In recent days, news and denials about the beginning of the demolition have been coming Belgrade Fair, and different information about General Staff, and at the same time, the leading ones announced themselves Slovenian professional institutions, with a declaration on the fate of these two buildings in Belgrade.
In May of last year, the Declaration on the Fate of the Belgrade Fair and the General Staff was also signed in Belgrade, as an appeal to the domestic professional public against the announced radical interventions on the architectural heritage. Now they are supported by colleagues from Slovenia, Gradnja portal writes.
"Due to the problem of endangering the exceptional urban and architectural achievements of our common architectural heritage of the area of the former Yugoslavia, as well as the consequent unenviable and unsustainable position in which the Serbian architectural profession found itself, we express unwavering professional and moral public support for the Declaration on the fate of the Belgrade Fair and the General Staff, which was signed by representatives of various professional organizations and institutions of the Republic of Serbia in Belgrade on May 17, 2024," reads the letter of support they sign. experts from different institutions.
Among them are experts from the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Ljubljana, the Faculty of Civil Engineering, Traffic Engineering and Architecture, the University of Maribor, the Chamber of Architecture and Spatial Planning of Slovenia, the Society of Architects of Ljubljana, the Museum of Architecture and Design and the Society of Slovenian Restorers.
The common heritage of Yugoslavia
They express their support for the declaration, as they state, not only from the point of view of well-founded expert facts, but also out of indignation over the announced inadmissible spatial interventions that would follow the unacceptable destruction of such a rich and priceless common heritage of the former Yugoslavia.
"The Belgrade Fair (1954-1957), designed by architect Milorad Pantović and engineers Milan Krstić and Branko Žeželj, as an urban unit with its public space and three interconnected exhibition halls - Halls 1, 2 and 3 - represents not only a spatial reach of international proportions, but also one of the most sincere testimonies of the technical, technological, scientific, cultural, creative and economic revival of the society of the former common state", it is stated in a letter of support.
As it is added, due to the harmonious urban conception and exceptional specific architectural-engineering solutions, the Belgrade Fair is counted among the most successful and valuable ranges not only of domestic, Western Balkan architecture, but also of European and world architecture of the 20th century.
"The complex of the State Secretariat for National Defense, i.e. the General Staff (1955-1965), as the last work from the oeuvre of one of the greatest Yugoslav architects, Nikola Dobrović, represents in the urban fabric of Belgrade a comprehensive urban-architectural intervention and a spatial phenomenon. The dominance and symmetry of the portal-like cascading volumes are followed by the freely developed other bodies of the complex, which, removed from the traffic roads, free up the space, but at the same time meaningfully close the corners of the city squares", he states. se.
Despite the partial damage to the ensemble of buildings due to the NATO bombing of Belgrade in 1999, the General Staff complex still represents not only an expressive urban dominant, but above all one of the most homogeneous spatial orchestrations of an architect of exceptional international importance, write experts from Slovenia.
As they add, in the light of increasingly frequent questions about the fate of many high-quality achievements of modernist architecture in the area of the former Yugoslavia, and at a time when sustainable renovation and adapted reuse of the existing building fund are increasingly necessary for the planet and humanity in spatial planning, they advocate in the letter for the preservation and restoration of the Belgrade Fair and the General Staff as integral spatial achievements of our common, exceptional heritage of wider international importance.
What is written in the Declaration on the Fate of the Belgrade Fair and the General Staff?
The declaration sent by the expert community on the occasion of the announcement of the demolition of the Belgrade Fair and the redefinition of the premises of the General Staff demanded the cancellation of the existing one and the adoption of a new decision, which corresponds to the original decision of the Government of the Republic of Serbia on the declaration of the complex of the Belgrade Fair as a cultural monument as a whole, which would protect it from the demolition of Halls 2, 3 and 4, which are by all accounts a whole with Hall 1, and establish protection measures for the area of the Belgrade Fair as a whole.
It is requested that the ensemble of the General Staff and the Ministry of Defense be restored and rehabilitated in accordance with the already established measures for the protection of cultural property, which prescribe the restoration to its original state, as well as the preservation of its administrative and administrative purpose, and the higher degree of categorization of that architectural work into the status of a cultural property of exceptional importance for the Republic of Serbia.
The cancellation of all decisions, agreements, contracts and plans that are directly contrary to the Constitution, laws and binding acts of the State of Serbia was also requested.
Source: Construction
