URBOGLYFS: CITY MULTIPLICATION – OPEN OFFICE – KVATERNIK SQUARE (April 9th and 10th)

Building on a twenty-year practice of engaging with the city, its material and immaterial heritage, spatial reading, and citizen education on the resourcefulness of shared spaces, Shadow Casters have been conducting a project titled “Urboglyphs: City Multiplication” for several months.

“Urboglyphs” is a research program conducted in the form of lectures, workshops, and cinema screenings held on weekends in the Matko Laginja Neighborhood Council, Ribnjak Youth Center, Prince Zdeslav Park, Eugen Kvaternik Square, King Petar Krešimir IV Square, Noble Square, and several micro-locations in the lower city in Laginja and Martićeva Street in agreement with the co-owners. The aim of this project is to collectively rediscover the urban identity of neighborhoods based on raising awareness of the context of coexistence and community, as well as the resource potential of the given space.

During the project, we have decided to set up Open Offices at several locations for five days to contemplate the city and its changing identities with the citizens themselves in situ.

The first Open Office of the “Urboglyphs: City Multiplication” project will take place on April 9th and 10th at Kvaternik Square.

During this Open Office, we will be ready to engage in discussions with citizens about the quality of space at Kvaternik Square as one of the main transportation hubs in the city, a place of diverse activities, and a transportation hub for many suburban and urban settlements, “Franjo Tuđman” Airport, and shopping centers on the city outskirts.

Through Open Offices, we also test and improve the entire “Urboglyph” program directly with citizens, organize and promote the project, and collect stories that we will incorporate into further thematic events, as well as all other project activities. These offices thus become “mobile interpretative centers” of the neighborhood and meeting places. The goal of setting up open offices is to raise awareness of the daily life of the neighborhood as a resourceful and useful tool for considering the well-being of the local community. We will do this by collecting urboglyphs, symbolic and spatial accumulations, signs, and meanings that arise from events being inscribed into the place itself. By collecting statements and testimonies from both accidental and intentional passersby, we collectively explore the character of the city and discover its resourcefulness.

About Shadow Casters

Project Support: City of Zagreb

Support for Shadow Casters: National Foundation for Civil Society Development, Culture Nova Foundation, Croatian Audiovisual Center