HERITAGE OF INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION: AFRICAN AND ASIAN WORKS BY CROATIAN ARCHITECTS

The exhibition “Heritage of International Cooperation: African and Asian Works by Croatian Architects” will reopen in Zadar on September 7, 2021!

The activities of Croatian architects abroad have been, and continue to be, diverse in spatial and organizational terms. The selection of territories in African and Asian countries as areas of convergence is largely the result of the foreign policy of socialist Yugoslavia guided by the idea of non-alignment. At the same time, it represents a dynamic platform involving various actors in the construction market of young, newly emancipated nations, where architecture offers visions from its own perspectives for their expected sovereign development. The character of architectural practices emerging within this concept of the Third World is therefore highly heterogeneous. Economically speaking, the scale ranges from economically significant to entirely individual business and even migration endeavors. From the perspective of immediate work circumstances, there is a significant contrast in project execution location: some documentation is exported from Croatian offices, while others are developed based on years of work by international experts on-site.

Insight into relevant African and Asian works by Croatian architects is presented through ten displays encompassing spatially and thematically diverse thematic units. Certain displays are further illuminated through a library of published material, a collection of architectural drawings, and presentations of realized architecture in a contemporary context. The exhibition content also reflects the variability inherent in these modes of operation.

The exhibition opening and tour with the authors will take place on Tuesday, September 7, 2021, at 12:00 PM at the National Museum Zadar.

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Exhibition Organizer: Bacači Sjenki Association

Partners in exhibition realization: National Museum Zadar, Faculty of Architecture, University of Zagreb, Society of Architects Zagreb, Mars Architecture

Curators and exhibition authors: Mojca Smode Cvitanović and Marina Smokvina

Mojca Smode Cvitanović, architect, is a postdoctoral researcher at the Faculty of Architecture, University of Zagreb (Department of Theory and History of Architecture, Department of Architectural Design). She is a collaborator on the scientific research project “Atlas of Croatian Architecture of the 20th Century,” focusing her research on knowledge transfer and international dissemination within the architectural profession.

Marina Smokvina is a practicing architect and independent researcher. She is the founder of Mars Architecture, whose design domain encompasses spatial situations of various purposes and scales. In her research, she explores the activities of Croatian architectural and urban practices in international relations.