The past ten days have been heavy with, as they say, important events, and historically important events related to architecture, the art most dear to all of us, i.e. technical discipline.
The first event, I can freely say, went beyond the confines of Montenegro, although some of my friends are still not aware of that fact, I'm afraid.
The evening of professor, urbanist, architect and theoretician of architecture, and graphic artist and painter, the late Ranko Radović, was held in Danilovgrad, in the ceremonial hall of the Municipal Assembly, on Thursday, October 6, organized by Matica Montenegrin and the Association of Architects of Cme Gora.
The invitation was not officially sent to the email address of Nezavisni dnevnik Vijesti, I even thought at one point that it was a meeting closed to the public, so I rushed to Danilovgrad, on the old road, next to the green river Zeta.
I did it partly out of respect for Professor Radović, whom I had the opportunity to listen to several times, but only once at the Faculty of Architecture in Belgrade, where he was completely in his element, in the dark year of 1991, just before his departure to Finland and , it will turn out, from the Faculty of Belgrade, partly due to the announced lecture by Ljiljana Blagojević, a historian and theorist of contemporary architecture and art from the Faculty of Architecture in Belgrade. history and theory of contemporary architecture on the topic: "Ranko Radović: professor, urban planner, architect and theoretician of architecture", and partly, I must admit, also because of that incredible residential building at the turn for Spuž that I don't fail to verify, whenever I have the opportunity, ie when the road takes me to those parts.
Professor Blagojević actually read her text with the mentioned title that evening in Danilovgrad. The following is, for the sake of illustration, a short insert from that text, which, in the integral version, I recorded on a dictaphone, for the sake of history:
In the same year, 1966, in the magazine Arhitektura i urbanizam, Radović's project for the Memorial House at Tjentište, dedicated to the Battle of Sutjeska, was presented. Because of its very specific architectural character, which is in a special, synergistic collaboration with Krsto Hegedušić's frescoes in the interior. The memories of the house on Tjentište represent one of the most intriguing memorials dedicated to the Dear World War, in the area of the former Yugoslavia.
He was a young, thirty-one-year-old architect at the time, when in the text about the Memorial House project he set forth a deeply thought-out, universal attitude about architecture.
Conceived through a conscious rethinking of the modernist paradigm, in relation to nature, the natural environment and the cultural-historical context, the house is characterized by a concrete construction, which is modern in construction, composition and form.
At the same time, it is a multi-coded architecture. From orderliness in the spirit of Japanese aesthetics and privileging the tactility of the natural material of concrete, to the reference to vernacular log cabin architecture from the region, and the modern transpotation of regional tradition in the spirit of the Finnish architectural paradigm, but also present references to the Enlightenment era and MarcAntoine Laugier's concept of a primitive hut , about which he spoke very often in his lectures.
Radović very consciously constructs this complexity in this object, his first realized work, and at the very beginning of his career.
He was a young, thirty-one-year-old architect at the time, when in the text about the Memorial House project he set forth a deeply thought-out, universal attitude about architecture.
I quote:
He could not pass by the authentic spirit of the climate, the inspiration of the ethical and material realities of the world of cruelty and purity. Nationally.
If I am not mistaken, and I would bet that I am not mistaken, Professor Blagojević's text is the first serious, i.e., academic text about a whole series of extremely important aspects of Professor Radović's activities, and I am therefore extremely happy that this text, if the announcements are to be believed, will soon be published by sides of Matica Montenegrin, so all of us, who hold Ranko Radović's work close to our hearts, will have the opportunity to thoroughly read it.
As I said, I listened to Professor Radović only once at the Faculty of Architecture in Belgrade. The topic of the lecture was Bule and Ledu (ClaudeNicolas Ledoux & EtienneLouis Boullee), representatives of the so-called of French revolutionary/visionary neoclassicism, but on that occasion, while I was listening to but also watching something that bordered on a kind of performance - almost in the form of standup comedy - with peaks that related to explicit-lasciful connotations related to Ledu's Ikema (Oikema) once for was always struck by that Radovician, inimitable spirit - which, above all and from this perspective, was reflected in his need to directly transcend architecture, as a comprehensive human activity. Professor Blagojević's text is the dear side of that medal, if we understand each other - but about that after the text is published.
OK, that's all about the Danilovgrad episode.
A dear event, immensely important in the context of the emancipation of the Montenegrin architectural scene, was the opening of the exhibition of all the works, I emphasize: all the works from the international, general, one-stage and anonymous Competition for the conceptual architectural-urban solution of the hotel and tourism facilities in the scope of the State Study of the location "Old Town Ulcinj". sector 63.
The theme of the competition, I remind you, was the hotel complex on Cape Ratislava, on the site of the former Hotel Jadran, which was demolished after the earthquake that hit Cma Gora in 1979.
The theme of the competition, I remind you, was the hotel complex on Cape Ratislava, on the site of the former Hotel Jadran, which was demolished after the earthquake that hit Cma Gora in 1979.
The opening of the exhibition itself would not be epoch-making news if, for the first time in the last 9 and a half years, as long as I have been following events on the architectural scene in Montenegro, a public discussion regarding the competition was not organized after the opening of the exhibition, in the presence of the jury, all the authors of the awarded works and some of the authors of unrewarded works, and of course people from the profession, and citizens, which is, I hope you will agree, epoch-making news.
And what can I tell you, Professor Dimitrije Mita Mladenović, president of the jury. and members of the jury: Sanja Mitrović Lješković, Sahret Hajdarpašić, Dragan Marković and Budislava Kuč, as well as Mr. Novak Durutović, the authorized representative of the German-Montenegro consortium "Star of Montenegro", a consortium that has been trying to start the construction of a hotel complex of the highest category on Cape Ratislava for 12 years. I emphasize: publicly! came forward to defend their decision on competition awards.
After the discussion, I hope it was clear to all those present that the jury judged impartially, taking into account extremely complex inputs, and that the decision on the awards was made after a thorough, careful and comprehensive analysis of each of the proposals in turn.
Discussions of this type are, in short, an indispensable institution of the crown, if you will, in the process of solving urban-architectural problems through the organization of competitions.
I still can't believe that a public discussion happened, man! I still haven't fully come to my senses and I hope that this is a precedent that binds all organizers of future urban and architectural competitions on the territory of Cme Gora, as well as all future juries.
Discussions of this type are, in short, an indispensable institution of the crown, if you will, in the process of solving urban-architectural problems through the organization of competitions.
"All people know everything," as Mr. Durutović said.
Not to mention that from Igor Vujačić, the secretary of the jury, I received all the competition works, in an integral version, without any problems, so the analysis of some of those works, especially of the first prize winner, will follow in this place, as soon as I regain consciousness.
In the meantime, directly from the author, I also received an integral version of one of the non-awarded works from the Cetinje competition for Artists' Square, the authors are a young architect and a young architect, and what can I tell you, that work is exactly what I had in mind last Sunday, when I wrote those few sentences about the reconstruction of the mentioned square.
This paper functions excellently in the most important segment in accurately assessing the real situation in our capital, but more on that in the next issue.
Bonus video:
