture and heritage

This paper examines correlations of architectural culture in Serbia with modern ideas of the twen... more This paper examines correlations of architectural culture in Serbia with modern ideas of the twentieth century that were engendered through engagement with concepts originated by Le Corbusier.

My lecture argues for lateral thinking of affordable housing in architectural and urban design, w... more My lecture argues for lateral thinking of affordable housing in architectural and urban design, which overcomes the dominant modernist concept of 'Existenzminimum'. The concept of 'Existenzminimum' directly relates to the architectural design of the minimum dwelling, as formulated by avant-garde architects of the 'Neue Sachlichkeit' and discussed at the CIAM II in Frankfurt 1929. Socio-political ideals and practices of the avant-garde, modern movement and post-Second World War socialist modernisms take the concept of the minimum dwelling or 'Die Wohnung für Existenzminimum', as one of the principal points of departure in the design of affordable housing and the modern city.
Study of post-war housing cultures in modern towns and cities of Central and Eastern Europe, such as New Belgrade in the socialist Yugoslavia, points to potentialities of the original concept. I would contend that 'Existenzminimum' was architecturally and spatially presupposed on the idea of extension of the minimum dwelling into the social space of the city or natural space of the landscape. Architectural re-imagining of such notion of extension today means thinking towards the alternative concept of maximum habitation which considers socio-spatial sustainability, by appreciating landscape and, where applicable, waterscape qualities of modern cities and understanding relations between formal and informal spatiality.

Yugoslavia Architecture and Cities (1945-91), recent studies

Investigating and Writing Architectural History: Subjects, Methodologies and Frontiers, Papers from the Third EAHN International Meeting, edited by Michaella Rosso, 2014

The paper explores the emergence of architectural postmodernism in Belgrade (Serbia) and its sour... more The paper explores the emergence of architectural postmodernism in Belgrade (Serbia) and its sources, that is to say, the web of different socio-political, artistic and intellectual tributaries to the new architectural outlook. The focus on ‘sources’ terminologically and methodologically relates to the classic formulation of Nikolaus Pevsner’s book The Sources of Modern Architecture and Design from 1968. If, according to Pevsner, printing and clocking-in or, rather, mass communication and mass production sourced the aesthetic production he wrote about, which were the streams that bespoke a river and the basin beyond modern architecture and design, that we want to explore in this particular conference session on postmodernism in late socialism? I will examine several timelines which I argue to be indicative of profound changes that effected the emergence of postmodernism in Belgrade architecture: socio-economic, discursive and aesthetic. The paper will focus specifically on the architectural discourse which culminated in 1980s with a series of translations of key texts by Christian Norberg-Schulz, Robert Venturi and Charles Jencks, and exhibitions and events in Belgrade galleries, such as Group of architects MEČ show at the Student Cultural Centre (1980), and a series of collective exhibitions held at Salon of the Museum of Contemporary Art, namely Solar Architecture (1980), Earth Architecture (1981) and Water Architecture (1983). The paper asks how at that time of economic stagnation and socio-political disillusionment, uncertainty about the future and imminent crisis of the socialist system as a whole, the architectural discourse of postmodernism emerged and detached itself from realities of economy, construction, technology and production, and transferred into domain of arts and culture.

International Scientific Conference & XXIV Meeting of Serbian Surveyors: Professional Practice and Education in Geodesy and Related Fields. Proceedings

The paper explores teaching methodology at graduate-level architecture university education, aimi... more The paper explores teaching methodology at graduate-level architecture university education, aiming at mediating the post-industrial city issues and realities through the architectural and urban design studio teaching process. Explored specifically are innovative curricula addressing emerging trends in redevelopment, such as creation of new mixed-use neighborhoods on brownfield sites, formerly used for transportation infrastructure. Examined, also, are site environmental issues, such as the climate change and subsequent problems of tidal rise, as well as study of stormwater quality treatments and the feasibility of constructing floodplains or riparian edges as a public amenity and valuable habitat. The paper presents two case studies based on the direct practical experience in teaching urbanism studio as a visiting professor at Yale University School of Architecture in 2009-10.

When contemplating the future of cities, are we not, at the same time, critically considering its... more When contemplating the future of cities, are we not, at the same time, critically considering its present as well as its past? And, to the extent that the focus of our vision is a modern city, how do we see the future of the city such as New Belgrade, which itself is a modern, functional city, planned and constructed in the socialist Yugoslavia in the second half of the twentieth century? Furthermore, having in view the recent change of paradigms, i.e. the break-up of the former Federation, the change of socio-political conditions and the consequent change of the concept of modernity, the fascination with the future may well benefit from closer inspection of the vacillating narrative of modernity and strategies of modernism, as they have been unfolding in the planning and construction of New Belgrade.
It could be argued that the principal failure of New Belgrade is its functional incapacity, more precisely, its failure to develop as a complex spatio-urban structure of multiple functions, which has consequently put strain on the social life and movement of the community. The issue of re-functionalisation, thus, predictably becomes central in the contemporary discussion on the future of New Belgrade. Yet, could we propose that, paradoxically, the main resource of New Belgrade is that it is dysfunctional, and that its main potential for the contemporary re- functionalisation is that it is an "unfinished" modernist project?
The most obvious questions which could be posed with regard to this are: How will re-functionalisation deal with the concept of the modern city?; What new/contemporary strategies of conquering the modernist open/empty space can be invented?; What impact will the new development exert on the open plan of the modern city? And, perhaps, most importantly, what new concepts are investigated and set for what is actually being designed and constructed? But, instead of generating critical concepts, New Belgrade is facing the crisis of non-concept. This being the case, would we not come to a better understanding of the contemporary situation if we were to propose that the issue of re-functionalisation calls for an invention of new and alternative strategies of modernisation, albeit those critical of the original modernist concept.

Petar Bojanić, ur. Glas i pismo: Žak Derida u odjecima. Zbornik radova sa naučnog skupa, 2005

Naslov ovog priloga skupu o Jacquesu Derridi koji sam upravo proèitala, potpuno je drugaèiji od o... more Naslov ovog priloga skupu o Jacquesu Derridi koji sam upravo proèitala, potpuno je drugaèiji od onoga koji sam u prvi mah prijavila organizatorima i od onoga koji je štampan u programu skupa. 1 Ne pokazuje li ta nestabilnost naslova, veae na samom poèetku ovog saopštenja, potrebu da se postavi ograda arhitekta oko uèešaea na skupu posveaeenom jednom filozofu? Iskljuèujuaei se ovim, konaènim naslovom iz govora o filozofiji i prihvatajuaei da govorim o arhitekturi, postavljam polazište ovog priloga upravo na pitanje arhitektonskog problema tog govora. Uz pretpostavku ove korisne skepse, postaviaeu stoga pitanje, ne šta je to dekonstruktivistièka arhitektura, veae šta je to što u arhitekturi omoguaeava da vidimo problem dekonstrukcije. * Kada je 1932. godine, zajedno sa Henry-Russell Hitchcockom, u Muzeju moderne umetnosti u New Yorku, postavio internacionalnu izlo bu "Moderna arhitektura" (Modern architecture: International exhibition), arhitekt Philip Johnson nije mogao niti pretpostaviti da aee nekih šezdeset godina kasnije, na istom tom mestu, jednom novom izlo bom, ponovo, iako na sasvim drugaèiji naèin, pozvati na kritièko mišljenje kanona modernizma. Govorim, naravno, o izlo bi sa naslovom "Dekonstruktivistièka arhitektura" (Deconstructivist Architecture), koju je osamdesetdvogodišnji Johnson kao direktor i gostujuaei kurator, zajedno sa pedesetak godina mlaðim pomoaenim kuratorom, Markom Wigleyem, postavio 1988. godine u njujorškom Muzeju moderne umetnosti. Ove dve izlo be arhitekture, zapravo, obele avaju dve linije ili dva kraja kritièkog diskursa moderne arhitekture, s tim što ona ranija prevodi i time kanonizuje i institucionalizuje modernu, a ona kasnija je izmešta, transformiše, dekanonizuje, dekonfiguriše i deinstitucionalizuje. 1 Inicijalni naslov "Modernost i dekonstrukcija" prijavljen je organizatoru u poruci, poslatoj elektronskom poštom, kojom sam potvrdila interesovanje da uèestvujem na skupu. Naslov je, potom, promenjen u "Nezavršena kula i eksplozija folie: dekonstruktivistièka arhitektura", kako je i štampano u programu skupa. (Citate u tekstu prevela Lj. B.)

A decade ago, the international exhibit Cold War Modern: Design 1945-1975 (London 2007 attempted ... more A decade ago, the international exhibit Cold War Modern: Design 1945-1975 (London 2007 attempted possibly for the first time a wide assessment of the impact that the Cold War had on design culture, opening up new paths of inquiry for architectural historians. Since then, a multitude of studies have contributed to enriching the historiography of the Cold War, engaging new fields and addressing the topic through a plurality of disciplinary perspectives.

ZBORNIK APSTRAKTA KONFERENCIJE

INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC THEMATIC CONFERENCE, EAHN 2015

The term or concept of realism seems to be a recurring theme of the more recent theoretical inqui... more The term or concept of realism seems to be a recurring theme of the more recent theoretical inquiries, from debates in philosophy and aesthetics to those in theory and practice of architecture. In parallel, there is also the question of the real, such as the ‘return of the real’ discussed by Hal Foster or the ‘passion for the real’ introduced by the philosopher Alain Badiou as key to understanding the 20th century. Since 2000, the architectural discourse is concerned with the wide range of related issues coming from its own post-critical debates on utopianism and realism and the possibility of an ‘utopian realism’, as suggested by Reinhold Martin. The debates on realism resonate in the architectural theory anew as a reflection on the ‘Manifesto of New Realism’ by the philosopher Maurizio Ferraris from 2011. The questions of realism vs. postmodernism, ‘new realism’ on the ashes of post-modernism, critical and operative notions of realism and the like, have been asked both through practices of contemporary architecture and through consideration in history and theory of architecture.
The conference Architecture Utopia Realism aims to further the ongoing discussion on the relations of architecture with realism and utopia. In that sense, the speakers are invited to reflect on a polyvalent relations of practices and theory of avant-garde, modern and contemporary architecture to concepts and issues, such as utopianism, realism, social realism, socialist realism, neo-realism, utopian realism, new realism and the like.

If postmodernism is indeed “the cultural logic of late capitalism,” why did typical postmodernist... more If postmodernism is indeed “the cultural logic of late capitalism,” why did typical postmodernist themes like ornament, color, history and identity find their application in the architecture of the communist-socialist Second World? How do we explain the retreat into paper architecture and theoretical discussion in societies still nominally devoted to socialist modernisation?

Exploring the intersection of two areas of growing scholarly interest-postmodernism and the architecture of the socialist and former-communist world-this edited collection stakes out new ground as the first work to chart the various transformations of second world architecture in the 1970s and 80s. Thirteen essays together explore the question of whether or not architectural postmodernism had a specific second world variant.

The collection ultimately aims to demonstrate both the unique nature of second world architectural phenomena, and also to assess connections with western postmodernism. The work comprises thirteen truly diverse case studies, covering not only the vast geographical scope of the former socialist world, but also a wealth of aesthetic, discursive and practical phenomena, interpreting architecture in the broader socio-political context of the last decades of the Cold War. The result should provide a greatly expanded map of recent architectural history, which redefines postmodernist architecture in a more theoretically comprehensive and global way.

Table of Contents

Introduction, Vladimir Kulic

Part I: Discourses
Chapter 1. The Retro Problem: Modernism and Postmodernism in the USSR, Richard Anderson
Chapter 2. Humanization of Living Environment and the Late Socialist Theory of Architecture, Maroš Krivý
Chapter 3. The Discontents of Socialist Modernity and the Return of the Ornament: The Tulip Debate and the Rise of Organic Architecture in Postwar Hungary, Virág Molnár
Chapter 4. An Architect's Library: Printed Matter and PO-MO Ideas in 1980s Belgrade, Ljiljana Blagojevic

Part II: Practices
Chapter 5. Bogdan Bogdanovic's Surrealist Postmodernism, Vladimir Kulic
Chapter 6. One Size Fits All: Appropriating Postmodernism in the Architecture of Late Socialist Poland, Lidia Klein and Alicja Gzowska
Chapter 7. Werewolves on Cattle Street: Estonian Collective Farms and Postmodern Architecture, Andres Kurg
Chapter 8. Incomplete Postmodernism: The Rise and Fall of Utopia in Cuba, Fredo Rivera
Chapter 9. Anti-Architectures of Self-Incurred Immaturity, Alla Vronskaya

Part III: Exchanges
Chapter 10. Cultural Feedback Loops of Late Socialism: Appropriation and Transformation of Postmodern tropes for Uran and Crystal in Ceská Lípa, Ana Miljacki
Chapter 11. Mobilities of Architecture in the Late Cold War: From Socialist Poland to Kuwait, and Back, Lukasz Stanek
Chapter 12.East-East Architectural Transfers and the Afterlife of Socialist Postmodernism in Japan, Max Hirsh
Chapter 13. Defining Reform: Postmodern Architecture in Post-Mao China, 1980-1989, Cole Roskam

Postscript
A Postmodernist International? Reinhold Martin