Adam Marcus On Architecture and Other Things

This ongoing research project began as part of the William Kinne Memorial Graduate Traveling Fellowship, awarded by Columbia University GSAPP in 2005. The premise was to investigate the complex past and presence of modern architecture in the former Yugoslav nations of Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia & Montenegro, and Bosnia & Herzegovina. A research trip in the fall of 2005 throughout the region had two components. First, the itinerary included a kind of updated “Grand Tour” of the region’s seminal modernist works of the pre- and post-WWII periods—both vastly understudied yet fascinating topics (the former for its development of a modern aesthetic relatively isolated from yet parallel to that of Western Europe, and the latter for its unabashed embrace of modernism in contrast to the rest of the Soviet bloc). The simultaneous second component of the trip was a survey of the region’s vibrant contemporary scene of architectural production of the last fifteen years. The goal of the comparative approach was to map the resilient continuities of modernism despite incessant political, social, and economic tumult, of which the violent Balkan conflicts of the 1990s were only the latest in a long history of instability. If, as hypothesized, the prolific younger generation of architects is still invested in the rich legacy of Yugoslav modernism, how is this undeniable resurgence related to contemporary political and economic conditions in the region? What are the aspirations of this renewed modernism? What are its implications?

Travel included visits to all four national capitals (Ljubljana, Zagreb, Belgrade, and Sarajevo) as well as important modern landmarks throughout the rural areas. Sites included seminal buildings by Jože Plečnik, Edvard Ravnikar, Milan Zloković, and Nikola Dobrović. Interviews and meetings were held with established scholars, architects, as well as younger practictioners who came of age during the chaotic 1990s and have undertaken new forms of politically charged, activist design. Specific case studies included the work of Maechtig Vrhunc Arhitekti, Studio 3LHD, Bevk Perović Arhitekti, Sadar + Vuga, and Ofis.