A GAZE FROM WITHIN
What does Pobednik see?
- What was he supposed to see, that is a better question. Society with a dream of prosperity. City that never came to exist.The supposed new capital of a new nation.
The site was chosen…
- A place for each citizen to feel like home.
A place with no history?!
- A place determined by weak soil, left blank, unbuilt; making the efforts of building a new city upon it even more heroic.
Or even more symbolic… So, a place with no history of settlements, than?
- But a great history of warfare…
Wasn’t monument of Pobednik erected to celebrate peace?
Holding a sword and a dove, It is a monument to all the wars and a monument to everlasting peace.
„Spatial images are dreams of society.” Sigfried Kracauer
The concept of gaze, as Lacan argues implies the projection of ones ‘identity’ on to an exterior object; condition where an individual observes “the observation of himself” in a mirror.
As one gazes over the river Sava, where the statue of Pobednik stands tall, spreads the landscape of skyscrapers floating in park. CIAM (Congrès International d’Architecture Moderne)manifesto reveiled to reality some would say. I once dreamt of skyscrapers. There was no city for them to dwel upon. There was no soil to support their height.
They were lost.
Like in one of the sequences from Philippe de Broca’s movie L’Homme de Rio, where Jean Paul Belmondo runs through Brazilia being built, the feeling of being anywhere and everywhere prevails.
And so it began…
‚Када овде буде стајао поносни нови БЕОГРАД подигнут свесно, плански и с љубављу, вољом и рукама трудбеника, омладине и народа нека ова плоча казује и подсећа
11.априла 1948. године после завршетка народно ослободилачке борбе завршене су припреме за почетак нове радне битке у борби за срећу и благостање народа.
Тога дана радни људи и омладина свих народа Југославије прегли су да подигну нови БЕОГРАД, да прошире вољени главни град државе равноправних народа
С ове стране Саве да учине већим и лепшим град из кога је комунистичка партија Југославије на челу са другом ТИТОМ повела устанак да новом градњом створе још један непролазни знамен победоносне ослободилачке борбе наших народа које води у социјализам маршал ТИТО у држави коју су градили сами народи.’
’One day when proud new BELGRADE is to be standing here, built knowingly, with plan and love, with will and hands of laborers, youth and people, let this plate show and remind:
On april 11th 1948. after national liberation struggle is won, the preparations for the start of new labor battles in the fight for happiness and prosperity of the people are completed.
On that day working people and youth of all nations of Yugoslavia joined forces to erect new BELGRADE, to extend the beloved capital of the state of equal nations.
To make the city bigger and better on this side of Sava river, the city where communist party of Yugoslavia headed by comrade Tito started the uprising towards building yet another eternal symbol of the victorious liberation struggle of our people, lead towards socialism by marshal TITO, in the country built by people themselves.’
Quote from the memorial plate that commemorates the beggining of construction of New Belgrade. The plate stands in the lobby of 9th Belgrade High School in New Belgrade
The actuality of this new capital is something rather different. In reference to Holleins statement ‘alles ist Architektur’*, if we are to mess with architecture, architecture is surely to mess with everything in return. Today, loud statements are made; New Belgrade is being systemically devastated by private and corporate, market driven logic, with an influence of postmodernism still active on a very superficial level. And what is a result of this?
French philosopher Henry Lefebvre states that every society, more precisely, every mode of production creates a specific space. This line of thought leads us inevitably to question ourselves what kind of space does our society create? …
Public space promised by modernistic concept of a high rise city floating in parks is replaced by malls and commercial space. The social space of a city is replaced by social space of networks. Lefebvre says ‘Pour changer la vie, il faut d’abord changer l’espace’** It seems that now and here, it is the other way around.
What is the future of New Belgrade?
New Belgrade is here to stay, this way or another. It is what it is. Buildings are being built, new streets are making their way through new neighborhoods, density rising. New Belgrade is inevitably fading as a concept, as an ideology. How are we to stop this? How are we to preserve New Belgrade as a modern city that actually never came to existence? But, isn’t it contradictory to the nature of Modernism to be treated as a monument? It needs life, and so it changes. Constantly. And it grows from within.
I once dreamt of skyscrapers. They were lost. As new BELGRADE is. Allthough New Belgrade still has a chance.
* ‘Everything is Architecture.’
**’In order to change life, one should first change the space.’
Lefebvre, Henri. Critique of Everyday Life. Volume III. (1981)
Kracauer,Sigfried. Strassen in Berlin und anderswo. Frankfurt 1964, p. 70
